Savvy Content

Contextual Link Building For Dummies

Andrew Scherer — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 05:55:33 +0000

An example of contextual link building.

Contextual links: Links built within relevant content.

Every webmaster should be focusing on contextual link building when it comes to their SEO strategy simply because these are the MOST POWERFUL kinds of links you can build.

Non-contexual, irrelevant links are quickly losing their power: general directory submissions, sitewide blogroll/footer links, participating in text-link ad schemes like TNX or any similar network that puts your links on totally unrelated sites, etc…

Here’s a tip…

Build relevant links first – any PR that’s on the page just consider gravy.

A lot of webmasters get too “hung up” on the PR of page on where their link is being placed. While PR is important, it shouldn’t be the only factor you search for when it comes to finding good links. Relevancy and the content surrounding the link is going to make for a stronger, more valuable link in the long run.

The 4 Easiest Ways to Tackle Contextual Link Building

1. Article Marketing – Oldie but Goodie

Article marketing – the “ol’ faithful” when it comes to building links. It still works, and works well.

Anytime I see some of my rankings drooping I will fire off some articles and notice a pick-up a week later.

Contextual links galore, make sure the general topic of your articles matches the anchor text of your links in your resource box.

Keep your article marketing natural and consider our Dripped Article Marketing Service.

2. Buying Blog Posts and Reviews on Established Blogs

This is something I used to do a lot but not so much anymore.

I was buying my blog posts from the buy/sell section on DigitalPoint but it really became a chore sorting through the offers. 75% of the messages I would get would be for unscrupulous webmasters trying to sell “high PR” blog posts off of dropped domains. They would even backward-schedule posts so it looked like they had a years worth of posts – luckily Archive.org tells no lies.

Search for established blogs that are relevant to the niche you’re in for the best result.

You can also find good deals on posts from blog networks, but its anyone’s guess as to how long these networks will keep their sites up after the sales stop. Make sure the blogs are spread across a healthy amount of C Class Ips.

3. Create Squidoos and Hubpages

Write some content and create your own Squidoos and Hubpages. Link back to your site twice within the article using your targeted keywords and voila, instant contextual links.

Hubpages will keep the link nofollow until you hit a score of 70. You’ll have to add pictures, unique content, and give it a few links to raise that score.

Getting contextual links from these domains will benefit your site(s) nicely.

We can build 60 contextual links on 30 domains for you – including Hubpages and Squidoo.

4. Hunting for Contexual Links on Do-Follow Blog Posts

This is a nice little way to build contextual links because the content is already on the page, all you have to do is exploit it (and hope your comment/link gets approved).

Using Fast Blog Finder you can find blog posts that contain your keyword somewhere on the page. When it comes to link relevancy, it doesn’t get any better than that.

New Article Marketing Service Plus Price Drop On Press Release Service

Andrew Scherer — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 19:49:25 +0000

Just a couple of things I wanted to mentioned quickly.

Dripped Article Marketing Launched

Launched brand new service that will build links for you everyday for a month, on autopilot. Introducing Dripped Article Marketing service. Combining spun articles with slow release article directory submission you’ll be getting fresh links each and every day, for 33 days total (3 article directory submissions per day).

Check it out, will be adding some testimonials soon.

Press Release Changes

Press Release Service bumped up from 100 manual submissions to 125 manual submissions.

On top of increasing the amount of submissions, I’ve also lowered the price just a bit to make it a better value for everyone.

Press releases are probably one of the most underrated linkbuilding methods out there, and probably one of the most powerful if your PR starts getting picked up by media outlets.

Highly recommended, don’t forget to check out some of the samples of the press releases – highest quality around.

Spinned Article Marketing Case Studies

Andrew Scherer — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 23:34:34 +0000

I found some really interesting case studies that Sergey Loren’s posted at his website.

What he did was he created a mini affiliate site and only used social bookmarking and spinned article marketing to build backlinks for it. In 3 months his site was generating 70-80 unique visitors a day and it had generated $2,627 in revenue for him.

Not bad!

Read the case studies below:

parts 1 and parts 2.

Highlights from Part 1…

The only thing you needed to do was write one seed article, which looks something like this:

{Hello|Hi|Greetings} {John|Mark|David}, {how are you|how do you do|how’s life}?

Then you use a special script or piece of software which spins the seed article and generates many unique versions for you. Just from the example above, it is possible to generate 27 different variations of the sentence. Imagine how many unique articles you could generate from a 400 word article?

This is one of the biggest reasons I like using spun articles for linkbuilding and marketing. The sheer math behind it makes a 300-400 word article have thousands of possible combinations. It’s way more effective than submitting the same article to many different places.

I decided to test this method on one of my websites and the results were amazing. After just one month submitting spun articles to various article directories, I was seeing lots of valuable links as well as positive changes in my search engine positions.

Before writing this post, I made a small case study. I created a new mini affiliate website optimized for a keyword that was not very competitive (about 1,000,000 competitors in Google). There were only two link building methods I used with this website: article spinning and social bookmarking. I actually only submitted my website to couple of social bookmarking sites because it is proven to be a very fast method of having your website indexed in the search engines. Almost three weeks have passed and here are the results so far:

On December 6th my website was indexed in Google at number 60 in the search results and I then started submitting my spun articles. As you can see, the very next day my website dropped to number 75 and then disappeared from Google’s index for four days. This is a normal occurrence with brand new sites, so I continued with the article submissions. From December 11th my positions have been constantly improving and there haven’t been any negative fluctuations since then. The website generated more than 400 USD in three weeks through affiliate sales. Some of these sales were from traffic that came from the article directories; however, the majority of sales are from Google organic searches.

Judging by initial results, I can honestly say that this link building method is undoubtedly worth continuing… Moreover, it has two positive aspects: first, you can get sales from the article directories because if you have written a quality seed article, so generated articles will also be of good quality, and second, you can get sales from organic search engine traffic.

Pretty superb if you ask me! His SERPs just go up and up, and generating $400 USD in affiliate sales for a 3 week old site is something I’ve never personally done. I’d really like to know more about what he’s doing to convert the traffic like that!

Highlights from Part 2…

I started this case study just over three months ago in an attempt to prove that article spinning can be a very effective link building method, one that doesn’t only increase your website positions in the search engine results (SERP’s), but can also bring a fair amount of traffic from article directories as well. If you recall, the initial results of the case study was quite successful so now, in the second part of the case study, I will show you the website’s results that I have achieved so far and how much money it has subsequently generated. To begin with, I will show you the website’s traffic graphic from my Google analytics account.

As you can see, the website gets around 50 unique visitors per day and more than 1200 per month. 81%of the visitors came via the search engines and 13% came from referring sites. In my case, these referring sites are the various article directories where my spun articles were posted. At the moment the website is at the fifth position in Google’s results for the main keyword. Positions in Yahoo are lower, it is not even in the top ten for the keyword the website is optimized for.

Not too shabby, almost 100 uniques a day with some pretty decent SERPs for his niche.

The website has generated $2,627 so far which works out at about $850 per month just from one single affiliate website which took me only two hours to set up…

Sheesh, blows my mini sites out of the water! For a site only 3 months old that’s pretty good.

As mentioned in the previous part of this case study, I actually hired a person who manually submitted the spun articles to various article directories, so the total amount of money invested in this website has been $80 ($50 for submitting my articles and $30 for 3 months hosting) and the total amount of time invested is a paltry 4 hours!

I am absolutely delighted with the results I achieved from the website. If you can make $850 per month on autopilot from one single affiliate website, why not create ten or even more websites?

Good idea

Moreover, you do not even have to have a website to promote it using spun articles, you can use squidoo lenses or even blogger blogs instead.

Shameless plug, we also do that service here: 30 Hubsite/Blog Creation Not only will we write, spin, create accounts, and submit your articles, but we will also social bookmark the URLs after they’re live.

I think that this will be the last part of this case study. It is enough proof that article spinning is undoubtedly a very effective and profitable link building method which you should include in your “to do” list. At the moment I am writing some very useful affiliate marketing tutorials which will be sent to my subscribers in the very near future.

Cool case studies, thanks Sergey!

Celebrating My Record $221.04 EPN Day with 5 EPN Tips

Andrew Scherer — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 10:22:50 +0000

Screenshot of my EPN earnings for the beginning of March, 2009.

The other day I had a record breaker day on my Ebay Partner Network account – $221.04!

I’ve been an affiliate for roughly a year and a half and so far this has been my best day yet. $100 days can be sometimes normal for me, but never anything over $200

So to celebrate my success I wanted to make a post about everything I’ve learned along the way – what’s been most successful for me in really bringing in the money… Please read on..

1. Make your EPN site about a niche product.

Instead of making a general EPN site about “computers” niche it even more, maybe Dell Computers or Intel Motherboards, etc.. The better your niche then the easier its going to be for you to dominate those keywords.

Here’s a pretty good post on selecting a niche for EPN using Ebay Pulse to find out whats popular http://www.wpcontempo.com/how-to-choose-a-niche-for-your-ebay-partner-network-affiliate-site/

Some niches convert well, and some do not. Try to pinpoint the niches/products that have hungry buyers.

2. Before you register that domain!

Here’s a HUGE hint and something thats going to possibly save the destruction of your site (I lost 2 of my top earning sites to this newbie mistake): DONT PUT ANY TRADEMARKS IN THE DOMAIN.

Chances are good that the companies will come after you, and all your hard work will be flushed down the toilet. It’s happend to me twice, and losing a site earning $300-$500 per month is a pretty painful experience (to say the least).

And the shitty part is they don’t come after you when your site isn’t doing well (they can’t find you). They only come after you when you start ranking top positions in Google (doh).

3. Get PHPBay!

I’ve tried BANS, all I can say is it pretty much sucks. I felt really trapped with BANS, and I’ve heard Google is really slapping BANS sites so I would advise against using them.

One reason I like PHPBay is there’s just so much flexibility. The programmer Wade has made a ton of improvements since he first released it. Now you can put in Ebay auction listings on your Wordpress site and they won’t even look like auction listings.

4. Give it a “Store” look to increase conversion.

I was using the Cutline theme for my EPN blogs when I started out. I would have my “money pages” at the very top, but in retrospect this looked really amateur.

A few months back I decided to follow this PHPBay Tutorial from Eureka Diary (looks like they have since changed the domain on it) – the writer trigatch4 is also an avid poster on Wickedfire.

Anywho, I believe the Wordpress template setup I learned to use from this tutorial has really helped in conversions. It probably improved my bounce rate as well, since my blogs have taken a brand new look/feel. I attached a static front page which mentioned some of the most popular products people were searching for, so they could easily find more EPN listings or info on them.

4. Time for some content.

My biggest EPN site has roughly 120 articles on it, all keyword targeted for different products. I’m front page in Google for a ton of terms – I receive over 1,000 visits per day with that site and my earnings average around $30 a day or so.

I HIGHLY recommend you dump a ton of quality content into your blogs if you want to attract any kind of visitors.

The best keywords warrant 1,000+ word articles covering every possible aspect of the keyword.

This will make it a lot easier for you to dominate Google with a quality article.

5. Linkbuild, linkbuild, linkbuild.

Keep track of your keywords and URLs so it makes it easy for you to build links to each of your posts. I do this in an .xls spreadsheet.

Always use keyword variations when building links. If your targeting “Eddie Bauer Coats” for example, switch up your anchor text when building links: “Coats by Eddie Bauer”, “An Eddie Bauer Coat”, “Eddie Bauer’s Coats”, etc… You get the idea. This makes the links you’re building look more natural, and Google likes anything natural.

Keep your linkbuilding campaign consistent. If you build a boatload of backlinks in one week, then none in the next, Google is going to raise a red flag. But if you build roughly the same amount of backlinks week in and week out, Google will pay no mind to you. Consistency is key.

Linkbuilding is an ultra important aspect you don’t want to leave out. I’ve noticed most webmasters either have high quality content but aren’t great when it comes to linkbuilding, or someone is great with linkbuilding but the content is atrocious. Don’t make this mistake, if you need help in one area or another don’t be afraid to outsource.

6. Other random stuff.

If you’re having trouble getting approved for EPN check this post.

I also know that EPN will cancel your account if they feel your traffic is low quality. I did in fact have this happen to me once but I was able to get my account reinstated thankfully. A couple of my sites had super low EPC, so I just disabled the auction listings on them to avoid getting my account canceled (that would be tragic). They weren’t making much money anyway, so I don’t mind.

Update: 3/20/2009

A reader sent me an email today. I thought I might as well share the added tips/info here:

“I have around 8 sites with EPN, 2 of the sites make up the majority of the earnings. I guess the 80/20 theory was true. I cut off EPN on my lower earning sites, I don’t want my EPN account canceled.

Start with 5 sites in 5 different niches. Focus them around products, you can check out Ebay Pulse for ideas. If you want a general idea of the profitability of a niche you can use the Google Adwords Traffic Cost Estimator and it will tell you the Cost Per Click advertisers are paying. The more they pay generally the more profitable the niche is.

I outsource pretty much everything I do now, from backlinks to content. I’ve now even hired someone to post content to my blogs and I’ve found I can build sites faster this way.

But when I first started I was writing and posting everything myself. I wasn’t big on link building then but once I started really linkbuilding I could see how much of an effect it had on my traffic and earnings.”

How to Get Your Press Releases Listed in Google News and Get Free One-Way Backlinks

Andrew Scherer — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 07:08:58 +0000

Press releases are no longer for big businesses and big budgets. If you’ve got a small niche website you can get all the nice benefits of press releases too.

Submitting a PR Will Give You

Increased traffic.
Increased backlinks for SERP raises.
Possibility of getting picked up by major authority websites and news outlets for even more exposure, traffic, and links.
Extra crediblity and authority, especially if your press release is well-written and newsworthy.

A long-term PR campaign can really do wonders for the average website…

Google News and Why Your PR Needs to Be Indexed By It

One goal you should reach for when distributing your press release is to make sure it gets spidered on Google News. Around 11 million people visit Google News per month and it has SEO benefits for your site as well. Make sure your press release is well written and distributed to the right places so it ends up there. Google news spiders some press release sites, others it does not.

PR Sites I Know Google News Crawls

Live-PR.com – Not only did my PRs from this free site get on Google News but I was also able to get a backlink in the body of the press release itself. Check out the press releases I submitted here and here.
Prlog.Org – Another free site I have submitted my PR to and Google News picked it up.

3 Keys for Writing Effective Press Releases

Your press release should be indirect. Don’t make your PR look like a sales piece or an article, but write it like a piece of news. Add quotes, write your article from a news angle. If you sell acne treatments, for example, report about new developments in acne research or any other related news and then tie your product in at the end. Another example, if you sell blue widgets, report about how your made a donation of 50 blue widgets to your local school.
Who, what, when, where, and why? A newsworthy piece should cover all the bases for properly reporting news.
Your headline is everything. If the content of your press release is amazing but your headline is lacking, nobody is going to even take the time to read your press release. Spend a good amount of time brainstorming different headlines and pick the one that sounds the best. I recommend that you read it out loud to yourself so you hear what it sounds like when its read.

6 Topic Ideas for Your Newsworthy Press Release

Stuck for ideas on covering something that might be newsworthy? You might have any of these 7 going on for your website or business right now that you can report on.

New products or services.
Special contests or giveaways.
Customer survey results.
New employees and employee promotions.
Site upgrades or additions (a new feature or forum, for example).
Your companies opinions on industry news.
Fundraisers, charitable donations, any kind of philanthropy.

If you don’t have any of these that you can get a PR from, make something. It’s easy to run a giveaway contest, or create a simple survey on your website that your surfers will participate in.