This document provides tips and strategies for effective link building in 2018. It emphasizes focusing link building efforts on creating high-quality, valuable content that is relevant to target audiences and builds relationships. Specific tactics recommended include developing different types of content like guides, tutorials and case studies; promoting content through outreach; identifying opportunities for strategic partnerships; and consistently building a brand over time in a specific niche. The document stresses taking a content-first and audience-first approach to link building.

1. LINK BUILDING 2018

2. Years have passed, after hundreds of updates.

3. Yet, it has become the most difficult aspect of SEO (and it will get even harder).

4. It could be frustrating a lot of times.

5. No more gray area – it’s either you get great links or shitty ones.

6. Good Links:
• From trusted and highly
credible websites
• From topically relevant pages
• Can send traffic (referral)
• Use highly descriptive
anchor texts
• Easily accessible to search
crawlers
• Editorially controlled

7. Can’t we just automate the shit out of this?

8. Well, you could.

9. Link building is more of a branding tool. It’s both art and science.

10. Where you get to let search engines and users know the entities who vouch for you – to build
trust.

11. And trust can’t be built through numbers & technology alone.
The practice requires creativity, psychology and a ton of human effort (or Marketing).

12. We’ve built processes around it

13. But what we mostly miss out on is the human-side of it – the right mindset.

14. build links

15. “The types of links that really matter are often content-based and/or relationship-driven.”
- Jason Acidre

16. Content-First.

17. “You need to have a great answer to the question: Who will help amplify this and why?”
- Rand Fishkin, Moz

18. Audience-First mentality

19. “The links that people are most likely to follow are the ones that end up carrying the most weight”.
- Bill Slawski (on Google’s Resonable Surfer Patent)

20. Content

21. Create content around the keywords that matter for your business that are:
• Genuinely useful and/or educational
• Evergreen & authoritative
• 10x better than the ones currently ranking
• Have high chances of attracting & earning links
• And you can confidently promote on a massive scale
through outreach (or paid social campaigns)

22. Important: Make sure that there are existing linking opportunities for the topic.

23. Freemium Tools
LRD: 1.13K
Search Traffic: 16.1K/month
Social Shares: 3.1K
Ranks #1 for “free email templates”. Ranks #2 for “email templates”

24. Lists
LRD: 178
Search Traffic: 37.2K/month
Social Shares: 1.4K
Ranks #2 for “website builders”. Ranks #2 for “best website builders”

25. Guides & Tutorials
LRD: 385
Search Traffic: 279K/month
Social Shares: 22.5K
Ranks #0 for “how to make money”. Ranks #0 for “how to make money online”

26. Checklists & Visual Content
LRD: 179
Search Traffic: 49.8K/month
Social Shares: 27K
Ranks #1 for “packing list”. Ranks #1 for “travel checklist”

27. Case Studies (data) & Success Stories
LRD: 1.21K
Search Traffic: 1.4K/month
Social Shares: 1.2K
Ranks #3 for “viral content”. Ranks #2 for “buzzsumo”

28. • 50-page website
• Acquired 700+ links in the past 3 years
• From 50K to 360K monthly organic visits
• From DA 40+ to DA 73

29. Process and Action Items:
• Identify mid-to-high search volume
informational keywords you can build
content around on.
• Check if the topic is really linkable.
• Review your top competitors’ approach
to content dev.
• Create something better.
• Reach out to those who have shared and
linked to your competitors’ content.
• Promote 10x content through outreach
(guest blogging, broken link building,
resource link building, or social/PR).

30. Relationships

31. Exclusive/curated listings.

32. Strategic partnerships (holy…).

33. Interview opportunities.

34. Regular columns.

35. Amplifiers.

36. educate

37. Tip #1:

38. Launched a test site in the finance sector.

39. Figured the best people to amplify our first content organically (even before going live).

40. Spent $5 to boost post engagement (mainly to get more likes to the post).

41. Spent another $5 to drive traffic – targeting financial advisors and insurance agents in PH.

42. Help validate the idea they are selling (aka “emotions triggered”).

43. Bigger publications started picking up the story.

44. Turned it to a video content.

45. Turned it to an image-based content.

46. Social proof made it easier to connect to people and beg for links.

47. Proof of work opened more opportunities for relationship building / linking –
ie: getting invited as a guest author.

48. With enough links and activity, the page eventually improved it’s organic visibility.

49. If I was selling insurance, I’d make it rain all day.

50. Tip #2:

51. Position your brand to attract and earn more links through rich snippets.

52. Target or steal low-competition industry-specific terms (that authors usually have
to describe when used in their writings).

53. It’s one of the best ways to build hundreds of links to a site (without outreach).

54. Cited in an Entrepreneur article (without outreach).

55. This would have made a better case study to present.

56. Offer high quality branded images to independent bloggers.

57. Infographics and data visualizations still work.
Offer to complement existing blog posts – or help generate new content ideas.

58. Provide well-designed product manuals/hacks to bloggers reviewing products in your space.

59. Or videos.

60. Tip #3:

61. We’ve built more than 200+ links from .edu sites last year, by promoting
more content that provide a ton of value to students.

62. Applicable to any space. Be creative.

63. Broken link building works really well with .edu resources pages.

64. Offer student/faculty discounts.

65. They usually leave their contact details on those pages as well.

66. You can also check other sites and businesses that offer student discounts and see the sites
linking to their discount pages (use queries like: “keyword” + student discount”).

67. Tip #4:

68. Content in many fields have been overly-saturated. There are probably hundreds of thousands
of guest post pitches being sent out every week.

69. Publishers are already catching up. They know the drill. And it’ll even get harder to stand out.

70. I follow this very simple rule in outreach: Focus heavily on value proposition and personalization.

71. And to be able to genuinely provide value:
• You really have to do your research on their sites.
• Know what they actually need/want.
• Be very clear with what you can offer

72. Provide better topics to pitch. Do a content gap analysis to be sure.

73. See if they’ve written something about the topic in the past.

74. Analyze why their content didn’t work. And explain what will be different about yours.

75. Personalized = better response rates.
Value = better acquisition rates.

76. Stop talking like a robot.

77. Seek for more regular columns. It’s a great way to get to other publishers’ radar.

78. And to getting invited to participate on expert roundups.

79. Tip #5:

80. Identify the big movers in your space.

81. Study, analyze and emulate the kinds of content they share, link to, and learn from.

82. It’s the best way to reach their audience.

83. Mention them or their work in your own authoritative content.
Get their feedback (ego bait collaborate).

84. Focus on sharing ideas they won’t find elsewhere.

85. Tip #6:

86. Create content geared towards building strategic partnerships

87. Ask for links to sustain traffic. Send more business to them.

88. Or secure links through embeddable badges.

89. Link Intersect – Find websites linking to your competitors but are not linking to you.

90. If your product/service/content offers the same level of quality and experience to its users (or better),
you’ll have better chances of getting featured on those sites as well.

91. Invite guest authors.

92. Tip #7:

93. Build brand mindshare through consistency.

94. Focus on a specific niche where you can excel. And build your brand through making a firm stand.

95. “Only people with firm stands get really really good at marketing.
They care enough about their message to get it out there.”
- Benjamin P. Hardy

96. @jasonacidre