What is "Link Bait" and
How Do I Create It?
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This is a
cool term
that I
picked up in
an intense
Webmaster's
forum. I
fancy myself
a reasonably
talented SEO
marketer.
I've never
used Google
Adwords or
any other
PPC
advertising
and I'm
well-schooled
on
traditional
as well as
Web 2.0
search
engine
optimization
strategies.
I can definitely say that Web 2.0 methods are a lot easier and a lot more fun than the tedious traditional methods. What is the #1 thing that you need to get higher rankings in the search engines? Backlinks to your site. The more links to your site, the better your rankings, in a nutshell. There are of course other factors such as the linking site's pagerank, whether or not it's a reciprocal link, and the anchor text used--just to name a few of the biggies. So what exactly is this "link bait" and how do you make it? Link bait is the kind of content that makes people want to link to it naturally. No link trading, nothing in return. Just content so good that people just want to be connected with it somehow. So how do you create this kind of content that we call link bait? Well, you can give them what they were looking for such as news and solid information. If you become known as a reliable source of information, people will link to you whether they use your articles, link to you from their blogs, or bookmark you in the social bookmarking sites for example. Another way to create link bait is to stir your reader's emotion. Make them laugh, make them angry, scare them. Post the kind of content that makes people say: "Did you read so and so's article? I can't believe she said THAT!" Create a controversy, if you can back up what you're saying on the matter. Go against the grain. It's ok to have your own opinions. As long as they're well-founded, you should tell the world about them. That is what the "new web" is all about. Now go start a commotion or share your wealth of knowledge and create some instant link bait.
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