Creating effective link bait is an art and valuable skill that can generate visibility for your website. If you’re an experienced web builder , just getting your feet wet, or just wondering how all of this link baiting business works, here are some tips to help you get started creating content that people won’t be able to help but link to!
1.You have to have a good hook to draw people in!
I’m speaking of titles here of course, which are the first order of business for creating effective bait. You need an attractive title that will catch attention for you. You want to be succinct with your title but targeted toward your desired audience, with keywords that are specific to your actual topic. This way there’s no ambiguity, people know from a quick glance that this link is for them and is going to give them exactly the information they want, otherwise they will move on to a more attractive link. If you want to learn more about making your title stand out from the crowd, visit SEOsmarty for some great ideas.
2.Focus on a specific, relevant topic your audience will relate to.
The biggest key to creating good link bait is finding your topic. Any topic has the potential to become link bait, but what you’re after is something that is or will be generating a good bit of interest. What do people want to know about and talk about? Some techniques that have been employed include creating pages about breaking news stories, or creating a post on the hottest new movie of the season for some examples. The important thing is that you hone in on a specific topic that people want to read about and that is useful for them. For more information on how to create hot topics visit WIEP.net.
3.Don’t skimp on quality and take your time.
Related to the above is the fact that effective link bait is something that people can actually use or find interest in, how else are you going to entice people to link to you? Take your time, do your research, put some effort into your writing. Searchenginewatch.com has some useful ideas for creating quality link bait.
4.Don’t be obvious.
It will become quickly obvious to those in the know that you’re purposefully trying to create link bait and as such, you won’t be generating many hits. So again, go for quality information before obvious marketing and the links will come. For some more examples of baiting successes and failures check out Thirsty Pony.
5.Don’t be afraid to be controversial or draw upon emotions.
This is pretty well self explanatory. Sometimes things that create the most buzz are things that take a challenging or controversial tone, getting people involved in the discussion. Appealing to people’s emotions on a specific topic never hurts to draw them in either. What you want are readers who feel personally involved so they are likely to take the discussion elsewhere and link back to you. SmasHits.com has some relevant thoughts on the topic of controversy.
6.Get others involved.
Don’t hesitate to create content then go out to others who write on similar topics and let them know you’d value their feedback. Also, don’t be afraid to link to these people or discuss them in your article. Yes, it’s fishing, but if you don’t go about it in an annoying or horrifically obvious way, it will draw people in and help your cause. Visit Dailyblogtips.com for some more thoughts on getting others involved in your link bait.
7.Provide links for work cited.
Again, this is pretty self explanatory and part of not being too obvious or transparent in your goal. You want it to be obvious you have taken care and time in putting together your content and providing links to the work that helped you create it only helps your case, besides being good writing practice. For some ideas on link bait research, see 10e20.com.
8.Make the content attractive and easy to share.
Formatting is important and should be easy to follow and pleasing to the eye. It never hurts to spruce up your posts with graphics and to make it easy for others to share your posts by providing buttons for easy posting to places like Facebook and Digg. For tips on how to spruce up your link bait using social bookmarking check out doshdosh.com.
9.Employ creative means.
There are all sorts of gimmicks and gadgets you can use for creating effective bait. Some means that have been employed include polls, contests, giving away free items like graphics, products or web tools. Use your imagination! For some ideas on how to use quizzes as bait for an example of this technique, visit searchenginejournal.com.
10.Make use of lists and keep content easy to digest.
In the age of the three paragraph news story, people like to get their information in the easiest and quickest format possible. Lists are easy to employ and easy to follow and will get the job done. Doshdosh.com once again has the best examples and explanation for this resource baiting technique.
Author Resource:
MrCyberSmartWeb- For more information, free videos and podcasts, be sure to check out my marketing resource website: http://www.cybersmartwebmarketing.com/ Your "How To" WordPress Business Web Development Resource Center For my review on the best hosting service that I have used,
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