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Putting links into your visitors’ hands

Posted by Michael Martinez on April 9, 2007 in Link Building, Link Theory

One of the least discussed methods of building links is the gizmo offer. As you build content and value into your Web site, you may find it useful to include a content gizmo on your site. If it makes sense, offer that content gizmo to other people for inclusion on their sites. Some people call these things “gadgets” or “widgets” but a content gizmo can be something else entirely.

“Content gizmos” include remote search boxes (useful for promoting your new directory), scrolling headline boxes, rotating images and photos, RSS/XML feeds, etc.. Anything that provides unique content from your site for another site provides you an opportunity to embed a link back to your site. Most site operators are happy to include the link. Here is how you can make that linking relationship more happy and valuable for both you and your partners:

• Embed a “target=’_blank’” in your static link. Don’t try to capture other sites’ visitors right away. Show new visitors from partner sites that you are trustworthy.
• Allow your linking partners to include your code anywhere on their sites. Don’t ask for specific placement on the front page above the fold. You have absolutely no justification for making such a request.
• Update the push content you create for other sites on a regular basis. And test the service regularly to make sure it doesn’t break.
• Make your push content configurable. If you generate an HTML snippet, you can embed colors, images, and other gizmos. Allow people to use vertical or horizontal configurations, too.
• Offer a default configuration for people who don’t know what’s best for their sites or who don’t care. Just pick a standard and make that your default.
• Make your push content flexible. Some people will prefer to use a table they can drop into their pages. Other people will prefer DIVs. Don’t get too fancy, but don’t demand that everyone else on the Web start organizing content the way you do.
• Make your embedded link visible but inobtrusive. Inobtrusive means the purpose of the gizmo is to enhance someone else’s site, not push your site name into their visitors’ faces.
• Make the embedded link anchor text flexible — help yourself by passing multiple expressions back to your site to help make it more relevant to many more expressions.
• Provide your linking partners with a contact form on your site so they can report problems. Be responsive to the problem reports.

I have used many content gizmos on my Web sites through the years. I’m extremely selective about what I put on my pages. Not because I care about whom I link to, but because I care about what I put on my pages. I have on a few occasions tolerated possessive linking from gizmo providers simply because their gizmos offered considerable value. Most of the time, if the gizmo’s purpose is obviously just to siphon traffic off of other sites, I don’t use it.

It is highly unlikely you’re in a position to offer sufficient value to justify siphoning off another site’s visitors before they are finished with that site. Be confident that you offer value; don’t be so arrogant as to assume you offer more value than anyone who would put your content gizmo on their site.

If you operate forums where a few regular, popular posters have their own Web sites (and if they don’t have their own forums), look into helping them include custom XML/RSS feeds on their sites. Many forum software packages now allow you to make your discussions available on a section-by-section basis through RSS. You may be able to help people install those feeds on their sites with third-party scripts (keep in mind, however, that those scripts will probably be done in Javascript and won’t provide you with static HTML backlinks).

Don’t be link greedy. If you can get visibility, exposure, traffic from a Javascript gizmo, take it. Traffic is more important than crawlable links.

The more content gizmos you build, the more linking partners you’ll acquire. Some mashup artists may milk your content gizmo inventory for everything you can produce. It is reasonable to include some standard restrictions in your content gizmo service.

For example, reserve the right to block any site that offers what you feel is inappropriate content (but make sure you list what you feel is inappropriate content).

Require site owners to register their sites with you before you activate the gizmo code. Engage them in the process.

Check your referrals. If you don’t see any visitors coming from a site that hammers your server for gizmo service, figure out why. Did the site operator alter the code to remove the embedded link? If so, deny all requests from that server through your .htaccess file. But if the code is in place and for all intents and purposes it’s clear that a random visitor should see your gizmo and link, then you need to reconsider the design and function of the gizmo. It may not be compelling enough to help you build traffic.

Also, in some cases you may not see referrer data if you use the “target=’_blank’” option on your embedded link. If referring data is vital to your gizmo management, you should use “target=’_top’” to ensure that your visitors come out of a framed site properly. Keep in mind, however, that not every browser will pass referrer data anyway regardless of what type of link is being followed.

Use your own gizmos. Show people how they work, how they add value to a site’s content, and why they want to include your gizmos on their sites.

There is a downside to offering gizmos. For one thing, the more gizmos you push out, the more your server gets hammered by remote service calls. Make sure that your hosting provider allows you to serve remote content. Some providers care, other providers don’t. Your Terms of Service agreement should be very specific if the ISP forbids remote service.

Also, tracking service visitors separately from primary site vistors can be a hassle if you read your raw server logs. You might think, “Well, all the hits to the service URL will tell me what I want to know.” That depends on the gizmo. If you include images, for example, every request for an image is added to all your raw hits. I operate a banner network. Guess how many hits per day I receive for images alone.

Gizmos can help your search engine optimization in a number of ways, all of them indirectly. They build traffic, visibility, and your reputation. They bring you natural, editorially-chosen links (as long as you make it clear to your partners at sign-up that the embedded links are there and must stay in place). And they help you become relevant to more query expressions than you may have previously imagined. You have no idea of where a link to your site may turn up in oddball queries just because it happens to be on a page that has some random content relevant to your site’s purpose and function.

Don’t think of gizmos as link bait. Maybe they are, maybe not. With link bait you are looking for quick success, a lot of referrals from social linking sites, etc. With gizmos you’re looking for long-term referral relationships, builing those one site at a time. It may take a year to build a sufficient inventory of linking partner sites through your gizmos before you can really see appreciable traffic from gizmo referrals.

Gizmo link building works on autopilot. And what is best about this methodology is that it puts you in control of the linking relationships. Instead of being ignored or rejected or banned by other Webmasters, you get to pick and choose from whom you’ll accept links.