I’ve been trying to talk my customers into some three way link love lately. Crazy!?!?! Yep!
Check it out. When you’re building links for a new domain name that was recently purchased, which some experts feel isn’t worth the time, I believe that it’s EXTREMELY important to start first by creating content that is actually valuable for the sites competitors… NOT THE CUSTOMERS.
This is mis-understood by many of our customers before we get a chance to explain it to them. I’ll explain and feel free to tell me I’m insane in the comments.
Let’s pretend that I’m doing a lead generation campaign for a large event planning company. This company wants to meet people who are planning large corporate picnics and retreats nationwide. They have JUST purchased a domain name and because of that they have no authority with the search engines.
At this point, we would build the site in two separate pieces on the same domain. The first piece would include a basic lead generating landing page that we would toss adwords and yahoo ppc at and begin generating leads immediately.
The second phase, however would not be targeted to the sites potential customers. It would actually be targeted toward the sites competitors and provide those people with something remarkable so that it builds links. You see, if we create something of great value for the competitors to use on their sites, they will link to the new site.
You could create something of value for your potential customers as well… but here’s the thing… In many cases the customers do not have sites that would provide you with RELEVANT links that would effectively tell the search engines what your site’s about.
If you get ten links from sites that show up in the search results when you enter [your keyword phrase], won’t the search engines more quickly consider you relevant to [your keyword phrase]? Of course.
So, where the heck does the three-way take place? Right here! Once you have created a lot of industry targeted links by providing your competitors with creative and remarkable content, tools, articles, ebooks, videos… or whatever, then it’s time to use the organically ranked section of your site to help your customers.
The bottom line? Don’t worry about the portion of your site you want organic ranking for actually getting traffic from potential customers. Build resources for your competitors first… create great relationships with them… REAL ONES. Become trusted… and then go after the customers once you have trust in the industry.
