There’s probably a good number of you reading this solely because of this headline, but stay with me, people: There is a connection to link building.

Earlier this month, I went to the Chick-fi-la Leadercast where Tim Tebow was one of the speakers. As he was talking about his football past and how he views leadership, it occurred to me how downright amazing he would be at link building and SEO in general.

“Timmy!” I wanted to shout from my seat. “Quit football and come do SEO for me instead!” I don’t think it would have gone over well.

Sadly, Tim Tebow will never become an SEO, but he did say some pretty remarkable things during the Leadercast that apply to what we should do every single day.

“If You Don’t Love It, It’s Going To Be Hard To Do It Every Day”

You could say a lot of bad about the SEO industry — in fact, a lot of people have — but you can never say we don’t love what we do. I have never met an (ethical) SEO who isn’t deeply passionate about it.

They have to be because it’s a time-consuming and frustrating job to do, especially the link building side of it. There’s no way around that. And if you don’t love it, you better learn to or just get out now.

“I Just Try To Be Real & Authentic”

Automated link building is not a long-term growth strategy. Neither is sending the same “Can you link to me?” email to hundreds of prospects. The best link builders are real and authentic.

Yes, link building is about the getting links to your websites, but to be successful, your focus should be on building the relationship not the link. How do you do that? Here are two key ways:

• Send personalized emails: I don’t think we can harp on this enough. If you want to increase your response rate, write an email worth responding to. You can do these with some standardization, though, with Gmail’s Canned Responses. I have saved email templates for guest blogging, broken link building, content promotion, and resource listings that I then build off with personalization for each source.

• Follow up: Once you actually get your link placed, the relationship isn’t over. In fact, you’ve really just had your first date. Follow up with them. Thank them for including your guest blog post or your website as a resource. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to get another link from them in the future.

“Don’t Worry About What You Can’t Control”

There are no guarantees in SEO and link building, mainly because you’re forced to rely on someone or something else. And it’s hard for clients to understand that just because I reached out to 100 different sources, we’re not going to get links from those 100 different places.

While madly infuriating, it’s not worth your time to stress about it what you can’t control, like algorithm updates, the links themselves, or random changes in rankings.

Instead, focus on the things that you can control. Put out great content. Every. Single. Day. Build and maintain relationships. Internal link the bejesus out of your pages. Be creative.

“At The End Of The Day, It’s Just A Game”

There’s been a big to do about all of Google’s updates with the umpteenth version of Panda and now Penguin, and there are even more articles written about how you can recover from them. Algorithm updates are a fact of life, and you have to live with them, regardless if the outcome isn’t what you expected.

At the end of the day, it’s just an algorithm update. There’s nothing you can do to change it, so rub some dirt on it, walk it off, and figure out how you can better frame your link building to avoid updates in the future.

I don’t want to make light of an issue that is impacting livelihoods, but at the same time, there is a certain aspect the this current “unnatural links” meme that is just silly.

I think I realized we’d reached the tipping point when a client asked me why the links he had pointing to his main site from the 25 other sites he owned was unnatural, since after all, he owned all the sites and wouldn’t he thus naturally interlink them? And you know, even if they aren’t about the same subject matter, he had a valid point.

Removing those unnatural links isn't always easy

Isn’t ‘Unnatural’ In The Eye Of The Beholder?

Think about how many products there are manufactured by Proctor & Gamble. On grocery store shelves, every single one of those products, in the fine print on the packaging somewhere, it says Proctor & Gamble. And indeed, this is logical, and “natural”.

But on the Web, the rules change, and it’s all because of the signals that links throw off. Any given link can send off multiple signals depending on where it’s located, how often it appears, what it says, who it points to, how long it’s been there and on and on.

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, then unnatural links are in the eye of the algo.

Further complicating matters is the definition of “unnatural” as it pertains to off-site versus on-site.

If you sell Titanium Ball Bearings, I would naturally assume these words, as clickable links, ought to appear on your own site. It would be hard for them not to. But if those words appear as a clickable link on 275 blog rolls, something is not kosher. I’d go so far as to say if the words Titanium Ball Bearings appeared on 15 different blog rolls, something is fishy.

I’m going list some of the more obvious unnatural links, and include a few of the less obvious unnatural links. I hope you will comment below and add your own definitions well as examples.

As a preface, if there had never been a Google, never been a links based algorithm, and if the terms anchor text had never entered into SEO lexicon, my hunch is 75% of the links on the Web would say “click here”, 10% would say “read more”, and 14% would be company names and/or URLs.  The remaining 1% would say “buy Viagra”.

Since Google does exist, we will never know. I do know that the average Web user who does not work in a Web marketing related field hasn’t a clue what the signals are that impact search rank, meaning that this is all a very SEO centric subject.

15 Types Of Unnatural Links

Because I do not believe in absolutes (except that one), each of these below could have exceptions, and I can argue those exceptions all day, but in general, these below mean trouble. What are your thoughts?

1.  You have a link to your Atlanta based tanning salon site from an Alaska based Halibut fishing charter site. This is the classic unnatural link. When there is no plausible connection in subject matter or location between two websites, I think we can agree it didn’t happen by accident. And if anchor text is involved, it’s even worse.

The example I just provided does actually exist, but it would be unfair to categorize all Alaskan Halibut Fishing Charters that way, so here’s an example of a honest natural one: http://alaska-halibut-fishing-charters.com/halibut_links.html (I bet that fellow is wondering why he’s getting so much traffic today).

2.  On any interior page of your site, if the title tag of the page as well as the page’s main heading text is an exact keyword match for multiple anchor text links from other sites pointing to that exact page, it’s unnatural.

Caveat by example: A niche glossary, like this http://birding.about.com/od/birdingglossary/Birding_Glossary.htm. It’s titled as such, and linked to by other sites using the words Birding Glossary. This makes sense. It’s natural.

3.  The link says Orlando Limousines and it appears on 60 school newspaper websites, including one from Montana State Technical College. Actually, any site with a link from 60 school newspaper sites islikely unnatural. Or even 6. And has anyone else noticed the current migration of school newspapers from .edu domain space to .com? Wow. I wonder why?

4.  You have ten times the blogroll links as your nearest competitor. Don’t jump me on this one. I agree that blogroll links are often totally legitimate and reflect outstanding content, especially in narrow verticals. But when I can see the world’s worst Forex site has links on over 100 blogrolls, I call it manipulated and unnatural. Poor quality content should not attract links from quality sites in numbers.

5.  Out of the 3000 unique TLD backlinks your site has, 375 of those 3000 TLD’s contain a directory or file named /resources-links.html or links.asp, or /exchange-links.html (I know you must be thinking “surely nobody would do that”, but yes they would). When half your inbounds originate from links pages, that’s unnatural.

6.  Your site has a high number of links, but they all come from just 8 other sites. This one is pretty easy to understand.

7.  82.5 % of your backlinks originate from prweb.com, prnewswire.com, and/or businesswire.com. The remaining 17.5% of your links come from ezinearticles.com

8.  One word: sitewides (or is that two words?)

9.  Your blogspot site about hummingbirds launched a month ago and has already 60,000 links. Caveat: You are Lanny Chambers, hummingbird expert extraordinaire.

10.  Blog networks. No more to say here.

11.  Article networks.  Ditto.

12.  Mass directory submissions outside your vertical.

13.  A site linking to you does not provide an about section, author name, or means of contact.

14.  Blogs with posts of about 400-500 words with 3 links per post, one of them to a .gov site, one to an .edu site, and one to the client site. Easy pickings.

15.  You never used to offer discounts, but now you have student discount links on 50 different University discount program pages. This one is tricky, because the original intent of those discount pages was not to manipulate.

It’s that link builders spotted an opportunity and abused it. When you see a discount link for a GED tutoring program on a University discount page, somebody somewhere is not paying attention.

Remove, Fix, Recover, Repeat…

I believe that some sites, but not all, can recover from unnatural links. There are numerous variables.

A site that’s been around for a decade with 100% natural backlink profile that made a mistake by hiring a shady SEO firm that adds a few hundred unnatural links has a much better chance at recovery than a brand new site that has nothing but spam in its profile. That’s an easy comparison to understand.

Unfortunately, the Web (and links) are all shades of grey, and nobody can predict with certainty the outcome. Your position in the rankings may never return to where it was.  Then again it could, if you have the content to earn it.

If we’ve learned anything with the J.C. Penney and Overstock situations, it’s that Google will forgive, especially for those who are willing to pursue a legitimate content creation and link building strategy.

1. Google anounced that they were changing how they view links (nicely recapped here:)
2. Pandamonium!
3. Certain large blog networks were devalued and webmasters started to receive warnings about unnatural links.

Link building can still work well using ways that I wouldn’t personally advise because I don’t think that the techniques are sustainable. However, I fully recognize that not every site is destined to have a long-term link campaign that seeks to win the race by being slow and steady.

Thus, you’ll keep seeing link builders writing about the “best” ways to do something, and you’ll see others arguing and saying that riskier tactics still work. I doubt we’ll ever see the day when risky tactics don’t work in some way, but I do also believe that unless you want to stay terrified of losing your rankings and traffic, you have to recognize that link building is no longer what it once was.

Maximize Each Link

Get a link to your site and make sure you get the most out of it…traffic and conversions. If you get a great link, build some links to that page too!! Don’t think of a link as being just a one-time event.

If a blogger links to you (perhaps in a roundup or reference to an article that you wrote) then by all means, reach out via email, blog commenting, or social media, and say thanks. Maybe you’ll get another link, be asked for an interview, asked to guest post, etc. Honestly, unless the link was done to tell the world that you’re a horrible moron, you have nothing to lose by saying thank you.

Keep Your Content Linkworthy

Encourage comments and social media sharing. I wouldn’t really want to link to an SEO post that seemed good but had zero comments and social media shares, because I would be wondering “what am I missing here?”

If you write an article and people comment, respond. Encourage members of your staff to comment or respond to other comments, and encourage social sharing. This increases the chances of someone coming back to see what’s next.

In the above example, you can see that this post is getting some good social love. As of this writing, it also had over 20 comments. To me, that’s a signal that the content is linkworthy.

Find New Competitors

Look at your referral sources, find the great ones, and see who else they link to. Those are fantastic sites to perform competitive analysis on.

Here we see that a few of the top SEO industry sites are linking to us at the SEO Chicks blog, so I’d do a quick site search of each of those sites in order to see who’s on their blogrolls and use a tool like Get Rank’s Link Extractor to get a list of sites linked to from the original site.

I’d also suggest that, if you have time, you at least look at any site that puts up a link to you, and see what they link to, even if it’s not a site you recognize. You can find some gems this way.

Keep Analyzing Your Profile

Analyze your link profile more than once. Hopefully you’re keeping a constant eye on your link building campaign but at minimum, you need to review your link profile at least every few months (and much, much more often if you’ve recently been penalized) unless you have a very small site and are generating few links a month.

While I don’t recommend chasing the algorithm, I have to admit that I do it occasionally. Considering the frequency of Google updates, it’s wise to review your profile after each major update if you do this too.

Link Out

I know that reciprocal links aren’t a great strategy for the most part (usually because they are so poorly done) but there is nothing wrong with linking to someone who links to you if you don’t abuse it and rely on it. In fact, linking out initially, to a site that you’d love to get a link from, is a great way to get noticed and generate a link of your own.

If you’re checking for new links or mentions of your name/brand and you see something pop up, don’t you usually check it out? I certainly do, and I occasionally find great new sources to keep my eye on. Even if a link out doesn’t get you a reciprocal link immediately, it still has the potential to help you form a connection that can help you down the road.

Familiarize Yourself With On-Page Work

I am lucky to have come from a programming background and my first efforts were all focused on on-page work, but since links are easy to build without having to touch a site, obviously, I’m sure there are people building links who have little idea about much else.

Links can only do so much for a site, and if you’re building links and seeing no good results, you need to be able to look at reasons outside of the links. With the recent chatter about over-optimization issues, analyzing a backlink profile to figure out where the problem lies will just not cut it any longer. You’re going to have to look at the site too.

This is why I love link building though; it’s never stagnant for long. Even if you do everything the “right” way, you’ll end up having to adapt, which keeps us all on our toes.

Scott Fasser, Director of Customer Experience at Optify and I shared a number of B2B linking tactics and then hosted a lively Q&A session. We ran out of time and couldn’t answer everything submitted, so Scott and I decided to split the remaining questions and answer them here.

Q.  Is submitting press releases as a method for link building efficient? Will submitting too many press releases hurt your SEO?

Scott:  Press releases, if submitted properly, are an effective way to build short term links and  to syndicate news and content. The search engines use different indexes like news, local, etc. which have different lifespans. The news index has one of the shortest because they cycle so often.

So, you can’t just shoot out one news release and expect success. Having a plan for syndicating on a regular basis – no less than monthly is the best strategy.

Optimizing the release for the focus keywords and submitted with the right service is a good strategy – especially when combined with an on-going  PR effort to build excitement for news and participate in reviews, stories and roundups.

Q.  In terms of micro sites or blogs, it is better to have them on a unique URL linking back into your main site or as a root in your main site?

Scott:   Microsites and blogs are distinct and serve different purposes. A micro site can contain a blog as part of the strategy and tend to be driven by specific campaigns. There should definitely be links back to the main site from a microsite.

There should also  be a blog on the main site that provides content for longer tail phrases, interactivity opportunity through commenting/sharing and internal links.

Debra:  Regardless why you set up a blog or microsite, keep in mind they will only be SEO effective if worked like any other site. You need content, social signals and inbound links pointing to the blog/microsite in order for it to pass link popularity and/or traffic to your main site.

If you can promote these micro sites and blogs, great! But if you can’t, even if you use a site like Squidoo as your microsite base, be prepared to receive little algorithmic influence. You can’t pass along what you don’t have.

Q.  How effective are link exchanges? Does Google penalize you for engaging in them?

Scott: Link exchanges are helpful if it is a very relevant content on the pages that are exchanging links. Partners, customers, industry associations are all examples of where  a link exchange makes sense.

Participating in a large scale or questionable link exchange program should not be pursued as those types of situations – non-relevant content essentially – can cause some penalties.

Debra:  If your customers are using mobile devices to access your site, they’re looking at other sites too. Increase exposure of your brand by adding/swapping your company link with influential blogrolls in your niche. These links aren’t heavy hitters algorithmically but because they are text links, they will be seen online and via mobile.

Q.  Now that we have a list of prospective links, what are the most effective outreach methods?

Debra:  No matter what industry you are in or what type of link you’re after, establishing a point of commonality between you and your target increases your chances of getting a link.

Once you identify a list of sites you’d like to secure links from, figure out what you have in common with the site owner/company.  Do you both know the same people, worked at the same company or went to the same college?

Have you both blogged for a certain site, been a Foursquare mayor or been active on an industry forum?

You’re going to have to do a little homework here, we play a game in the office I call the Six Degrees of SEO Bacon which I patterned after the Kevin Bacon game to find a hook we can use. Spend time looking at the owners About page, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter bio’s for a clue or three you can use in an initial email to show a point of commonality.

Go beyound the usual flatter-them-for-a-link spiel, in todays’ jaded online world your email needs to say more than “you have a great site” to get the link.

Q.  If you host infographics on third party sites, how to you get the links to your site?

Debra:  There are three ways you could do this, (1) include an author bio, (2) include a sponsor or courtesy  link or (3) include cut and paste instructions at the end of the infographic.

A terrific example of a third party site providing a courtesy link can be found here on Mashable and in the image below.

This particular graphic was created by Mat Siltala from Dream Systems Media for Pinnable Business. Mashable linked to Pinnable Business in the body of the post preceding the infographic and gave them a courtesy link at the end of the article so double bonus here.

Mashable rocks and is the exception rather than the rule on linking out from content areas, most media sites won’t so you’ll need to ask for a sponsor link or provide copy and paste instructions for the graphic.

Q.  To me, reviews seem more like a B2C item. Can you talk more about how they’re relevant for B2B?”

Debra:   In my presentation, I suggested reviews were a powerful and effective link building tactic for B2B sites. Companies selling B2B have a more difficult time attracting links (IMO) because of internal and and competitive hurdles.

Not only do they have to convince competitors to link to them but often they have to convince management to let them ask. Since the search engines don’t make allowances for what kind of industry you’re in, B2B sites can be doubly challenged with  getting links and social signals to their pages.

In the past, I’ve had success using product and service reviews as a way to attract B2B links, I find they make linking out less threatening and provide lead generation leverage. A great example of this concept is dpReview.com, a blog devoted to digital camera reviews.  It is owned by Amazon.

If you review every piece of hardware, software or service in your niche, you will build a reputation as a neutral subject authority which in turn will attract links. Companies and prospects will subscribe to your RSS feeds, follow you on Twitter and comment if you use a blog.

You can also include reviews from industry thought leaders on your review site, eventually they’ll come a-calling for a guest post when they see what you’re pushing. Guest posting leads to more inbound links, tweets and other forms of social media and the best part is, your guest authors will be helping you do it. Win!

Think of it as becoming the Wikipedia of your industry. People have no trouble linking to Wikipedia because it doesn’t threaten their bottom line and it provides tangible information.

They also link because in many cases, its the only neutral informational source out there. The only thing I recommend doing differently is including video and podcast reviews to help with universal search placement. The more your site is seen and found, the better.

Of course you can take the concept and substitute news and education for reviews but in my case, I’ve found reviews most effective.

Q.  One of our competitors has a lot of paid links – is this ever worthwhile? I thought Google assigns a penalty for this.

Debra:  They do and lately, they’ve been assigning a lot of them. Is it worthwhile to use paid links? You’ll find a wide range of opinions on this, for me the question begs another – “can you afford the consequences if caught“?

If yes, then the decision is yours but if there is any hesitancy, it might be a good idea to stop and think before you run out and pay for links.

Pages rank the way they do (in large part) because of their backlinks. A common tactical suggestion is to aquire the same links as your well ranked competitor. It’s good advice but should you grab the same links if you aren’t sure they’ve been editorially given?

I don’t advocate rising to a level of mediocrity just because the guy ahead of you has, the links you see may not be the only reason a page is ranking well.

You don’t need the same link, you need a better one, use the competitors backlink profile as a guide, not a blueprint. Look at everything they have and most importantly – what they don’t have –  and then go secure your own.

Always keep in mind it’s not what you do that makes a difference, it’s where. When you are doing competitive analysis, look less at the links you’re finding and more on the pages hosting them.

The anchor text, the page and the history behind it are sending the bulk of the ranking weight. Find a better page. Or find a similar page, negotiate your way to an editorial link and then socialize the heck out of it. Imitation may be a sincere form of flattery but in this situation, being totally unique wins.

Regardless if you call it a penalty, a slap or being ignored, if Google thinks you’re using paid links, they think you’re using paid links and that’s when things start happening.

You may see a:

Dip in rankings or

Disappear from the SERPS, or

Remain the same but get a Google love note

That last one has been happening a lot lately, it means you’re hearing what Google thinks about your backlinks. “Thinks” is a nice way of saying Google assumes you have paid and unnatural links pointing at your pages and they’re letting you know they know.

The flip side to getting a note is not getting one, in which case you’re left to wonder why your pages are falling or gone from the SERPS. The ”why” is harder to figure without a note but in the end, the remedy for either situation is the same – more content, more signals, more links.

If you need some help getting started, try using my Linking Blueprint series, it outlines a number of effective and proven link building tactics you use. The best way to regain your rankings is to regroup, rebuild and promote!

For an encore of the webcast, please visit http://searchmarketingnow.com/proper-and-effective-link-building-9735

Until next time, good linking!

Burn.

I don’t know the exact moment when marketers started getting this bad reputation, but I’m seeing it a lot. Frankly, if you’re getting good content or getting more value for your website, it shouldn’t matter if I’m a freelancer writer, a webmaster, an in-house marketer, or an agency. But it does.

We live in a world where SEO leaves a bad taste in people’s mouths and marketers are seen as pushy people who’ll do anything for a product mention. (Thanks for that, Black Hats.) So, you have to adapt your approach if you want a successful link building campaign.

Above All, You’re A Writer

I would almost guarantee that if I wrote the exact same pitch from an email address that didn’t have “media” in it, I would have gotten a much different response. (We’re testing this now: I’ll update you with the findings.)

When you’re pitching blog posts, yes you’re a marketer, but above all, you’re a writer. Your focus shouldn’t be on the outbound link: It should be on the content.

Writers want to provide quality information; writers want to add value; and writers want to share advice. Your pitch should reflect that.

Good pitch + great content + Gmail = link win

Even if you’re an in-house marketer, you can (and should) still use Gmail if you’re making straight pitches for most one-off guest blog posts.

You’re Also The Client

Remember: I said most guest blog posts. There are instances where it makes sense to be the marketer. In-housers, no problem there: You’re already “the client.”

Agencies, always have access to an @clientdomainname.com email address. Always.

Not only do many directories and local citation sources require you to have an email address that matches the domain you’re listing, it gives you a stronger tie when pitching expertise and not just content.

Client's email address = more credibility and more expertise

For example, one of my clients is a mortgage lender. Not only are we writing articles where we could mention them as a resource, but part of our strategy is furthering their expertise within the home loan industry. When I’m pitching articles that need more credibility behind it than just “writer,” I opt for the client’s email address to show that expertise.

Don’t Forget The Golden Rules

Bloggers are busy, and they get lots of pitches every day. So before you pitch, think about how you would want to be pitched to if you had a blog. (In fact, go start a blog, say you offer guest posts, and put yourselves in their shoes.)

Keep in mind, this not just with bloggers. Whether you’re hoping to get listed as a resource, joining a community or forum, or asking for product reviews, always treat your sources how you’d want to be treated. Link building is a strange combination between art and science, but you’re always going to deal with people.

Finally, never be afraid to follow-up. Because they get lots of pitches from unknown email addresses, spam filters are likely on high alert.

Whether they’ve seen the original email and forgot about it or it ended up in their junk mail, there’s no harm in checking in to get a status update. I typically wait a week before sending a follow up email, and when I do, I’ll email it off the original email I sent so they have the thread right there and don’t have to go hunt.

How much is too much?

As Barry Schwartz recently mentioned in Google Sending Warnings About “Artificial” Or “Unnatural” Links, “Google says this isn’t a fresh crackdown on link networks but rather a change from bad links being “silently distrusted” to being more vocal about this type of penalty.”

So, Google is now going to warn people about their link profiles, whereas before, they didn’t. It would be a wondrous thing if Google actually gave you the exact URLs on which the offensive links existed, but that’s not happening.

I understand why they do not, but it would be nice if they did, because many people running websites took over the job for a previous person, SEO firm, agency, etc., and have no idea about the linking history of the site they run.

It’s no fun to find out that site you are now in charge of was part of  a deep link network for five years before you were in charge. See When Link Rehabilitation Is A Viable Option.

If you are a link builder and have performed back link analysis for a client, you know how unpleasant it is to be the one to have to tell the client their site has a manipulated link profile. It’s especially difficult when they had no idea, and no clue as to who created those links, when, or how to get rid of them, or if they can.

But that’s exactly where we are. A great big pile of what do we do now?

I don’t envision I’m going to offer a link rehabilitation service, though it would be a great new niche for link builders to get into. The reason is because in most cases, there isn’t a lot you can do to remove the offending links. Often, the owners of the sites will not reply to emails or phone calls, nor will they want to remove the links because that’s a tacit admission that their service can no longer be trusted.

Pick A Number…

But let’s back up for a moment. Exactly what constitutes off-site over optimization of links?

We know blog network participation is one thing. Things get fuzzier when we look at specific metrics like anchor text or reciprocal links or sitewides or blog rolls etc. You can’t pick a fixed number and say that number is the tipping point for any given metric.

I’ve shown before that if you are looking at a specific vertical, like Bat Conservation societies, they often all link to each other out of a common courtesy and shared  mission. It isn’t about SEO.

Would you be surprised if you learned that there were 15 different organizations around the world that were devoted to that subject and all of them linked to each other? No, not all all. It’s quite natural in that particular case. But isn’t 90% reciprocity kind of spammy looking? Yes it is, if the vertical is online slots. But if the vertical is Bats, no, it isn’t.

Anchor text would seem to be an obvious target. Most people outside the SEO world really don’t fully understand its impact, what it does, why it matters, etc. And Google has mountains of historical data that show what a typical “normal” distribution of anchor text should look like across subject areas. I bet even now, with the Web approaching twenty years of age, the most common anchor text is still probably “Click here”.

So I would like to end this by starting this. What constitutes over-optimization of external inbound links? How would you measure it? What allowances and exceptions would you see as crucial? And at what point do you tell a client to go back and “undo” what’s been done, kill the site completely, or leave what links already exist alone and make changes moving forward?

Find the brown M&Ms

Some rock backs such as Van Halen, are these days, almost as famous for their outrageous demands as they are for their music.

The most famous is their requirement for a bowl of M&Ms to be in their dressing room; with all the brown ones removed. Failure to comply with this seemingly outrageous request was grounds for immediate cancellation of the concert.

However, what may at first seem like a stereotypical rock star demand was actually an inspired strategic test to ensure that the contract had been read in full.

The presence of a brown free bowl of M&Ms provided confirmation that the promoter had paid attention to the details of the contract, especially the important safety and technical specifications.

I have applied the principles of the ‘brown M&M technique’ to help me find higher quality contractors, save time, and to build links.

I don’t suggest using this technique with the sole intention of acquiring links, instead, use it as an accompaniment to the development of your website.

Testimonials – Links Turned On Their Head

Leaving testimonials and asking stakeholders to include a link back to your site is an effective SEO technique that has been used successfully for many years.

Usually, testimonials are requested after the completion of a job, contract or transaction. I have taken this technique and turned it on its head, asking for a testimonial up front as a way to filter out designers, programmers and writers, in a similar way to the brown M&M technique.

An Example:

Like many website owners, I use Elance and Odesk to find contractors at competitive prices. These websites act as a marketplace for businesses and contractors to connect. Within hours of posting a job, you usually have dozens of potential employees responding to your post.

Having many applicants for a job may sound appealing. However, I have found that filtering through such a range of potential contractors makes it hard to find the best candidate for the job.

I noticed that many of the contractors applying for jobs were using copied and pasted cover letters. It appeared that these contractors were using a shotgun approach to applications, applying for as many jobs as possible without taking the time to craft individual cover letters for individual projects.

Anecdotally, I found the contractors that used this shotgun technique to be below standard and I needed a way to sift out the contractors that I suspected of applying to every job. While thinking about this, it occurred to me, why not use the brown M&M technique to filter out those contractors that were sub standard?

How To Apply The Brown M&M Technique In The Virtual World

To ensure that my project briefs had been read in full, I employed a technique of asking contractors who submitted proposals to include the answer to a simple question at the start of their cover letter, for example:

•  What is 2+3?

If anyone failed to answer the question I would decline their application because it showed that either their attention to detail was lacking or they were using a copy and pasted cover letter.

This technique worked well and helped to separate the wheat from the chaff in terms of quality contractors. Despite this, I was still receiving a lot of quality applications at low prices; many of which I would happily employ. I needed another way to help me choose between them.

Building Links Using Testimonials

I often think in terms of SEO and I wondered if I could filter applicants and acquire a link at the same time. It struck me, why not ask some additional pre-screening questions?

This list included questions such as:

1. Do you or your company have a website?
2. If yes, what is the URL of your website?
3. Does your website have a page where it lists partners, suppliers or reviews from clients?
4. If we build a working relationship, can we be included on this page?

By using this technique, you are filtering potential applications, saving time and maximizing the return on investment of hiring them.

This technique could be expanded or customized. For example, if you are thinking of hiring a writer, why not ask if they write for other websites and if they do, would it be possible to link to your website where applicable.

How Much Is A Link Worth?

The value of a link depends on the authority and the quality of the webpage on which it is found; the higher the authority of the webpage, the more the link will be worth. Links on partner or testimonial pages often stand the test of time much better than links from blogs or articles as these pages are pushed down the hierarchy of the site.

I have often found the value of a link acquired using this technique is worth more than the price I pay the contractor for their work. Links like these also have the added benefit that they will not be easily replicated by your competitors.

The Bigger Picture

If you are looking for a designer, don’t sacrifice quality for a contractor who might give you a link on a higher PageRank page. This does not make sense. This technique is best used when you have many quality contractors who are charging a similar price. This technique can be used as a deciding vote on otherwise similar proposals.

Websites often tack on SEO as an additional business strategy when it should be integrated into everything they do. This technique shows that SEO should be a holistic approach to your business development and not an additional strategy.

Photo  from mischiru . Used under Creative Commons license.

For the record, I don’t see networks as being any worse than a lot of other tactics, so I’m writing this to illustrate a point, not to judge in any way.

We work with some clients who also work with other link builders who do other types of link building than we do. We also work with some clients who dictate what we do, and we work with some who leave it all up to us. Because of this, I think we have a fairly good idea of the full picture and of what works and what doesn’t work.

If I had to choose just one thing that our most successful clients have in common, it would be link diversity.

The sites that continue to enjoy good rankings and traffic are the ones that employ a variety of methods, that either have different groups working on different tactics, or that ask for and follow our advice about how to do things so that they aren’t reliant upon something that can crush them if the algorithm changes.

What Is A Diverse Link Campaign All About?

I think it’s much more than making sure that you have some nofollowed links, some image links here and there, and maybe a few good old sitewides. It’s about analyzing all the opportunities available to you and pursuing anything that you find credible. It’s also about ensuring that you’re visible in the latest and greatest places.

Where To Get Links

For a diverse profile, it’s all about getting your content out there through the use of social media, guest posting, reviews, and many other forms of interaction.

It’s about pursuing blog links, directory links, links on sites where your competitors are listed, and possibly links on crappy sites (trust me, it’s extremely rare to find a link profile that doesn’t include something spammy or questionable) and paid links that will send you lots of traffic.

Anchor Text Variation

I did something very cool recently, at a client’s request. I broke down competitors’ anchor text into categories that he gave me, rather than classifying them in my usual way. It gave me a whole new perspective on anchor text variation.

We tend to think of anchor text in broad categories like money terms or longtails, so breaking anchors down further made me see the smaller picture and identify similarities where I hadn’t seen them before.

Top Level Domain & Geo Variation

I know there are certain gold standards for link building (we love those .govs and .edus!) but I like to see a variety of links from other TLDs like .info, .net, .biz, among others. I also like to see good CCTLDs (country code top level domains) where it makes sense for your audience, but there are few sites that don’t show some sort of foreign links in their profile.

It’s kind of ethnocentric to think that you shouldn’t have those. If you’re doing link outreach and you’re finding targets by searching in Google, run some searches that will only generate results from a specific TLD or CCTLD.

Types Of Links

Permanent, sitewide, footer, sidebar, directories, links that roll off a blog’s homepage, links to your homepage, links to your subpages, profile links, forum and blog comment links, links on sites that show nothing but press releases or articles, links that fade away from a site after a certain amount of time, image links, and yes, even flashing banner links are all part of most profiles that I have analyzed.

I don’t deliberately pursue certain types of links at all times, for various reasons, but in analyzing profiles, it’s apparent that variety is definitely there. Many links that I wouldn’t necessarily pursue (like at the moment I’m not feeling the love for sitewides) are part of a natural profile and can give you great traffic if they’re well placed on the right site.

I’ve had to work on sites that had too high of a reliance upon sitewides, and that’s why I don’t usually seek them out, but I’d take a blogroll link on a great, high-profile blog relevant to my industry over an in-content one on an old site that gets 50 hits a month.

Real World Examples

Our SEO Chicks blog is approaching its 5th anniversary and I’ve used it before as an example of a very natural link profile.

Here’s what we see:

• A really nice percentage of nofollowed links that are giving us good referrals.
• Text and image links.
• A good homepage to deep page link ratio.
• Links from .com, .uk, .org, .net, .us, and .br.
• Link from the Netherlands, Germany, the US, the UK, and Canada.

A quick look at my company website shows the following:

• Links from the US, the UK, Canada, and France.
• Text links and image links.
• Nofollowed and followed links.
• .com, .net, .org, .uk, and .me links.

That is a very simplistic summary of two link profiles that are at least semi-diverse and completely natural (ie., there are no paid links involved.) There is a heavy reliance upon certain types of links (I think we have too few image links and too high a percentage of .com links for my website, for example) but it’s getting to a better place in my eyes.

We also do a local city blog called Avant Greensboro which is very, very new and shows the following:

• Massively high anchor percentage for the brand.
• No image links.
• Links from only .com and .org sites.
• Only links from the US.

Now, as I said we’re just starting out and we have not yet actively pursued links, but I can immediately devise a plan here. Since I like to create wishlists, here you go:

Now, as I’ve said earlier, this is an extremely simplistic (and initial) method of analyzing your link diversity, as it’s limited to what’s been reported by Link Research Tools in my case. However, it’s a start, and it’s a good way to see your profile in terms of its variety in a few areas.

This type of quick analysis won’t tell you things like whether you have enough blog links or whether you’re too reliant upon certain anchors (there are other tools to help you with that) but the key is to think about diversity and to pursue it.

A Final Word

You may have a rare demographic that isn’t engaged socially (yet) for example. However, as we’ve seen with the recent insane growth of Pinterest, new social networks arise that appeal to people who might not have been previously attracted to them. In fact, the people following me on Pinterest are a truly diverse group that includes an old next door neighbor, high school classmates and their moms, and of course all you SEOs.

Who knows what’s next? We may see another Facebook or Twitter, and you will need to promote your site socially. Getting good links on high-traffic blogs with lots of good social signals is (in my opinion) something that will be one of the key ways to build links moving forward. I wouldn’t have said that three years ago.

Think about this too:  in the event that something bad does happen with your site in the rankings, being able to keep traffic coming is going to be critical. You have to diversify your traffic sources, period.

Unfortunately, he’s right — even if the slap would have been justified. If you do SEO for a big brand, like Ryan, you typically don’t have to put effort into link building. They already have an established following of fans, critics and media just waiting to talk about them.

But for the rest of us, us commoners if you will, we don’t get to enjoy such a luxury. When you’re a new website with no established clout, no established authority, and no gaggle of swooning fanboys (or angered skeptics) waiting with baited breath over your every move, links are your lifeblood. So where should you start?

Guest Blogging

I cannot stress enough how important it is to guest blog for links, especially if no one knows who you are. Get the right topic on the right blog, and the results can be pretty astronomical. You get the link juice, sure, but you also get traffic, brand awareness, and potentially even conversions.

One guest blog post brought us 72% more traffic.

As I mentioned last month, I swear by guest blogging communities like Blogger Link Up and My Blog Guest. Instead of you finding the opportunities, they come to you. Blog owners will send out a query on the type of post that they’re looking for, and you can respond if you’re a good fit.

Offline To Online Relationships

If you’re new to the online realm, it doesn’t necessarily mean you’re new to the offline world.

The first place I go when building links for a new client is finding any partnerships, relationships, or even just friends they’ve worked with or built offline. Then, parlay that connection online. People are much more likely to link to you when they already know who you are and can vouch for the work you do.

Forums & Online Communities

Whoever your target audience is, they’re probably already hanging out somewhere online. You need to be there.

Find these online communities, forums or discussion groups and join them. You can use these search queries to find these forums or discussion groups:

• inurl: + keyword + forums, discussions or groups
• intitle: + keyword + forums, discussions or groups

Word of the wise: Establish your credibility first. If you go in there firing out links and praise, it’s like saying “I’m Erin. Marry me?” Take some time first to get to know people there: ask questions, answer questions, tell your story, whatever. Just build the relationship first. And when you do post a link, don’t let that be your last post.

Go Local

Every community has a local chamber of commerce. Join it. You get a great link and great exposure to other networking opportunities. If you live in a bigger city, there are also directories specifically to list local businesses in that area.

Also, target your local press. Local journalists are craving for content to write about, so if you’re doing something within the community, let the media know about it.

Whether it’s your staff doing a day of community outreach, helping a local charity or nonprofit organization, or just doing something really cool, people will write about it. We got press coverage and a link just because we hired 24 people over half a year. Whatever you’re doing, let people know.

Give Stuff Away

I don’t know where you stand on the link bait debate, but frankly: I dig it. The whole point of link building is to create things that people like and want to link to. (Of course, don’t do something for the sole reason of going viral.) And what people like is to get free stuff. Host a giveaway or contest that is related to your business (don’t just giveaway an iPad ) which will put you in touch with people in your target audience.

What are some other good links to get for new websites?

But from a search results standpoint, there are aspects to the social link graph that make the playing field uneven and out of balance.

The search engines have to know this, and hopefully are adapting and accounting for it before rewarding a site with higher search rank due to social signals.

There are several bothersome aspects to the social link graph and its impact on search results that merit discussion. Here are a few examples.

1.  Product Effectiveness Versus Human Nature

Take a look at the Facebook page for Pepsi, and you find close to 8 million Likes. Coca-Cola’s page has 40 million Likes.

To what extent does this matter with regards to search rank? To what extent does it matter at all? These are easy brands to like, so of course they will attract millions of likes.

But what if you have the misfortune to be the brand manager for Preparation H? Or RID head lice treatment? Notice on their main websites they don’t even bother with social media buttons.

It’s like they already know it’s futile. No parent is going to let their entire facebook friend lists or G+ circles know their kid has head lice. In an ironic twist, is it possible that the more important a product is to solving a real problem, the less likely that product is to ever catch a social media wave?

How about substance abuse facilities? Ready to tell the world you finally kicked that crack habit? Like that and share that story with all your friends and business associates on LinkedIn.

So the reality then is we can’t all be Skittles (21 million likes, 28k followers). We are what we are. If you sell grain elevators in Iowa, your Twitter feed is going to be very lonely.

The obvious question: how does the algorithm account for a product’s social potential across subject areas? You can’t penalize a site because it’s boring. Grain elevators are boring. But someone has to rank first, with or without a Facebook or G+ page.

2.  Inclusion & Location Of Share Functionality

The decision as to where you place those little buttons on your page can significantly impact whether they get clicked or not, yet is often quite arbitrary, or forced into a specific spot due to design issues. I see many sites with long content pages that include the social click tiles at the very end of the article.  That’s it.

But what if the article was absolutely awesome and I learned what I needed to know in the first paragraph and didn’t scroll any further? I never saw those social buttons. Impulse social click opportunity lost.

I know people can share content without their being any on-page buttons, but really, what percentage of the Web using population has added a “Tweet this” button to their browser toolbar? That number is likely very low.

So the reality is, your site’s ability to attract its maximum social share potential could be determined not by the quality of your content, but by your placement of the share function.

3.  Intent Of Searcher

Your spouse is having some health issues and your researching it online. You find what you were looking for. His symptoms indicate potential problems. You print it out for him.

At that moment, you aren’t in share-with-the-world mode, no matter how stupendous the content was. No matter how many buttons the page has or where they are placed, you are not going to hop over to your facebook page and update your status to “Just found what I needed to help Jim with his ulcerative colitis!”

So the reality is that the choice to share or not is is also driven by the purpose the user of the site or search engine at that moment.  Quality of content had nothing to do with it.

4.  Incentivized Social Activity

“Like us on Facebook and receive 5% off your purchase”. Really? How does Mr. Algorithm factor in incentivized social signals?  “Help us reach 100,000 followers!”

I’m not going to link to any of the many sites and brands that have a bounty or rewards based social strategy, but being honest here, that’s smart, makes perfect sense, and is a great use of social media for branding and click traffic.

But from a search perspective, doesn’t it muddy the water for the algorithm when one company is paying for followers or fans, and another company isn’t?

So the reality is we cannot say with certainty how the the social activity surrounding any brand came to be.

These are just a few issues worth discussing. There are many others. The social graph is in its infancy and it’s not going away. Google already shows 180,000 results for the phrase “social media expert”.  Let’s all hope the collective wisdom on both sides of the social media and SEO equation can find  balance.