Austin SEO Meetup 4/1/09 with BuzzStream

My Link Building Story

My Experience The first million visitors are the hardest

What You Need
A good story
What does your site offer that's unique?
The most… the only…. the largest
What problem does your site solve?
Basic writing & persuasion skills
Industry knowledge
Basic on-site optimization
Crawler-friendly
Good URL structure
Page optimizations (good unique titles, meta tags, kw density, etc.)

Our Strategies
Content Promotion
Link Requests
PR for Link Building

Srategy 1: Content Promotion 1.0
What we did
Forums
Usenet news
Emailing friends
Printable flyers and postcards to apt renters
Link exchanges
Industry associations
Awards
Directories
“ Do follow” site sponsorships (quasi paid link)

Content Promotion 2.0
What I'd do today...
Biz dev (n-way link exchanges with trusted partners)
Blogging
Twitterhawk (Twitter search + automated Tweets)
Widgets
Relevant “do follow” blog comments
Facebook Connect (announce users’ activity to friends)
Wikis
Indirectly-Paid Links (contests, donations, paid reviews)

Strategy 2: Link Requests
Co-citation/hubs
.edu sites
Similar category, not competitive

Link Requests: co-citation/hubs
A site that links to multiple of your competitors
Free way to find...
Google search: linkdomain:competitorA.com linkdomain:competitorB.com -linkdomain:yoursite.com
Paid way to find...
SEOBook Hub Finder
SEOMoz Linkscape

Link Requests: .edu sites
.edu's are high authority
Webmasters will add legitimately valuable resources
Google search: linkdomain:competitorA.com linkdomain:competitorB.com -linkdomain:yoursite.com site:.edu
Research, research, research
Understand who you're contacting
Who is responsible? Web editor, web admin, department secretary, director of department

Link Requests: similar category sites
Find related sites that don't compete
Your site likely has 2 topics
My topic: apartment + city
Real estate > Rentals > Apartments
US > State > City
Go up 1 conceptual level and combine: City + Real Estate
Give us a link, get free ad impressions
“ Join our directory of realtors who help Denver first time home buyers!”
Self-serve system to generate the correct geo-specific anchor text + deep backlink

Link Requests: How To Pitch
Research site owner – find a person
Track your prospects
URL, PageRank, name, email, Twitter ID, Linkedin
Personalized email “Hi Mary, I was wondering if you could point me in the right direction... who is responsible for the Dept of Urban Studies website?”
BE HUMAN
Use multiple channels (Linkedin, Twitter, Email, Phone, US mail)
3 tries, 2 channels, then move on
Tools: Twellow, Zabasearch, Broadlook Diver

Strategy 2: PR-SEO
PR for Link Building
Blogger outreach

PR-SEO – PR for Link Building
Coverage in mainstream media
Newspapers and TV
Very high influence links
Reporters expect to be pitched
Website owners and bloggers may get huffy
You don't always get a link
Approach many
Pitch your website, not your company
Bloggers often cover news stories

PR-SEO – Finding Reporters
Find reporters via news monitoring
Be creative “ your landlord ” “ apartment rents ” “ vacancy rate ” “ facing eviction ”
Look for competitors & complements: Zillow, Trulia
Segment your contacts
Real estate beat reporters local/natl, Tech reporters, Multi-family industry trade press, Lifestyle/personal finance, Local interest, Startup/Web 2.0

PR-SEO – Finding Reporters
Tools
Google Alerts, Topix.net, Technorati, Trackur, Vibemetrix, Filtrbox
Factiva (historical news), free via APL http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/library/databases.htm
EBSCO (industry trade pubs), free to UT students

PR-SEO – Reporter Research
Research and record
Name, email, phone, publication, category, city
Relevant story
Recent coverage
Tools
Daylife
Media Bistro
Vocus/Cision/PR Newswire
Search: twittering journalists
Broadlook Diver

PR-SEO - Pitching
When you find a reporter...
Short intro/elevator pitch for your site (100 words)
When you have news...
Do NOT send one-size-fits-all press releases
Write a version for each segment
Email each reporter personally, 1-line informal intro
Paste your segment-specific story at the end
Tools
Bad Pitch Blog

PR-SEO What to Pitch
News is...
Major company news – round of VC, big client win
New product features
Apartments + Sex Offenders + Google Maps
Industry Calendar + Google Calendar
Top 20 Best Cities for X
Whatever is new/shiney (Facebook, iPhone/Android app)
Someone else's news where you're relevant
Zillow home valuations ... “What the Neighbors Pay”
Evergreen research tools – rent pricing trend graphs

PR-SEO - Blogger Relations
Rules of Engagement
#1 Must be personalized & relevant
#2 Follow instructions
Sometimes giving bloggers stuff is ok (never ok for reporters)
#3 Build a relationship
Comment on their blog (add value)
Find, follow, and engage via Twitter
Email them via their preferred method
Beware of the the PR blacklist
Lifehacker, Chris Anderson

Additional Resources
Laura's presentation http://www.slideshare.net/LauraAlter/linkbuilding-presentation
Wiep.net, The Perfect Link Request
http://wiep.net/talk/link-building/link-request-email-template/
WebInkNow, How to Pitch the Media http://www.webinknow.com/2007/02/how_to_pitch_th.html

BuzzStream for Link Building
CRM for link prospects
Automates contact info & metics research
Create campaigns based on advanced searches
Tracking outreach
Tracking payments
Backlink checker
Team coordination/sharing

The Link Building Process Find Prospects Review site Research contact info Research metrics Record in spreadsheet Personalized outreach Record in spreadsheet Check for link Make outreach list Lookup previous outreach

The BuzzStream Process Find Prospects Review site BuzzMark It Personalized outreach Advanced Search

BuzzMarker
Prospects
Existing links
Paid links

Link Prospect CRM

Advanced Search

Outreach Tracking

Track Link Payments

Backlink Checker

Thanks! Free private beta invites for SEO Meetup http://kl.am/M7 Jeremy Bencken Co-founder, BuzzStream [email_address] Twitter: @jeb512 Note, capital “M”

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Austin SEO Meetup 4/1/09 with BuzzStream

by Jeremy Bencken on Apr 02, 2009

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Austin SEO Meetup 4/1/09 with BuzzStream — Presentation Transcript