Now on to today’s main concern for many of these SEOs: getting links (legitimately). One way to get links is via PR. And although many news websites and journalists don’t link out very often, there are still lots of ways to get links from newspapers. Just make sure that your pitch is ok, that you’re pitching the right person in the right way, and you’ll double your chances of success. Keep in mind, though, that influence != popularity.

And more great articles:

• 5 Link building questions that make me die a little inside – Jennifer Van Iderstyne
• An infographic case study – Ken Lyons
• Five things I’ve learned about paid links – Melanie Nathan
• Link building expectations formula – George Fisher
• 124 eCommerce link building queries – Garrett French
• Market research for link building – Paddy Moogan
• Link building techniques: risk vs. reward – Ian Lurie
• 7 Different visualisations of link profiles – Tom Critchlow
• Different types of overlooked linbait – Jordan Kasteler
• How to promote link worthy content – Arnie Kuenn
• Investing in link building – Mike Pantoliano
• SESSF link building live blogging – Garrett French
• ASE link building live blogging – Lisa Barone

PS – Feel free to drop me a note or to shout at me on Twitter if you think I left out an amazing article.  Desperately need more link building round-ups? Ontolo publishes one every week!

This post, Link Building this Month (08.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Building this Month (03.2010)
   Compared to last month, it’s been relatively quiet in terms of link...

The reason why group interview articles are so great to read, is because they are usually packed with real life examples (not guesses or assumptions), case studies, tips from the field and some form of link building discussion. Any link building strategy tips, advice on how to do research, or content marketing guidance you get from such an article has already been tested an tuned, so you can use it straight away.

And more great articles:

• Are we over-engineering the link graph? – Nicola Stott
• The 5 types of influencers on the web – Lisa Barone
• 9 Steps to SEO PR that won’t drive the PR team crazy – Ian Lurie
• The evolution of ranking signals – David Harry
• Visualising back link data using Venn diagrams – Kelvin Newman
• 15 Tips for harnassing your creativity – Tucker Cummings
• Content based link opportunity analysis – Garrett French
• Crafting real business metrics for link building – Conrad Saam
• Guest blogging: leveraging expertise and influence – Loren Baker
• How to focus on content to create linkbait – Jordan Kasteler
• Link bait: half luck, half skill, half something else – Ian Lurie
• How to rank on page 1 of Google without buying one paid link – Neil Patel
• Beginners guide to link building – Steven Bradley
• Linktoberfest (Infographic) – Vertical Measures
• Link building Monopoly (Infographic) – Linkbuilding.nl

This post, Link Building this Month (07.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Building this Month (03.2010)
   Compared to last month, it’s been relatively quiet in terms of link...

Actually, I even think that link building has become more easy, and especially a lot more fun during the past few years. Sure, it can be different to build links to certain types of websites, and some industries are more polluted with bad links than the Gulf of Mexico currently is with oil, but this just asks for more creativity.

Thinking outside the box, evaluating success from the past, building relationships, or even thinking a bit past the usual tactics while avoiding the most common pitfalls can bring you quite far. In other words: there’s no such thing as advanced link building – it’s simply a mix between creativity, logical thinking and persistence (sometimes with a little bit of help).

And also:

• Real life link building examples from SMX Advanced at Bruce Clay and SEO Gadget
• The myth of volume-based link building – Hugo Guzman
• Why building links is important – Leo Dimilo
• Choosing the right link development strategy – Kieran Flanagan
• Death to the paid link – Ross Hudgens
• Link building opportunities big brands miss – Rishi Lakhani

This post, Link Building this Month (06.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Building this Month (03.2010)
   Compared to last month, it’s been relatively quiet in terms of link...

Sure, there are still many relatively easy ways to get links to your SMB website, or to build links to local websites, but this trend will probably not go away. Link tactic differentiation, of which creatively pursuing .gov links or by building links backwards (a very effective way of content based link building) are just a few examples, is probably more important than it ever was.

And also:

• Link building normalization – Anthony Verre
• The reasonable surfer – Bill Slawski (but please read this one, too)
• What kind of links do you need – Scott Willoughby
• 9 “Reach metrics” for evaluating guest publishing opportunities – Garrett French
• Breathe new life into your emailed link requests – Julie Joyce
• How to use goverment website information to create sticky link bait – Debra Mastaler
• All links are not created equal – Rand Fishkin

This post, Link Building this Month (05.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Building this Month (03.2010)
   Compared to last month, it’s been relatively quiet in terms of link...

The biggest ‘problem’ with tools, however, is that tools can’t do the thinking for you. Tools can provide data, but you’ll have to analyze most data yourself. Tools can provide insights, but you’ll have to draw conclusions yourself. Tools can provide link targets, but you’ll have to do the negotiating and/ or cold calling yourself. Obviously, this is a good thing, as this is the point where creativity comes into play.

And also:

• 6 Steps BEFORE you start link prospecting – Garrett French
• How a search engine may identify undesirable web pages by analyzing inlinks – Bill Slawski
• Paid link noi$e – Julie Joyce
• 29 Queries for content-based link builders – Garrett French
• The definitive guide to web spam – David Harry

PS – If you think I missed one or more interesting link building articles last month, feel free to mention it in the comments ;)

This post, Link Building this Month (04.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Building this Month (03.2010)
   Compared to last month, it’s been relatively quiet in terms of link...

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

This post, Link Building this Month (02.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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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

This post, Link Building this Month (01.2010), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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1. Link Development Training: How Link Building for SEO is Like Picking Up a Girl – Todd Malicoat
Unfortunately, Todd doesn’t write tons of articles anymore, but when he does, they’re usually great. In this post, he explains how he trains new link builders and which tools and approach he uses. Great stuff.

2. 101 Advanced Tips For The Next Time You Buy Text Link Ads – Gab Goldenberg
Even when you don’t buy links, there’s lots of tips you can get out of Gab’s post. Just replace ‘buy’ for ‘talk your way into…’ or ‘offer services/ a discount/ anything else in exchange for…’, and you’re good to go.

3. 21 Tips to Earn Links and Tweets to Your Blog Post – Rand Fishkin
Rand shares 21 great tips for optimizing your content in a way that you maximize its linking potential. Just try to implement all these tips in one of your articles, and you’ll end up with some killer content.

And here’s a few more excellent articles:

General

• Link building ranking factors – SEOmoz
• Why link building may not work – Michael Martinez
• How to buy links with maximum juice and minimum risk – Lisa Barone
• 17 Ways search engines judge the value of a link – Rand Fishkin
• Link building from A to Z – yours truly (yes, I hate including my own stuff, but couldn’t find a good 5th article…)

Finding & evaluating prospects

• 21 Link builders share advanced link building queries – Garrett French
• Link building evaluation guide – David Snyder
• The link builders guide to analyzing SERP dominators for link opportunities – Garrett French
• Link buying: the good, the bad and the ugly – Aaron Wall
• A big bunch of link building ideas – Debra Mastaler

Webmaster outreach

• Link building outreach: 5 steps to maximize the value of every opportunity – Garrett French
• Get your link building requests answered – Mat Siltala
• 10 Tips for requesting link exchanges – Steven Snell
• How to woo a blogger (and get covered) – Lisa Barone
• 10 Reasons why journalists will write about your website – Ken McGaffin

Content & link baiting

• What makes a link worthy post, part 1 and part 2 – Casey Henry
• How to research, create and distribute highly linkable content – Garrett French
• Getting links and content from Flickr – Lisa Barone
• The psychology of a linkbait – Ryan Caldwell
• How to promote good content – Lisa Barone

Most viewed posts of Wiep.net

1. 69 Link building strategies for 2009 (I know, it’s a post from 2008)
2. The perfect link request email template
3. Indispensable link building tools
4. 10 Questions to ask a new link marketing client
5. Advertising strategies that improve your link popularity
6. A good alt is better than a bad anchor
7. SEO Motivators (also a post from 2008)

This basically wraps up 2009. I hope this year has been as good for you as it was for me. All the best wishes for 2010!

This post, Link Building this year, was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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Also, Garrett French’ compilation of dozens of very useful advanced search link building queries was an excellent read. I’m pretty sure that nearly anybody would find at least one new query he or she didn’t think of yet.  And if you didn’t: how about keeping track of (relevant) companies going out of business in your neighborhood, and checking out their link profiles? :)

Everybody and their dog knows that having good content improves your chances of getting good links, but how do you come up with good ideas? Of course, analyzing success stories is a good starting strategy, and from their on, it’s basically just thinking outside the box.

And also:

• 11 Effective, efficient ways to use limited time to build links – Debra Mastaler
• The disproportionate value of deeplinks – Eric Enge
• The new rules of international link building – Andy Atkins Kruger
• The holiday link building blitz: a plan for ecommerce sites – Garrett French
• 10 Reasons why good link builders fail – Angela Moore
• Effective link building, one major ingredient – Lynn Terry
• 7 Ways to maximize your internal linking value – Thinkseer
• How to buy links with maximum juice and minimum risk (Pubcon) – Lisa Barone

Tools:

• I came across Tynt last month, but Patrick Altoft mentioned a similar tool today that’s certainly worth checking out as well: Link building pro.
• Cemper.com’s Link Research Tools will be leaving beta soon. I hope to review some of their tools (along with a few others) later this month.

PS – If you think I missed one or more interesting link building articles last month, feel free to mention it in the comments ;)

This post, Link Building this Month (11.2009), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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Let’s start with one of the best posts I’ve read in a while – Gab’s 101 link buying tips. Whether you buy links or not, there are lots of useful tips in there for everyone!

If you rather not buy your way to the top, you’ll have to learn the art of web promoting. And this art starts by fully understanding why people share stuff with each other, and/ or how you can persuade them into doing so. From there on, you can move on to creating the right content and thinking about the right promotion strategy. The actual contacting of webmasters, either by phone or email, is the last (but also very important) part of the process.

And also:

• SMX East: Ask the linkbuilders – Lisa Barone
• Link building using Delicious – Wil Reynolds
• DMOZ: A solid directory or the great pumpkin of search? – Debra Mastaler
• The anchor text sparsity problem – Bill Slawski
• What is the perfect link? – Michael Martinez
• A marketing role in product development – creating buzz… & links! – Todd Heim
• Recovering from link building mistakes – Eric Ward
• Offer testimonials, get links – Rand Fishkin
• Advanced link building: clone your most successful link profiles – Ken Lyons
• Link building: not just off-page anymore – Julie Joyce
• The best linking expert you can know – Micheal Martinez
• Mining 31,500,000 free links for the take – Ruud Hein
• Google trust rank patent granted – Bill Slawski

PS – Lots of people I talk to about link building are always on the lookout for shortcuts. There. Aren’t. Any. Nifty tools like this come close, but it will always be lots of work.

PPS – Shaun Anderson is giving away free link building ebooks this week. Yes, that’s even more link building tips to digest.

This post, Link Building this Month (10.2009), was published on Wiep's link building blog. Visit the site to read more stuff, or to join the link building conversation.

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