Co-authored by Ken McGaffin and Mark Nunney, the full title of the ebook is Link Building: How to build links to your website for SEO, traffic and response. The book, according to the authors, is “aimed at people at all levels of ability and involvement in web design, publishing and marketing.”

McGaffin and Nunney have succeeded in this goal. If you’re brand new to building links, then you’ll appreciate how the authors have, in one ebook, tied together the:

• importance of quality content
• principles behind successful link building techniques
• need to investigate and understand – and network with –
  your online community
• role that targeted keywords play in this process
• specific tips that will strengthen your link building program

If you’re experienced with the process, but find yourself falling into a rut using the same old, same old link building techniques, use this ebook to renew enthusiasm.

Like anything else in life, you can get into a routine that needs shaken up from time to time. By reading this ebook, we’re certain that you’ll become excited about new strategies and/or different ways to look at your current link building strategies. The checklist at the end of the ebook ties the recommendations together in one handy helpful tool.

The ebook includes an enlightening business case study that shares how Wordtracker successfully obtained thousands of site visitors and links by strategically creating free content and promoting it effectively. Using this business case study as a template, you can tailor your own killer link building strategies.

If you order Link Building, you’ll definitely get your money’s worth.

Check out other ebook reviews given by The Search Guru:

• The Web Content Recipe Book: 21 irresistible content ideas to wow visitors and boost your search engine optimization
• Blogging for Business

The Search Guru received free copies of all three titles for the purpose of writing ebook reviews.

If you have an ebook that you think might interest us for a future review, email Kelly@thesearchguru.com with the title of your book, plus a brief description of its contents.

Follow these link building strategies to get some link love to your site!

Valentine’s Day is an annual reminder that we all need love. Our websites need love, too – link love, that is. But what link building techniques should you use to get that love?

First and foremost, for an effective link building campaign your site should contain fresh and interesting content, otherwise known as “link bait.” If you offer something worth linking to, then other sites will naturally link to your site. Be sure to include your target keyphrases in your content, too.

Checking your competitors’ sites is one of the best link building strategies to get additional link love.

If a site is linking to your competitor, they may be inclined to link to your site as well, if you ask. But how exactly do you find out how many, and which sites, are linking to your competitors?

Link building techniques using Yahoo! Site Explorer: Part 1

In Yahoo! Site Explorer, you can see the number of sites linking to your competitors. Go to http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com, type your competitor’s URL (e.g. http://www.competingsite.com) into the search box, and click “Explore URL.” Then, click the Inlinks button. Choose “Except from this domain” from the first dropdown menu; this will display the number of links coming only from external sites, and will exclude links from other pages in the competitor’s own site.

From the second dropdown menu, choose “Entire Site” to see the number of links going to every page in the competitor’s site:

Or, select “Only this URL” to see the number of links going to the home page only:

Link building techniques using Yahoo! Site Explorer: Part 2

Once you have noted how many links the competing site has compared to your own site, you will want to examine those links to determine if any would be good candidates for your link building campaign. Scan the list of links and click on any you think might be a good fit. The linking site should:

• be relevant to the topic of your site,
• have decent home page PageRank,
• not be a competing site, and
• have less than 100 other outbound links on the page.

In addition, submit your site to The Search Guru’s top 5 most important link directories to help with your link building campaign:

1. Google’s Directory (DMOZ.org)
2. Yahoo!’s Directory (Dir.Yahoo.com)
3. Business Directory (Business.com)
4. Best Of The Web Directory (BOTW.org)
5. JoeAnt Directory (JoeAnt.com)

Put these and other link building strategies to work for your site to increase rankings and traffic. Happy Valentine’s Day from The Search Guru!

How to create a direct linking campaign

First, when crafting an effective link building strategy, consider the types of sites that you would like linking to you. It is best to start with a very narrow focus at first. If you sell pet food, you may want to just focus on sites that talk about toy-sized dogs or Beagles. This narrow focus will help you sift through the chaff better.

Search in a search engine using keywords that relate to that narrow topic. Note the sites that come up for those searches. Create a list of sites from those searches. Check the site for quality. This will be the foundation for how to create a direct linking campaign for your site.

One way link building advice and tips

Now that you have your list of sites, consider the following one way link building advice and tips to entice these sites to link to you:

• An effective link building method is to offer to write a unique article for that site which will link back to your site.
• Supply a free item, like a white paper or coupon that the site might be interested in linking to.
• Offer free products or services for the site to sample or review.
• Simply ask for a link.

Remember this bit of one way link building advice: effective link building is a numbers game. While not every site will link back to you, the more sites you approach, the more links you will get. This brings us to the next question on how to create a direct linking campaign.

When to hire link building services or get a link building package

The process behind link building is pretty easy. Find, contact, rinse, repeat. The problem is that truly effective link building is time consuming. For some niches, as low as a 10% success rate is acceptable but that is a lot of sites to contact – and it takes time.

If you are busy with running your business, you may not have time to do link building. If this is the case, consider hiring link building services or even a basic link building package. I would, of course, prefer that you use The Search Guru for your link building services, but whoever you hire, make sure it is a reputable firm.