There is not a single site that is perfect. All of the sites can use some work and updates. In this post I will show you some of the ways you can improve your website but under 5 minutes. Well at least most of them took me under 5 minutes to go through. They are [...]
In my previous post, I shared How Not To Ask For Links To Your Blog. So well this post, I will be showing you how you can get backlinks to your blog from other bloggers. I have seen that people who are desperate for links are those who are starting out, and they often make mistakes that effect their blog’s reputation significantly.
Some say just write quality content, and you will get links to your blog. But it is really hard to get blogs to link to you when your readership is small. A lot of of my newer posts have no links even though they are one of the better ones. Some of the great tutorials are toward the beginning of the blog. Well this is when you would need to ask other bloggers to link to you. Sounds simple, but it is not.
You must make sure that your content is best of the best if you are approaching one of the top bloggers. Because I certainly won’t link to a post that you wrote in 30 minutes between your break from work.
Find out whether the blog links out. Some blogs never link out whereas others link out almost all the time. Take Engadget for example. They link out just about every time. Then there are blogs that have weekly link roundups. My Blog, and several other blogs in the blogosphere. Then there are ones that never link out. So you would be wasting your time if you pitch a story to someone who never links out.
Learn the blog inside out. You need to know what type of stories they link to, how they link to them and more. The more you know the better you will be prepared. The more prepared you are, your chances of getting a backlink would be higher. Some blogs even present you with methods to pitch them stories with contact forms dedicated to story submissions, so make sure you look around.
Don’t expect a webmaster blog to link to your blog if you run a real estate blog. So only suggest posts that are highly relevant to their website. So don’t bother if your story isn’t relevant because not only you will waste your time, but you will waste the other blogger’s time.
Don’t just go out and promote all of your posts. Save it for your best posts. Because I definitely don’t want to link to your blog every week unless you have a best post every week. Hint: Always think of your post from other blogger’s perspective.
Don’t email bloggers asking for links to your blog. Ask them to link to your article. Remember if someone comes to your article, he is coming to your site, so it is actually better than getting a link to your homepage.
Write guest posts for bloggers. I always welcome guest bloggers on Balkhis. Your chances of getting your post approved would be even more if you attach pictures with it because you will save bloggers a lot of time. Also since guest posts are mutually beneficial, your chances of getting approved is much higher.
Use their name, show that you know their blog etc. Remember no one likes a Kiss ASS. However be careful when doing this to multiple blogs – you don’t want to personalize an email and then send it to the wrong blogger – major embarrassment! Always be polite in your email, and make it brief. Always include details that will help them. Save them time and get to the point. No need to make the email long.
Often times people ignore some of the B, C, D list bloggers because they think they won’t get a lot of traffic from them. So they only pitch to the bigger bloggers. Half of the times their requests get rejected. You need to think that if you get about 30 small blogs get approved, you will have 30 links and more users.
Now if you follow the steps above you will be likely to get more links. Always remember that if a blogger links to you, then you make better relationship with them. Always keep in touch with them, so it does not seem like that you always come to them when you need something. Enjoy more links for your blog.
New blogs are popping up left and right. There are thousands of blogs that claim to teach you how to make money online. There are hundreds of bloggers that are self-proclaimed web experts. Each blogger is trying to get the most traffic, most backlinks, and the most credibility. There are certain popular figures like Darren Rowse, Shoemoney, and others. At the same time there are new coming in the industry. So you get to ask a question how do new blogs get famous? Well they get links from other bloggers and that is how their reader base increases. I have been started to receive this sort of emails quiet a lot, so I have decided to mention here on my blog how not to ask for a backlink to your blog.
Here is what these emails sound like:
My name is XXX XXXX and I’m a great fan of Balkhis! Balkhis inspired me to create my own blog. I would like to share my knowledge as an entrepreneur with other entrepreneurs. Since linkbuiliding is very important, I want to ask you if you want to trade links with me. If so, please answer me and I will put a link to your site on my homepage, so you can link back to me!
Never ever ever ask a blogger to trade links with you if you are starting a blog. Specially one that is already well known. You know why? Because he or she will turn you down. Before you ask for trading links you need to consider:
What do you get if they link to you?
What will they get if they link to you?
Who is getting the most benefit?
If the benefit is not mutual, then you will not get a link. But it will prove one thing for sure. That you are an idiot for asking. You want to start a web developers blog claiming yourself an expert and then begging for a link? Doesn’t really sound like an expert.
Another thing wrong with the email above is Kissing Ass. No one like Kiss Ass except for another Kiss Ass. I obviously won’t consider you as a special case if you put you are a great balkhis fan. So never ever start of saying that you are a big fan of them. Because by saying that you already put yourself below them.
Even though you need a link, you do not need to make yourself inferior. Try to stay on same ground.
Never ask a link for your main site. Because only idiots will link to your main site without knowing you. Blogroll links are usually bought or linked to special friends. If I don’t know, I won’t link to you.
These are the few things that I can think of right now of how not to ask for backlinks. Keep updated with my blog because in the next post I will show you how to ask for a link.
So people ask me, Syed which plugins are you using on your blog. Why my blog is more SEO Friendly? That doesn’t really have a whole lot to do with my plugins. Well not entirely, but I will make a list for all of you guys just in case you were curious. So after this post, do not email me asking me about what plugins I am using. I will list the plugins, hopefully with the download link and I will provide you some tips if I have any, and the reasons why I use them.
Check my other article on How to protect your blog from hackers?
I wrote a post about Killing a Giant Lion Turtle with your site’s load time
That is my list of plugins that I use. Hopefully this have helped you guys. There are tons of other great plugins out there that you can use. These are not the only ones. Always look for additional ones as your needs require. Do not email me this question again because I swear I got so many that I thought that I must make this, so I don’t answer the questions individually.
Well last night, I was going through my spam folder which was about 340 some comments. I came across a few known names. Well these names were my regular readers specially those who are in my top commentator’s list. So without noticing, I de-spammed those comments. Usually what I do is, I de-spam the comment if it sounds genuine, and then when I go to the comment page, I try to reply to them.
The reason why I marked them not spam was because I know these were my regular readers. They each had a new website, so I thought they just started a new website and want to promote that. Since I was going through 340 comments, I was sort of rushing. So I didn’t check which IP address this comment was from.
Now here we are talking about multiple comments about 12 that were from my regular readers, or so I thought. Silvia, Ann Harbor Web Design, and Nicole Price. If you notice they are actually in my top commentator list. They are ranked among the top 3.
Well after I marked them not spam along with a lot others, I came back to reply to them. These comments were so genuine, but they were all on one post. So the spammer basically replied about my recent posts, on one of my very high ranked / good PR post with different links. Now since the comments were about recent posts, I didn’t think it was spam.
But when I saw all 12 comments were on that one post, I realized I was caught in a spam trap. Anyways, I had to mark those comments as spam again.
I did notice that they were all from the same IP, just different emails after the fact. So I eneded up disallowing that IP Address.
But that was a clever technique whoever tried. It got me for a few minutes, but than I realized, so next time try harder.
I thought I should let you guys know if you get something like this, so you know what to do.
Hey, I am Syed Balkhi, The guy who is behind Balkhis Inc. I entered the industry back in 2002 not knowing a single thing. I barely spoke English at that time. In the past six years, my language barrier has been eliminated. Aside from English, now I also speak html, and php. Along with the languages I have also managed to master a few arts. Art of web-designing started when I first entered. Messing around with photoshop, I learned how to create my first web design. Now I founded a web designing firm Uzzz Productions. After running numerous amount of websites in various niche, I have mastered the art of web-development. Now I am compiling a resource of what I already know, and what I am learning on this blog. This resource is to help me if I ever need a guide to look back to, and it is help my fellow webmasters.
