This is a list of sites I use to backlink from for myself and my web design, SEO, and social media marketing clients:
Social Bookmarking Sites
Google is now bringing it’s search engine and the Android operating system to televisions.
In response to this move by Google to TV. Rishi Chandra, one of the product managers at Google, announced at their I/O 2010 conference, Google TV, which will bring the best of the web and TV together, integrating them into one platform. Google touts, “Less time finding, more time watching,” “Control and personalize what you watch,” “Make your TV content more interesting” and “more than just a TV”. There are two points from this that I’d like to discuss in relation to Internet Marketing and SEO, which may lead my to other topics, but I digress:
1. Apps as marketing (SEO) techniques – creating a WordPress, Android, or iPhone app creates backlinks to your site.
2. Video as promotional tool (and primary content) – it’s not just making sure your site looks good on a TV, it has to be something people want to view on a tv, and it has to be something they can find in Google.
From what I’ve learned about SEO, I’ve created a set of tenets for Internet Marketing, which center around the Clinton-esque phrase, “It’s the backlinks, stupid.”
A. Update-able Web Design (Blog Area), On-Page SEO, and Directory (at least the ODP, but Yahoo if you can afford it) and Search Engine Submissions are foundations.
B. Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Myspace, [+Space of your choice], Youtube, Relevant Forums, and Relevant Blog Comments should all be pinged in equal measure. Don’t rely too much on the most popular (Twitter and Facebook) for two reasons:
1. Heavy re-posting could damage brand with followers who actually care about the product/service
2. It doesn’t spread the backlinks around to different IP addresses. Consider that there is a saturation point, if you will.
C. Now that the low-hanging fruit is gone, it’s time to hit Squidoo and Hubpages to create lenses and create distributable content like ebooks, Ezine articles, and any app you can (ex. WordPress plugins or themes, Android apps, or iPhone apps). Youtube videos can also fall in this category.
Forums, Forums, Forums
The power of forums is that once you get a signature file, every post you’ve ever made, every comment you’ve ever made on the forum creates a backlink to your site of choice and changing it in the future will retro-actively change all your old posts in the past. Just know that if you intend for the backlinks you create with your signature file to stay powerful, you’ll need to leave your signature alone or start a new account. Most forums require that you post ten times and wait ten days before being able to add hyperlinks to your signature. This is because they almost all use the same forum platform, which also makes it nice when learning how to navigate.
News Mentions of Tumblr over Time
Tumblr is Nice, and Growing – I stumbled upon tumblr through Ping.FM. I was looking for ways to expand the use of Ping.FM and browsed a couple of the choices. Tumblr seemed like it had a very clean design and was simple to use. It’s kind of setup like Twitter should have been. Each post can be a blog, a picture, a video, a link, or a quote. You can re-post another person’s work (like Twitter’s retweet function) and follow other users, just like Twitter. Tumblr can even go out and pull blog posts then blast the links to that post out to Twitter and Facebook, a Ping.fm-like feature. Very nice. I see Tumblr growing over time (even John Mayer has left Twitter for Tumblr). If you use Alexa as a ranking tool, here are where the sites I’ve mentioned fall:
Tumblr Alexa Rank over time
2 – Facebook
3 – Youtube
11 – Twitter
18 – Myspace
130 – Ezinearticles
149 – Tumbr
230 – Hubpages
235 – Squidoo
But consider that LinkedIn ranks at 29 and allows you to have 3 customized backlinks per person, but like forum signatures, once it is changed, it is no longer a back-link.
Android Apps
Mobile Devices reports that Android beat out the iPhone OS for the 2nd place spot in the US smartphone market, but the iPhone OS still outranks Android globally. This could change though. ZDnet says, “The time to build Android apps is now,” and I would have to agree. If you can get in at this stage of the game, you will be better positioned for success, and isn’t that what it’s all about?
Growm your business. Need help?
