Today we are looking at an overview of linking strategies.  We lay down a foundation for the correct mindset of what we should do.

The Foundation

First of all, there is little else that I like least in the world of site marketing than ‘begging’ a site to link to mine. It’s demeaning, it feels like begging and I won’t do it. There are too many good ways to accomplish this.

Now again, let’s recap why we want to have links pointing to our site - the bottom line is that search engines love them. So they are necessary if we are going to garner that easy, FREE traffic from the organic search engine results.

Today, we are going to address some of the common reasons site owners/manager might resist linking to your site.

Website Traffic is the lifeblood of any internet site. If you sell the greatest widgets in the world, and yet no one comes into your ’store’, you will starve. 

So….

When you have visitors coming to your site, you covet them and appreciate them because they could have gone to a million other sites.

What you just read is true and is the mindset of most website owners and managers.

So now, here you come asking for an Inbound Link…

Your site pages are judged by search engines in two primary ways. 

First, by the number of Inbound Links from other relevant sites and second, by the page’s optimization. 

If your site pages have a ton of inbound links and are optimized properly, you won’t be able to beat away the FREE traffic.  Google, Yahoo, MSN, etc will drive it relentlessly to your door. 

Today, we are going to talk about obtaining Inbound Links.

Obtaining Inbound Links is a challenging part of this business, but they are really crucial for your success.

Adland Pro - A Free Classifieds Site

I have been using a great classified ad site to advertise my various ventures called Adland Pro (http://adlandpro.com) for about 3 years now.  The great part is I’ve never spent a dime, but I continue to get traffic, month after month.  Now, mind you, it’s not a waterfall of traffic - but more of a slower trickle, but FREE is FREE.

Adland Pro offers free classifieds as a teaser to entice you to spend money with them on advertising upgrades - but I’ve never felt the need to, especially with some of the narrow niches that I’ve been focusing on.

There are many, many ways to drive FREE traffic to your Blog.

The technique that I’m going to show you is wonderful because it is very natural and organic, and adds content to the internet, which helps everyone.

Posting to Yahoo/Google Forums

This technique isn’t unique and certainly isn’t new, but it is very effective and FREE to do.  I have used this technique with great success.

What is a Forum?

It’s really nothing more than an online ‘meeting place’, usually organized around a certain theme.  And there are a myriad of themes and forums - everything from cat grooming to lawnmower repair.

Can Podcasting Hurt You in Search Engine Rankings?

The short answer to this is yes and no.

Search Engine Rankings are a function of Page Optimization and Site Popularity and are centered on your webpage’s content and how the words on your page match up with what a person types into a search engine ’search’.

For example, if you have a webpage about the pros and cons of certain types of cat food, you most likely have text on your page about dry cat food, wet cat food, raw meat, etc.  When a search engine spider scans you page, it will index on the predominant terms on your page - ‘wet cat food’, ‘dry cat food’, etc.  It will then match up its index results to customer’s search phrase.

I stumbled upon a wonderful piece of software a couple of years ago that I’ve used for a whole host of audio purposes, including podcasting - it’s called Audacity (and it’s FREE).

Audacity is very powerful because it allows you to record multiple tracks which give you the ability to easily add additional audio clips to your main podcast file.  If you want to add some intro or outro music, you can put them on the two different tracks, separate from the main track.

Welcome back.  In our last issue, I demonstrated a longer article-type of blog posting.  In this issue, we are going to look at a shorter-type of blog posting.

Short Posting

Remember, the key to a successful blog is frequent, other’s-centered posting.  The internet audience world has a very short attention span and if you ‘leave’ them, they will eventually ‘leave’ you. 

Also, people are looking for humanity on the web - a touch.  Talk to your visitors respectfully and warmly.  Also, give them a way to respond back to you.  Most blogs have comment boxes on a particular post, however, you may want to erect a contact form or give an email address - this encourages dialog - a relationship if you will.

I hope you found the "Good Keywords" tool helpful.  Did you get a chance to create a blogger.com account yet?  If not, then go do that now.

Today, I am going to show you how to write a post.  There is nothing magical about writing posts - they can be formal, informal, whatever your style is.  The thing to remember about posting is it’s not about you.  Self-centered blogs rarely last very long.  You are trying to help someone with your vast knowledge and experience - in this case, in "babysitting."

Last time, we established that we were going to create a blog about ‘babysitting’ and that rather than guessing what we should write about, that we were going find out what questions people are asking and address those.  We discussed how search engines are places ’search’ for information about topics.

There are many tools in the internet marketplace that allow us to see under the hood of the search engines a bit.  Obviously, the ones that cost money are going to be more thorough, however, for what we are looking for, we can get from a free tool.  This tool is called "Good Keywords" (http://goodkeywords.com).  Here is the download link: http://www.softnik.com/download/gkwv2.exe.