The Whitest Hat: Relationship Building

If you want to have not only a great website but also one that can be useful from a marketing point of view, you have to use SEO. Not to mention that it has become an integral part of businesses’ online presence today, and the question of whether you need it is obsolete to say the least. Everything in regard to web design and development has evolved and changed significantly from the preceding version and the same applies to SEO. It has changed so much that almost nothing of it resembles its former self, not even when it comes to keywords and anchors.

And therefore, the link building has changed, too, being an important part of SEO and in manner more concentrated on the relationships with the blog owners who enable the back links than being oriented on the links alone, as the practice was before.

Start with social media

Social media provide the perfect starting point for building relationships with some future collaborators. There you can introduce yourself and build a community that will follow your work and engage in the content you post. This can be a great start to try and create your links by evaluating how much your followers share the content you post. By using the tools to measure this you can get feedback on what to change and how to improve the content you want people to share. This is an excellent way to see what your followers are responding to, that is, what they prefer to share.

So what does this have to do with link building? Actually, consider it a stepping stone. Firstly, some of your social media followers may have their own websites and want to link to you because of the great social media strategy you used. Secondly, this is wonderful practice for how to deal with the content on your own website, meaning that the better and more interesting the content the more visitors it will attract and among them parties interested in starting a link building relationship with you.

The eMarketer’s report stated that 77% of buyers were more inclined to buy the products from the company whose CEO is using the social media, while 82% of them will put more trust in the said business. Also, campaigns that promote social responsibility are perfect to create organic relationship. As an example, Marriott hotel started a campaign which promoted online check-ins for guests. Namely, for every online check-in Marriott will donate $2 to charity. This way they created a relationship with their guests through interest in the greater good and humanitarian work.

Build relationships with bloggers and influencers

Back in the day, link building was all about buying links since there were no clear rules or strategies in place to organize this part of web development. But since 2000 and the creation of Google Panda, the whole SEO and link building has changed and evolved into something appropriate and fair for the everyday Internet user and commercial websites. Modern link building is all about creating relationships with the bloggers and influencers, thus bringing back the human factor into the game and making the whole online content more meaningful and less spammy.

Bloggers and influencers are persons who already have a significant number of followers and are considered to be opinion makers. Their websites have regular visitors and that number grows on a daily basis. Thanks to the almighty social media we know these people, they’re not just some names that pop up here and there, but rather celebrities in their own right. If they support a link, then their followers and fans will check it out too, thus creating a relationship with these people is important if we want to have successful link building.

Blogger outreach is significant for a business since the surveys showed that a consumer will, on average, check 11 reviews for the product they’re interested in order to come to the decision to buy it. That puts bloggers and influencers in a unique position to be trusted when they recommend a product. This is supported by the data stating that 81% of people seeking reviews online will trust blogger’s opinion on the product. Bloggers are considered to be mid-level influencers. This means that they have a smaller audience but a 16 times bigger outreach than paid media, because of the loyalty they created with their followers.

Create lasting relationships

When you start working on creating a relationship with an influencer, don’t think about it as something you’ll do now and never again. Form a strategy that will ensure a lasting and long relationship with the influencer and maintain it constantly. This is called a sustainable link builder, and that’s what you need if you want to have a successful marketing campaign for your client. Professionals like the GWM Company and other entities and individuals with a wealth of experience in web development and marketing advise you to have more than one relationship if you want to have a booming SEO campaign.

Namely, if you create a relationship with one blogger considered a great influencer now, that means that you’re limiting yourself to one audience and soon enough you’ll lose it as well. This happens because the bloggers lose their popularity as their audience changes and a new generation comes forth.

Also, the bloggers themselves change and evolve as persons. That’s the human factor and a completely normal development to expect and accept. That’s why it’s important to have several relationships and to always be one step ahead of the upcoming trends and keep up with the constant change of audience and consumers’ needs.

Since 18-34 year olds said that bloggers’ opinions and recommendations are the most relevant to them when making a purchase, brands are orienting their media campaigns on creating lasting relationships with these influencers. Popular makeup brand Urban Decay thus launched a campaign in regard to their new lipstick line. Instead of giving one or several lipsticks to bloggers, they gave each blogger the whole new collection consisting of 100 shades. This started the buzz, and, since the bloggers talk among themselves, it also created positive reputation for Urban Decay. The campaign was talked about on every media and almost 20,000 images were hashtag-ed on Instagram.

Conclusion

Everything matters! Don’t underestimate the audience and try to focus on creating quality content which will give you access to top-profile influencers and thus create more opportunities for you and your SEO campaign. Link building has become more complex over time and is responsible for your own or your client’s website appearing in the top results when people use the search engines. To be in a position to have a successful and useful SEO, you must work diligently and implement several techniques to ensure the best results.