by Stoney deGeyter
Link building sucks. There I said it. Of course it's been said before and most people who have even the slightest bit of experience with it can tell you the same. It's tedious. It's monotonous. It's mundane.
True link building is marketing. But that doesn't make it any more interesting. For every link achieved there is a lot of time spent researching, analyzing, comparing and communicating.
It's the same for whatever kind of link building you're doing; link exchanging, link buying, link convincing, link baiting. Very few people can open up shop and immediately gather hundreds or thousands of links. There is a process.
Where does it start? Having something worth linking to.
This is the entire concept of link baiting, creating something that others want to link to. I suppose if you're buying links having link worthy content isn't as much as an issue, but it should be.
There is more to life than links
Getting links is great, but as search marketers we should be looking far beyond that. We should not be so much as trying to get other websites to link to us (that's certainly a welcome result) but we should instead be working on getting exposure, in whatever format that comes in.
Why? Because exposure is far better than a link.
If you had to choose between getting a link from a decent, industry related website, or a mention in a high-powered publication such as Time Magazine, which would you choose?
I think we'd all prefer the exposure we'd get from Time Magazine. Screw the link, get me a positive mention in a publication like that and it's money for nothing with the links for free.
And that's exactly my point. Exposure brings links.
But it also brings so much more. Credibility. Trust. Validity. And those things bring links. But not just run-of-the-mill average links. They bring high-powered links. Trusted links. Authoritative links. Links full of all kinds of link juice. The real good stuff, too.
Motive can make a world of difference
Does all this change the game of link building? No. The processes of getting links are still the same, whether you're link exchanging, link buying, link convincing, or link bating. But the motivation behind that is what changes.
If one is motivated to get exposure--legitimate, positive exposure--rather than links, the process of linking will evolve. Not on the surface, but underneath, where it really matters.
Most people don't want to bring exposure to their crappy company with crappy products or crappy services. You're only shining a light on the crap.
So if you're motivated to bring exposure to yourself you're going to do what you have to do to make sure that all the exposure you get makes you look good. Instead of shining light on crap, you want to shine the light on things people like such as quality, honesty, integrity and knowledge.
This means you need to run a company that is exceptional in all areas. It means building a website that offers more than "the lowest prices" or the "most stock". It means providing something that people truly want and need.
It means going beyond getting a sale and creating a resource that people want to return to time and time again. That gives you exposure. And that exposure will likely lead to more exposure. Bigger and broader exposure.
And that exposure earns links. Good links. Quality links. Powerful links.
When you start thinking beyond the link, start looking for ways to build your exposure within your industry, you'll get the links, plus a whole lot more.
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Source: Think Beyond The Link: How Exposure Building Trumps Link Building
