Links are the currency of the search engines. Without good inbound links to your web site, your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts will be in vain. Link building is arguably the most difficult, most misunderstood, and most poorly executed aspect to SEO. Join SEO and link-building expert Stephan Spencer as he guides us through the quagmire and shows us the way to great search engine rankings. What Will You Learn? •Google's PageRank score: red herring or useful metric? •What makes a link valuable or not •Creative strategies for building link-worthy content •What works when approaching webmasters with link requests •Dangers and pitfalls of buying or bartering links •The power of anchor text and how best to leverage it •The role of authorities, hubs, and topical relevance •How to leverage blogs and social media for link building

1. Google in the Real World:
How Links Boost Your Rankings
Stephan Spencer
Co-Author of The Art of SEO; Author of Google
Power Search; Founder of Netconcepts

2. First Off... Who Am I?
• Author of Google Power Search &
Co-author of The Art of SEO
• Founder of SEO agency Netconcepts
• Sold Netconcepts to Covario in 2010
• Lived in New Zealand for 8 yrs, returned to US in
2007
• Invented GravityStream, a pay-for-performance SEO
technology (now Covario’s Organic Search Optimizer)
• Now a free agent, developing an SEO coaching
program which will launch soonish

5. Links & PageRank
 “Link popularity” affects search engine rankings
 Links are lPageRank – Links from “important”
sites have more impact on your Google rankings
(weighted link popularity).
 Google offers a window into your PageRank
– PageRank meter in the Google Toolbar
(toolbar.google.com) & 3rd party tools like SEO for
Firefox are all powered by Google’s Toolbar Server
 Bing/Yahoo has similar measure to PageRank
 Excellent alternative to PageRank score: mozRank
(SEOmoz’ Open Site Explorer)

6. PageRank 101 10 Google
Sampling of Homepage
PageRank Ratings
 Logarithmic scale from 0 to 10
 Assigned to web pages, not sites 9 Amazon
 Based on inbound links to pages
 Heavily weighted on link quality E
8 ebay
 Passed through internal & F
external links. F
 Higher PageRank may lead 7 O Disney
Googlebot to: R
– Crawl more frequently 6 T Gap
– Crawl faster
– Crawl deeper 5 Culligan
4 Boston
3 Store
Relative number of pages with PR rating
2
1
0

7. Logarithmic Nature of PageRank

8. The Best Links for SEO Are…
• Topically relevant
• One way (not reciprocated)
• Not in footer and not site-wide
• Earned by merit, rather than bought, bartered or
stolen
• Not crowded with many other links on the page
• On a highly trusted, authority site with a long
history and in a pristine link neighborhood

9. And They…
• Have descriptive anchor text but not the same
descriptive anchor text
• Appear to be passively obtained/organic
• Are not all found on the same IP block
• Are not all found on the same top level domain
(.com, .org, .edu, etc)

10. Building High Quality Links
• Develop great content
• Submit to authoritative, topical, & local
directories
• Work with your business partners
• Do competitive intelligence
• Link bait
• Tap into social media
• Blog
• Syndicate through RSS

11. Checking Link Popularity
• To a page vs. to a site
• Third party tools:
– OpenSiteExplorer.org
– MajesticSEO.com
– LinkResearchTools.com
• Google's link: operator displays only a sampling of backlinks.
– Note: the operator also works in Google Blog Search, and there it is much
more comprehensive
• Google Webmaster Central only provides backlink data for your
own site (if you're verified)

12. Checking PageRank
• Google Toolbar for IE or Firefox
– Download it from toolbar.google.com
• Third party tools that query Google's Toolbar
Server, pretending to be the Google Toolbar
– SEO for Firefox
– etc.
• Get historical PageRank scores SEOmoz Historical
PageRank Checker tool

13. Google Toolbar

14. Problems with the PageRank Meter
• Take the PageRank scores with a grain of salt
• PageRank scores are merely indicative
• Scores displayed in the PageRank meter are:
– Months old
– Imprecise
– Not the same as the PageRank as what is used in Google's
ranking algorithm
– Not representative of the home page PageRank when a
redirect is present
• An alternative to checking toolbar PageRank
– SEOmoz's mozRank and mozTrust (OpenSiteExplorer.org)

15. 15

16. Find Link Targets
• Review links of competitive sites, sites in your
keyword market
– Use the tools just mentioned and will mention later in
this session
– Check sites with high rankings for relevant keywords
– The fewer the number of links on their page, the
better
• Review links to your site; look for opportunities to
get the link text revised

17. Competitive Intelligence
• These tools aren't just good for finding link
targets
• They're invaluable for uncovering competitors'
dodgy practices
– E.g. Unraveling the mystery of Findgiftcards.com
commanding the #1 spot for “gift certificates”
• It's also just good to know where they're getting
the bulk of their PageRank from

18. Link Analysis & Research
• Very hard to do without the appropriate tools
• For example...
– LinkResearchTools.com
– OpenSiteExplorer.org
– MajesticSEO.com
– Raven (raven-seo-tools.com)
– Advanced Link Manager (advancedlinkmanager.com)
– Back Link Analyzer (tools.seobook.com/backlink-
analyzer/)

19. Link Intelligence –
OpenSiteExplorer.org

20. Link Intelligence –
OpenSiteExplorer.org

21. Link Intelligence –
OpenSiteExplorer.org

22. Link Intelligence –
MajesticSEO.com

23. Link Intelligence –
MajesticSEO.com

24. Link Intelligence –
LinkResearchTools.com

25. Link Intelligence –
LinkResearchTools.com

26. Link Intelligence –
LinkResearchTools.com

27. Link Intelligence –
LinkResearchTools.com

28. Link Baiting
• Offer a niche-specific blogroll, tool, How-To, or
compilation of news stories
• Post a scoop
• Expose a story as flawed or a fraud
• Be a contrarian about a story, product, or
prominent blogger's opinion
• Be humorous. Good topics include a bizzare pic of
your subject, “10 things I hate about…”, and “You
know you're a when…” Source: Performancing

29. Link Baiting
• Publish or commission some original research
• Creative-Commons-license photos you made of
an event you're blogging about
• Make available for free a theme, plugin or piece
of software
• Start a meme that others can replicate and that
links back to you (e.g. buttons/stickers/tools for
bloggers/webmasters to post on their
sites, contests, quizzes, surveys, etc.)
Source: Performancing

30. Memes
• A “meme” is a “copy me” instruction backed
up by threats and/or promises
– e.g. chain letters
– “5 things you didn’t know about me”
– “Which superhero are you?”

31. So… Get Creative!
• Give awards / recognition
– Badges with link text underneath
• Allow webmasters to republish your articles
– Require a link in your byline
• Publish unique content
– Podcasts (e.g. SteveSpangler.com)
– Screencasts (use TechSmith's Camtasia Studio)
– Wikis (e.g. SEOGlossary.com)

32. So… Get Creative!
• Run contests
– E.g. Design Shoemoney's business card, win business cards for life
• Offer useful tools for webmasters, such as…
– Hit counters
• E.g. NOT 123counters.com
– Weather stickers
• E.g. Wunderground.com, SuperPages.com
– RSS feeds
• Lottery winning numbers from SuperPages.com

36. Blogging for Links
• Search engines – and Google in particular – love blogs
• Inherently link-rich
– “Hat tips” – part of blog etiquette
– Blogrolls
– RSS feeds
– Trackbacks
– Comments
• Blogs are a great platform from which to launch linkbait campaigns
• The dark side of the blogosphere:
– Blog comment spam
– Splogs (spam blogs)

37. Don’t Forget RSS Feeds
• An unspammable content delivery channel to your
consumers AND to the linkerati, as well as…
• A powerful way to syndicate your content to other
web sites
– Propagate deep links that drive traffic and PageRank
– Careful! Some spammers lift your content from your RSS
feeds, strip out the links, and use as keyword-rich content
• “You should be fired if you do a marketing site
without an RSS feed.” - Robert Scoble

38. Don’t Forget RSS Feeds
• What will help subscribers keep their finger on
the pulse of your industry and compel
webmasters to disseminate to their visitors?
– News alerts, latest specials, clearance items,
upcoming events, new arrivals, new articles, new
tools & resources, search results, a book’s revision
history, top 10 best sellers, project management
activities, forum/listserv posts, recently added
downloads, …
– For blogs: latest posts, latest posts by category,
latest comments per post, …

39. Slashdot
headlines
syndicated
on
Nanodot.org
39

40. The top result
was thanks to
syndication via
RSS
40

41. Wikis
• Contribute to Wikipedia
– Build up your street cred (virtuous contribution history, user
profile) before doing anything at all self-serving. A link on a
high-profile article is worth gold, as it builds your credibility &
visibility with journalists and bloggers
• Contribute to other wikis
– e.g. the NewPR Wiki (thenewpr.com), the WordPress Codex
(http://codex.wordpress.org/Search_Engine_Optimization_for_
Wordpress), ShopWiki, Web 2.0 Expo conference wiki
• Create your own wiki (e.g. SEOGlossary.com)

43. Link Baiting – Viral Content
• Quizzes/Personality Tests:
– How Many Five Year Olds Can You Take On in a Fight
– Which Superhero Are You?
• Widgets:
– Swicki
– SeenOn.com Grey's
Anatomy

46. Link Baiting – Viral Content
• Microsites:
– Gizoogle.com
– CounterfeitMini.com
– MentosIntern.com
– AngryLeprechaun.com
– SEO Eye for the Google Guy (Queer Eye
spoof, makeover team optimizes Matt Cutts' blog)

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51. Link Baiting – Utilities
• Write a WordPress plugin
– Netconcepts' “SEO Title Tag” plugin
(www.netconcepts.com/seo-title-tag-plugin) was the most
successful link bait we've ever done
– Netconcepts' “WordPress Quiz” plugin for personality tests
(www.netconcepts.com/wordpress-quiz-plugin/). Example site:
quizfanatic.com
• Write a Firefox extension
– Aaron's Walls' “SEO for Firefox”
• Release software as Open Source

52. “Seeding” Linkbait
• Leverage social media by seeding your linkbait
into social networks like
Facebook, YouTube, StumbleUpon, Digg, etc.
• Every social network / community has its own
unique opportunities, quirks and anomalies.
• Link baiting is most effective when you have
something viral to spread (such as a meme).
52

53. Viral Videos & YouTube
• Be creative but unpolished
– Eepybird’s Bellagio Fountain of Diet Coke + Mentos
– BlendTec’s “Will It Blend?”
– Heroes spoof commercial (“Zeroes”) – an NBC
creation
– John Cleese Backup Trauma webisode
– Intuit’s “Tax Rap” content
• Read this:
http://multichannelmerchant.com/ecommerce/o
ptimizing_videos_youtube/

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56. Leveraging Social Media
• Seed linkbait into social news (e.g. Digg) & social
bookmarking (e.g. Delicious) sites
• News articles, blog posts, photos, etc. identified
by enough “shout outs” by users
– Digg, Reddit, Newsvine, Mixx, Kirtsy, Techmeme,
Shoutwire, etc.
– StumbleUpon is a bit different. More like channel-
surfing on your TV
• Votes push the good stuff up to the front page
• Popurls.com is an aggregator of the most popular
stuff from many of these social sites

57. Leveraging Social Media
• Strip away all commercial links during the initial social
media swarm
• Friend popular users. Better yet, get a popular user
(power user) to submit your story.
– Consult the Top 100 list of Diggers
(http://socialblade.com/digg/topusers.html)
• Time your presence to go popular for daylight hours
• Craft a killer title using this formula from Muhammad
Saleem: number + adjective + key phrase
– E.g. “13 Most Chilling Haunted Hotels” or “16 Incredibly
Unconventional Hotel Rooms”

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59. Q&A
• What can you do tomorrow that will improve your
link popularity? Write down 3 things. Get ‘em done!
• Remember: you eat an elephant one bite at a time
• To contact me: stephan@stephanspencer.com
• To get a copy of this slide deck and an SEO Myths
whitepaper, email admin@stephanspencer.com