Optimize 3.0 Inbound Marketing Blog

Link Strategies for High Quality Links

Posted by Doug Kirk  Sep 20, 2011 2:33:00 PM

I recognize there are a range of link strategies, but during the Hubspot User Group Summit last week I came across an amazingly simple and effective way to garner high quality links.  Much thanks to Andy Pitre for this.  I’ve seen a bunch of link strategies, but this is so easy and made so much sense I wanted to share (and add a little tweak).  Mind you, there’s work involved and it will take time, but if there’s that one or two magic keywords you really need this may be the answer.  Here’s a step by step guide:

1) Chose your keyword.  Put that into Google search and see the first 10 results that come up.  I’ll do this for a very competitive keyword “Link Building.”

link building strategies for high quality links 

 2)   Put each URL of the first 10 organic ranking sites for the keyword into Hubspot’s Link Grader tool (this can also be done in Opensite Explorer; a freemium tool from SEOMoz).   This can be used to display the sites linking to the sites that rank for your keyword. This is the key. You want to identify the sites that link directly to the sites with the highest rank for your targeted keyword.  These sites have provided the SEO juice to get your competition to their Google organic position.  For my example, I'll use the URL www.backlinkbuild.com and put that into the Link Grader.

Hubspot link grader tool

3)      Now in the Link Grader filter type in “blog.”  This will display all of the blog sites that link to the site that ranks for your keyword.  Determining if these sites are blogs is important because they’re always on the lookout for good content.   This is the underlying principle that allows you to build links.  As you can see below bloguay.com looks spot on. 

 Hubspot link grader tool for high quality links

4)      Now you need to do some investigation about these blogs you want the links from.  Put this into Google search: site:www.siteurl.com guest post.  This  identifies if the blog has any guest posts.  Should the term turn up, you know the site accepts guest blog posts in return for links.  In the below example it appears that bloguay.com has many guest blog posters.

site search for specific terms resized 600

 

5)    Look for the contact page of the blog.  Craft a one or two paragraph email to send to the blogger that runs the site.  This email explains you’re looking to blog about your keyword topic in exchange for a one or two SEO friendly links back to your site.  Most bloggers of this nature are happy to get good content, so if you’ve got something decent to share there’s a good chance you’ll get the links in return.  

6)    Craft a blog post about your keyword topic.  Keep it to 300 to 500 words.  Try to be as informative as possible.  You need to create a blog "post worthy."  You might even want to share a brief overview from the post in your upfront email. Important note: When you get the guest blog post lined up you want "SEO-friendly" links.  By “SEO-friendly” I mean that the URL anchor text pointing back to your site contains the keyword you want to rank for.   Here's an example:  The link back to you has the keyword in it “lead generation” rather than “click here for lead generation.”          

7)      Here's a tip.  Writing 30 or more blog posts may be too much.  Run your original blog post through spinner software such as The Best Spinner.  If you use this powerful tool correctly the software allows you to create numerous versions of your blog post.  Saves time and avoids duplicate content issues.  

8)      Finally, you can repeat this procedure by going back another link layer.  These are the sites that link to the sites that link to the sites that rank for your keyword.  This opens up another valuable layer of link opportunities. 

It will take a bit of time.  But this is one of the best link strategies out there.   You’re building high quality links from the very same domains that got your competitors ranked for that all important keyword.

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Topics: hubspot, Link Building, seo