Social Media for Link Building

Directing Traffic through Cross Promotions on Various Sites

On the Internet, links are the connective tissue that holds it all together - the basic relationship model for reaching out and finding/sharing/referring one cyber-self to another. And links continue to be the simplest way for a computer program (read "Google-bots") to judge the trustworthiness and relevance of a Web page.

For years now, link building has been an integral part of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) - the practice of getting found online by making page 1 of Google search results. So not only do you need to make sure your site is written with the keywords that folks use to search for your information, you need to find ways to get other credible sites to link into your site, what's known as "inbound links."

And, of course, social media sites - with their often massive traffic and credibility - can provide those golden inbound links to your site... that is, if your business actually appears in those social media sites!

It's All About Cross Promotion

Imagine that you have a YouTube channel (you should, you know) and in the top left corner where your information goes, you include a link back to your blog. (Please, tell me you have a blog!)

At your blog, you have links to your YouTube channel as well as to your Twitter stream. On Twitter, you regularly put up posts that include links to the latest article you put on Digg - and some of them are about your company, natch. And, of course, your LinkedIn profile has links to all of these web properties. And so on, and so on, and...

When the team at PROsocialmedia does online market research for clients, we are constantly surprised to see the vast number of missed opportunites on blogs and social media profiles where incomplete information keeps us from tracking someone easily from one spot to another. Why the forgotten links? Remember, linking is the lifeblood of the Web!

And every link you place in a social media site needs to be strategic: Where am I trying to drive traffic? What value-add content will I offer people if they go there from here? Beware the "retread": sending them from one social media site to another where the same information about your company is on offer.

Keep a close eye on your metrics - such as which referring sites are bringing you the most visitors - so you can adjust your linking strategies accordingly.

As they say in the link business - it isn't always just what you know, it's who you know, or more accurately - who knows you.