The long winter days seem to have kept quite a few folks inside, considering the large amount of great in-depth link building articles I came across last month. When even Bing starts writing about link spam, you know it must be pretty cold outside…

Although I don’t spend as much time on online marketing forums as I used to, I still try to read the most interesting threads on a few forums. WebmasterWorld is one of these forums, and threads like this link building case study thread are the reason why. And if you happen to like reading case studies just as much as I do, here’s two more.

Another great read is this NY Times article about a Penn study on virality. The researchers studied a list of well-e-mailed articles, checking it every 15 minutes for over 6 months, analyzing the content of thousands of articles and checking for factors like the placement in the paper or on the Web home page. Great stuff…

And also:

• A resource for information visualisation & infographics – Tom Critchlow
• Popularity matters, ignore at your own peril – Adam Singer
• How to write linkbait – Sam Tilston
• Pulling a Kesey (or tripping link filters) – Debra Mastaler
• Using bit.ly for spying, link building and happiness – Jim Gianoglio
• Quality link building starts with questions – Wil Reynolds
• Blogging etiquette – Tamar Weinberg
• Running giveaway competitions for links and SEO – Rob Ousbey
• An interview with Debra Mastaler – Zach Daniel
• Link building strategies video – Ian Lurie
• Things to consider when adding linkbaiting to your online marketing strategy – Lyndon Antcliff

Everybody who owns a website gets them, and usually several a week: link requests. Especially when your site jumps to a PageRank of 5 or higher, all kinds of webmasters suddenly seem to feel that their website is related to yours. And since they are, why not swap links, right?

Over the years, I must have received thousands of link requests emails, but I have sent out quite a few myself as well. This has learned me to understand the language of link requests, because some are actually written in a secret language with lots of hidden messages. I have translated an email for everybody who doesn’t speak this language, so you can see what *most* link builders actually mean.

This is a real life (slightly modified) example:

Hi Webmaster,

I have a web site, http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com and have spent a lot of time and effort to ensure my visitors gain the maximum benefit from their visit, and from what I have to offer. As our web sites are closely related and our products do not compete, I feel the exchanging of links would be a mutually beneficial arrangement. If you are interested for Link Exchange so please feel free to contact me at your earliest convenience. I will also add your site within 6 hours of your positive reply.

Here is my linking details :-

Title: Buy cheap blue widgets online
URL: http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com
Description: Cheap blue widgets, high quality red widgets, exclusive ivory widgets and fluffy pink widgets. Free worldwide shipping on orders over $250.

Or you can simply use the following Linking code:

<p><a href="http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com"> Buy cheap blue widgets online</a> Cheap blue widgets, high quality red widgets, exclusive ivory widgets and fluffy pink widgets. Free worldwide shipping on orders over $250.</p>

I will add your link at here :
http://www.website1.com/web-development-resources.html (pr1)
http://www.website2.org/website-development-services-india.html (pr3!)

http://www.web-site-4.com/Resources.html

http://subdomain.website3.com/Computers_Communications_And_Electronics/Internet/

Your link will be added on my site within 6 hours. So if you are interested for link exchange with my site please let me know and we can do a better work for our sites.

Please forward me your linking details along with confirmation where my link have been added by you.
Hoping an early and positive response from your side.

Have a nice day ahead :)

Bests Regards
webmaster.anna@gmail.com

But this is what ‘webmaster Anna’ actually means:

Hi there,

I was too lazy to find out what your name actually is, but webmaster is probably fine, right?

I have a web site, http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com and have spent a lot of time trying to find short cuts to make money with it. I am quite lazy and want to make loads of cash while I stay in my bed as long as possible. I believe that a link on your website to mine will improve my search engine rankings, so I feel the exchanging of links would be a good arrangement for me in particular. I love starting sentences with ‘I’ (after all, it is all about me), and my grammar is pretty bad. I pretend to add your site within 6 hours of your positive reply, so please drop all your other work and reply to me asap. Capice?

Here are my linking details :

Title: Buy cheap blue widgets online (Yes, this is my company name. Pinky swear.)
URL: http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com
Description: A bunch of keywords here. Additional sentence to camouflage all the keywords.

And since I really want you to use the exact keywords I provided as the anchor text, here is the info in html:

<p><a href="http://www.a-website-with-lots-of-hyphens.com"> Buy cheap blue widgets online</a> Buy cheap blue widgets online A bunch of keywords here. Additional sentence to camouflage all the keywords.</p>

I will add your link at here :
http://www.very-crappy-website.com/irrelevant-resources.html (PR1)
http://www.3-way-linking-site.org/link-page-391.php (PR3 – w00t!)

http://www.trapezoidal-linking-matriflux.com/Resources.html

http://even.more-crap.com/Free_Links_For_All/ (notice how I have stopped mentioning PR?)

Your link will be added on my site within 6 hours. My script will take care of it, and it will also take care of deleting two of your four links in about a week. The other two links will be on penalized pages with a noindex, nofollow meta tag. So if you are interested in exchanging links, please let me know and I will screw you over.

Please forward me your linking details, along with confirmation where my link has been added by you. I need to show this to my boss to collect my bonus.
Hoping for an early and positive response from your side. I’ll sign you up for 23 newsletters you won’t be able to unsubscribe from if you ignore all three of my messages.

Have a nice day ahead. With an average conversion rate of nearly .02%, I’m sure I will :)

Best regards,

webmaster.anna@gmail.com
(My name is actually Roger, but I think you’re more likely to accept my offer when I call myself Anna. Yes, I will literally do anything for links.)

Yes, the language of some link requests can be quite deceiving. Make sure you write yours in plain English.

Great content is the solid foundation of a good website, a positive user experience and (hopefully) some nice incoming links. This, in turn, usually leads to good rankings, a continuous stream of traffic, conversions, and -eventually- a fat bank account. Easy, right?

Well, what if you can’t come up with new ideas for good content? You can either start brainstorming for new ideas, or you can get to work straight away. A very effective way to combine this, is to create resource lists, and to add these to your website.

I have created resource lists (lists with a few links to other high quality, relevant web pages) for multiple websites in the past, and it’s been effective in every single one of these occasions. Resource lists not only add direct value to your website, but they can also help you to attract links and traffic.

Resource lists for a better user experience

For all of you who are still afraid of their website ‘leaking PageRank’, here’s an update: Linking out is not a bad thing! And again, in bold: Linking out is not a bad thing! Actually, linking out can be a very good thing. Especially in informational sections of your website, links to other websites can be great additions.

Believe it or not, but in most cases, your website is not your visitor’s end station. And when you can give the 97,3% of the visitors that does not buy something on your website a new place to go to, you still have made their user experience a little bit better than when you wouldn’t have provided those links.

Linking out also shows that you are not afraid of directing visitors to other interesting websites, and that you know your way around online, which both can increase your brand perception. Especially in niches where people aren’t used to it, but appreciate the added value. Some even go further by stating that linking out to authority websites may (indirectly) lead to better search engine rankings – I don’t believe this, but it shows how positive some people think about linking out and creating topical association.

Resource lists for content ideas

Forcing yourself to create one or more resource lists also is excellent for coming up with new content ideas.

When you are visiting dozens of websites, trying to find good content, you will learn what you like, and more importantly why. Although n=1, this can definitely give you more insight in why people will or will not link to specific content. Fully understanding this is key to success.

You will also find out what your industry is still missing in terms of good content, which -of course- can be created by you then. The same goes for good ideas that have been executed badly; improving those ideas is something that you owe to The Internet.

Resource lists for new links

Creating resource lists can also be a good link building tactic. First of all, it’s a great way to get noticed or to network. Linking out to someone, and perhaps sending him or her some traffic, may put yourself on that person’s radar. Especially when he or she is a blogger, as most bloggers are incurable stats junkies. Use this connection as an opening to get in touch with bloggers or webmasters you have always wanted to get links from.

You can also try to push it a little bit more. Simply letting the people you are linking to know where your resource list is can be enough sometimes.

My personal experience is that you can get an average email-to-link conversion rate of ~25% without even asking for a link. Just explain where and why you have linked to the person you’re contacting, and some will link back to your page almost instantly. Others may send you (positive) feedback, or mention that “If they ever can do something for you…”.

Something as simple as this can already do the trick:

Hi John,

When I was doing research for my own website, I came across yours (URL). I absolutely loved {page}, because of {reason} – in fact, I loved it so much that I linked to it at {URL}, and I thought you would like to know.

Please let me know if you want me to make any changes to the link, or if you prefer me to link to a different URL.

Kind regards,

Your Name
Email, URL, etc.

Of course, the ideal approach, as well as the average conversion rate may depend on your industry, brand and content quality, but 25% isn’t bad when getting new links isn’t even your main, or only goal.

What makes a good resource list?

I know it may be tempting, but I am *not* suggesting that you should instantly download a php directory script, or that adding 20+ resource pages with dozens of links to other websites to your site might be a good idea. After all, linking out to irrelevant, too many, bad or mediocre websites can harm your brand or reputation.

A good resource page offers extra value to your visitors, because the links on it are highly relevant to your website, and support the content of the page.

In fact, a resource list doesn’t even have to be a separate resource page. For example, you could add links to existing pages, develop an image directory, or you could try to create a dynamic blog sidebar – nearly anything is possible.

Well, there you go: need content ideas or links? Link out!

Since there wasn’t a Link Building this Month in December, because of the yearly recap, this month’s edition basically is a double edition. In 2010, I will be putting the bar even higher than it already was. We’ve all read the same stuff over and over again, so I’ll try only to mention articles that are new, different or simply excellent.

Every new year usually starts with awards, recaps (see earlier link), resolutions (mine is better time management) and predictions. Debra Mastaler asked all Link Week columnists what they think 2010 will bring, and this is the result. As you can see, group interviews can be a great way to create great, linkable content.

And also:

• The psychology behind link giving – David Snyder
• Linkable asset inventory – Garrett French
• Link building checklist – Mark Nunney
• Top searches can attract top links – Debra Mastaler
• How to drive more links via public relations – Jeremy Bencken
• Linkfromdomain: a link building tip for Bing.com – Will Critchlow
• How to woo a blogger – Lisa Barone
• Guest blogging: the ultimate guide – Glen Allsopp
• Getting links for a poker site is easier than you think – Lyndon Antcliff
• How to measure link building – Michael Martinez

Just like last year, SmallBusinessSEM’s Matt McGee is hosting the SEMMYs, an annual awards event for search engine marketing content. So in case you took a sabbatical last year and want to catch up, I would advize you to take a look at all the great stuff that was nominated this year.

Until the 29th of January, you can vote for your favorite article in 17 different categories. I was nominated in the link building category, but because I hate those “hey, I was nominated, please vote for me here”-posts, I’ll list my personal favorites from all 17 categories first. And then I’ll ask you to vote for me afterwards ;)

SEO – How user data, links & document scoring may be used in the “brand” algorithm – Patrick Altoft (Blogstorm)
Reading patents is hard. Who -except Dave Harry or Bill Slawski- can read 293 pages of technical mumbojumbo without falling asleep, right? Well, that’s why I loved Patrick’s article, since he recapped a very interesting Google patent in ‘normal’ wordings.

PPC – 7 Incredibly valuable but underused free tools tor PPC marketers – Brad Geddes (SEL)
Although I don’t use PPC very often, I like reading about it every now and then. I had hoped to learn a little bit more from the finalists in this category, but because I love tools, Brad Geddes’ article is my favorite here.

Social Media – 7 Reasons your Social Media Marketing failed (and how to fix it!) – Todd Malicoat (Stuntdubl)
He wrote my personal favorite link building article of last year as well, but wasn’t nominated in the link building category, to my surprise. Since I am one of the contributors of the SEMMYs, I considered it to be partly my fault that his article didn’t end up on the judges’ table, so this was my sorry-Todd-I’ll-vote-for-you-in-this-category-in-stead vote. And a great article, obviously.

Local search – The Local Search Ranking Factors: Ranking High in Google Maps and Yahoo Local – David Mihm (Mihmorandum)
An excellent resource, written by an expert in local search. Whether you’re an experienced local search marketer, or you’re new and want to learn about it, this article is a must-read.

Blogs & blogging – Guest blogging: the ultimate guide – Glen Allsopp (Viperchill)
The finalists in this category were all excellent reads, and I voted for Glen Allsopp’s article about guest blogging. Not only because guest blogging can be a very effective link building technique, but also because his articles describes almost every aspect of the process.

Viral Marketing – Here’s hard data for headlines that spread on Twitter – Dan Zarrella (Copyblogger)
A good and catchy headline can be the difference between failure or success of your marketing campaign. Dan Zarrella analysed thousands of headlines and published his findings.

Analytics – Google Analytics maximized: deeper analysis, higher ROI & you – Avinash Kaushik (Kaushik.net)
Ten awesome analytics tips and the dozen-or-so links to additional analytics articles are more than enough to get you through one of those rainy Sunday afternoons.

Reputation Management – Online Reputation Management Guide – Rhea Drysdale (Outspoken Media)
I can not think of a reason why this article shouldn’t win. Pure online reputation management awesomeness.

Small Business – If I were launching a new small biz web site today – Matt McGee (Small Biz Trends)
Excellent, in-depth actionable advice for both new and existing companies. Matt shares his findings of I-don’t-know-how-many years of experience, which is probably invaluable to starting small businesses.

Google – Big brands? Google brand promotion: new search engine rankings place heavy emphasis on branding – Aaron Wall (SEObook)
Google’s brand update had (and still has) quite some impact on search engine rankings, as of February last year. Aaron Wall shows where and how big brands managed to get good rankings, and introduced the brand update to a lot of people.

Search Tech – The SEO geeks guide to information retrieval – Dave Harry (Huomah)
I mentioned how difficult reading search patents can be earlier. Well, this page contains 250+ links to such content. How about that for rainy Sunday afternoons…

Design & Usability – 25-point Website usability checklist – Dr. Peter J. Meyers (UserEffect)
It was either this one, or Daniel Ritzenthaler’s Taking the guesswork out of design, but Dr. Pete’s article won because it was numbered, and therefore more user friendly :).

Online Marketing/ General – Why trust matters & how to earn it – Matt McGee (SmallBusinessSEM)
Matt McGee asked a few dozen people to answer a bunch of questions about trust, and how to earn it online.

Industry – 10 Questions to evaluate a social media ‘expert’ – Ian Lurie (Conversation Marketing)
I love Ian’s writing style and probably hate those ’social media gurus’ just as much as he does.

Copywriting – 50 Trigger words and phrases for powerful multimedia content – Brian Clark (Copyblogger)
Brian Clark highlights 50 words that invoke and engage emotion. Whether you’re a copywriter or have to create some PPC ads every now and then, this is a great read.

Rants – What is the difference between Google’s secrecy & your privacy? – Aaron Wall (SEObook)
As a Googler, you can’t say something like “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place” to Aaron Wall, and think you can get away with it.

Link Building – I was quite surprised to see that both of my articles that were nominated made it into the finals, especially when I noticed that Gab’s 101 link buying tips and a few other great posts didn’t make it. My indispensable link building tools probably doesn’t deserve to win, but I think Link building from A to Z (a Youmoz entry) might stand a chance.

If you agree, you can vote for the post right here. And since it’s a Youmoz post, Rand (who’s also nominated in the same category) also wins a little bit, so it’s basically the best choice you can make ;)

About a year ago, I made a selection of a few (in my opinion) indispensable link building tools. Except from a Majestic SEO redesign and some changes to the Link Diagnosis tool, I haven’t seen any big changes in the field of link building tools since then. Well, until this month…

Here’s three great new tools you can use during your link building campaigns.

Link Building Queries

The guys from Ontolo created Link Building Queries, a search query generating tool, mainly based on a massive list with link building queries.

After entering a keyword that’s related to your product or website, you can enter a linkable asset type, an opportunity type, and the type of content you’re after. When you hit ‘Generate link building queries’, Garrett French himself tries to come up with useful queries in the background, and spits them out lightning fast. And the output looks somewhat like this (depending on what you’ve selected, of course);

This tool can be very helpful when you’re looking for specific link targets.

Bulk link checker

Majestic SEO already had a handful of free tools, but they have added a lightning fast Bulk Link Checker to their arsenal this month. This tool will check the amount of linking pages and referring domains to up to 150 (!) URLs in just a split second. It uses Majestic’s own data, and also has the option to download the results in CSV.

I had to edit the results a little bit to make it fit on this page, but you can click it to see the real output. Or you could go and play with the tool…

Open Site Explorer

The third tool in this list was just released yesterday. The Open Site Explorer, an SEOmoz product, provides quite some insights in the link profile of a website. You can check the regular basic link data, but SEOmoz has also added a few very nice features.

One of these features is the opportunity to check which URLs 301-redirect to a certain domain, which makes bait-n-switch pages or redirected domains for SEO purposes easy to find.

(click to see the bigger picture)

Another interesting functionality is the option to compare two different domains. Just enter two URLs, hit enter, and you’ll see some pretty charts, accompanied by very interesting data.

(click the image to see the bigger picture, or click here to see the live data)

The Open Site Explorer is part of SEOmoz’ Pro membership, but you can still try it out for free for about a day or so. After that, the metrics, 10K links and the CSV download will be PRO-only.

All by all three great tools to add to your link building toolbox.