Free, Easy Backlinks Using Google Alerts
June 28, 2010
Webmasters are constantly in search of new and creative ways to get backlinks to their web sites in order to improve their rankings in the major search engines.
One free, easy way to get backlinks is to monitor forums where people are discussing your areas of expertise. This is really easy to do with Google Alerts.
Simply create alerts for each of the major keywords in your industry, and set the alerts to monitor "discussions" only. Click here for a snapshot of some alerts I've setup to do this.
I personally recommend you use an RSS Reader to keep track of these alerts, which is a lot easier than keeping track of email notifications. Google even has a handy built-in RSS reader that you can use if you don't already have one (thus the "view in Google reader" link in the image above).
How this works is simple: each time Google finds a new discussion that is related to the keywords you specify, it makes a note of that in the RSS feed. You can then scan the feed for threads where you can jump in and respond. Most forums let you have a keyword-rich link to your web site in your signature, and so you get free links by joining in these discussions. Those links help your ranking in the search engines over time.
Doing this also establishes you as an expert in your field at these forums, which at a busy forum can be just as valuable as a #1 ranking for your keywords. Not to mention the direct traffic you can generate from your signature links.
How many threads will Google find that you can respond to?
Well, as an example, the "Discussions" alert for "internet marketing" over the last ten days has generated 350 question threads on 140 unique domains. By "question thread" I mean a thread whose title is a question (e.g. "Where do I find a list of blogs to submit comments?" — that's a real thread). The question threads are often the best to respond to, since they establish your expertise, but you can, of course, respond to any thread that you feel you can contribute something to.
I wrote a script to extract only the questions from the RSS feed, since I find those to be more valuable. Getting free links on 140 domains in 10 days isn't a bad deal at all! And that's no doubt going to grow over time.
So if you're needing some free links, head over to Google Alerts and get started following discussions related to your keywords!
Please post your thoughts and questions in a comment below.
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Finding niche markets to dominate in Google.
October 8, 2009
After writing my post showing how I got 46 page one rankings in Google in 7 days, I was flooded with requests asking me to release my tool for researching niche keywords to build sites around.
Well, I decided to do something a lot better than that. I've built a web-based system that literally discovers and analyzes niche markets while you sleep! It's incredibly easy to use, and super, super powerful. It uses the exact method that I used to achieve all of those page-one rankings, but it finds the niches much faster than I was able to do so on my own.
Find out how it works by watching the preview video on the home page:
Click here to watch the preview video.
To answer a few questions I'm sure will come up:
- When will Niche Horde be available?
Soon. I can't give an exact date, but as soon as the beta testing is over (and I expect it to be over within a week), I'll make the system available to everyone.
- How much will the service cost?
I'm considering an annual cost of between $27 and $67 a year. I'm not completely decided yet. What I do know is that it will not be expensive. After all, each user helps grow and improve the system by having the Niche Horde client software installed on their own computer.
- What are the system requirements for the software I need to install on my computer?
The software requires a Windows computer (98/ME/XP/Vista) that has the .NET Framework 2.0 installed (most already do). I'm sorry, but it won't run on a Mac.
- How big is the database of keywords?
With only a few dozen beta testing users, the database achieved 32,000+ keywords in its first 16 hours of operation. That should give you some idea of how quickly the database will reach into the millions of keywords, with thousands of available niche markets.
- How does the database grow?
Niche Horde is continually fed new keywords to analyze and expand by finding related keywords. It's fed new keywords by users, and by other outside sources that continually grow the database. So the database actively grows and expands without any work on the part of its users.
- How is the competition (SOC) determined?
The number of competing sites is determined by querying Google for the number of results that
1) have the keywords in the title and2) have the keywords in links coming into the page. (I've modified the system to only count pages with links matching the keywords as competitors). Those are your only real competition. Sites that only have the keywords in the title or in the body of the page, but have no links into those pages containing the keywords, aren't real competition.
ADDED: Regarding Strength Of Competition (SOC)
I've gotten a lot of feedback from people who don't seem to understand the SOC numbers. Some folks seem to be assuming that if you search Google for, say, "pumpkin seed butter" (with the quotes) and it comes back with 7,780 results that the SOC is 7,780.
Wrong!
That figure is only the number of pages Google has that contains the phrase "pumpkin seed butter" somewhere on the page. That's NOT your competition. Your competition is only the pages of those 7,780 pages that have links coming into them whose anchor text is the keywords "pumpkin seed butter".
To find out how many pages THAT is, search Google for:
allinanchor:"pumpkin seed butter"
Then go to the "Advanced Settings" and set Google to show 100 results per page. Then go to the LAST page of results and look at the "Results X of Y" figures at the top of the page. THAT'S your competition. In the case of my example, "pumpkin seed butter", it's only about 295 pages of the 7,780.
Pages that do not have any links coming into them are not really competing to rank for the phrase. Only pages with links coming into them are the ones you need to concern yourself with. That's what NicheHorde.com's SOC number indicates.
Please post any additional questions or requests you have in a comment below.
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Move over Twitter…
July 16, 2009
It all started with Twitter. I love the idea of microblogging. It's a beautiful thing. Twitter makes it easy to post your thoughts and ideas about just about anything in 140 characters or less. Other folks can follow along and read what you have to say.
That's why I love Twitter, but that's also why I don't like it.
You see, it's a great idea, but unfortunately it often ends up that I'm following all of these folks who are posting about what they had for breakfast, or tweet that they're giving their dog a bath, or other ridiculous stuff that I have absolutely no interest in.
Then there are the spammers. Oh my goodness! 100 tweets in a row advertising trash I'm not interested in.
Even when folks aren't spamming, Twitter seriously lacks focus. From one tweet to the next, the sheer volume of subjects is dizzying — and it's rarely related.
That's why I created TipDrop.com. TipDrop is what I call a "social-knowledge" site. Simply put, it's a very focused form of microblogging site.
At TipDrop, a user creates a "tip sheet" focused on a particular subject. The user who created the tip sheet, and other TipDrop users, can post tips to the tip sheet. The users can also vote for or against the tips on the tip sheet. Since 140 characters really isn't enough for a good tip, your tips can be up to 255 characters long.
It's like Twitter meets Wikipedia meets Digg.
For example, let's say I created tip sheet on How to get people to link to your web page (which I have–that link points to it). You can go to that tip sheet to read all of the tips that I and other users have added to get ideas about how to build links to your site. If you like a tip, you vote it up — if you don't like it, you vote it down.
You see the power here? Instead of random bits of noise and nonsense, TipDrop creates tightly focused pages of practical knowledge. It's social-knowledge.
To make it even better, TipDrop is driven by what I'm calling a "credibility engine." Everything in the system is given a "credibility" score: users, tip sheets and tips. The more users vote for a tip, the higher the credibility of the tip, the tip sheet and the tip-writing user. The more users that vote against the tip, the lower the credibility of those three things.
The best (read: most credible) tips appear on top of the tip sheet. Once a tip falls below a credibility score of 1, it disappears off the list.
The more credibility a user gains, the higher up the list his tips appear when he first writes them. Of course, those tips are then subject to users voting them up or down. Also, the higher a user's credibility, the more power his votes up or down command.
What this does is encourage high-quality tips from users who are trying to establish themselves as experts in their field. Each tip is linked back to its author's own account page, where a timeline of the user's tips appear, as well as a list of the user's tip sheets.
The credibility engine also helps prevent spam and junk from coming into the system. Spammers' tips will quickly get voted down, reducing the credibility of not only the tips, but the spammer's account. That way, when they try to submit more spam, their spammy tips will have virtually no credibility, appear at the bottom of the tip sheet, and after just a vote or two disappear entirely.
Of course, the creator of a tip sheet has the ability to delete tips they feel are inappropriate. So the tip sheet owner maintains control that way as well.
Unlike Twitter, TipDrop also encourages you to have links on your account page. You can have up to 10 links appear on the right sidebar of your account pages. And since all of the tip sheets you create appear with your account profile and links on them, you are rewarded for making your tip sheets popular by having other people visit your links.
On top of that, the site is monetized with AdSense ads. In your user settings you can put your AdSense Publisher ID and have 75% of all ad impressions and clicks from your account pages and tip sheets credited to your own AdSense account. I believe that users should receive a monetary incentive to create great content, and that's just another way I make that happen for TipDrop.com users.
TipDrop is a great way to get your email list to build link-bait lists of information on just about anything. Think about it: create a tip sheet on the best ways to lose 10 lbs, have other users add their own tips, and monetize it from the AdSense ads plus links down the sidebar to weight-loss products you promote! Build your credibility up with enough great tips and you'll soon be an established authority in your niche.
The site is now in beta, and I encourage you to go take 30 seconds to sign up for a free account (that's really all it takes — it's super-fast and easy). Perhaps start by adding your own tips to my tip sheet on how to get people to link to your web page?
Check the Site Links down the right sidebar of the home page for links to the TipDrop blog and forum as well. I'm very interested in hearing your suggestions and thoughts on how to make the system better.
Click here to go to TipDrop.com now.
And be sure to post your thoughts and questions in a comment below.
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Like what you see? Then subscribe to Marketing Insiders and reap big benefits! By subscribing to my free Marketing Insiders email list, you will regularly receive special member-only insider information, discounts and freebies. You will also be notified when new articles are posted here at the blog. It's absolutely free to subscribe, and you can leave the list at any time. For subscribing today, I will give you a valuable free gift as well! |
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Jonathan Leger has been earning his living online full-time since the fall of 2004. He regularly posts advice about search engine optimization (his current passion), AdSense and Internet Marketing. He is the creator of a suite of popular software tools, including: Jonathan L Leger 
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