Missing: Links For Evolving Your Brand with Social

By: Luis Borba

Link Building: What is it, Why is it important?

SEO seems to be the holy grail of website visibility, with portions of marketing budgets focussed on refining and measuring its results. But, what is often overlooked are link building techniques that complement SEO and the overall marketing objective. In a nutshell, think of link building as door-to-door sales.

Link building is a perpetual effort, whereby specific techniques are used to promote a website through some form of engagement. There are too many techniques to list here; a simple search will yield a day’s worth of informative reading.

They can be grouped into one of three categories.

Content Engagement – Good content starts with a well designed website with a clear message. Blogs act as a branch for regularly updated content like lists, news and reviews. It acts as a listening post for its citizens.

Promotional Engagement – Deals and giveaways persuade new customers to connect with brands, while extending the experience to existing customers. Sponsorships provide a means of aligning the brand with a cause and its support communities. Deals, giveaways and sponsorships spark conversations among brand ambassadors and the social community as a whole.

Social Media Engagement – By engaging audiences through social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and Youtube, brands are showcasing their company culture to a diverse demographic. Enabling sharing features such as the Tweet This, Like This, or G+ buttons on websites and blogs, gives the audience an easy way to display their affiliation with the brand.

Who’s Got the Time?

Link building requires time and effort, and the right set of tools that some businesses simply don’t have because they’ve dedicated their resources to other, equally important, marketing tactics. In such cases it makes sense to employ an agency to handle these aspects for a well-rounded marketing mix.

See Also: "Crowdsourcing: Getting Customers to Promote Your Local Business"