10 Genuine Penguin Friendly Link Building Techniques

Google rolled out Penguin updates on April 24, 2012 and since then there has been multiple updates to the same which has completely changed the concept of link building. While it was primarily rolled out to target websites involved in link buying, the bigger picture was to identify and take action against websites that are involved in unnatural link building in any form. As Google progressed to tighten this, more and more sites got affected and the concept of link building has completely changed in the last one year. While this has caused much frustration for many SEO’s there are still some ways to get links for your websites.

10 Penguin Friendly Link Building Techniques

10 Penguin Friendly Link Building Techniques

“Link building” is now morphed into “link earning” and you will have to truly earn your links, your grandpa’s link building will not work, rather put you in trouble, for the most part at least.

In the post Penguin era link building is purely about content play and it is only your content that can get you links, so most link building suggestions center around creating various forms of content.

Here is a list of 10 ways for Penguin Friendly Link Building:

Guest Posts : Well everyone is talking about guest posts as one of the main link building methods after the Penguin attack. It was always a valid method but never gained so much importance because Google used to still give some value to the earlier links like directories, article marketing etc. While guest post is definitely a great way for link building, here are few pointers that can help you make it more effective:

  1. Try to get your guest posts published in authority blogs – few links from authority sites are much better than a bunch of crappy links
  2. Make your guest posts non promotional and something that adds value to readers – chances are you will get social sharing and some additional syndication can get you some additional links.
  3. Don’t fret over anchor text – use different variations of anchor texts as suited to the context of the article

Infographics : Infographics are another beautiful content form that allows you to get some social traction as well as some very good links. While it might apparently look difficult and expensive to do an infographic, it could actually lead to a lot of high quality link if you get both your content and design right. If you are limited by your design skills, consider the fact that you can create a moderately presentable infographics even by using Microsoft PowerPoint. Here are 5 Free PowerPoint Templates to create amazing infographics. Once you have created your infographic, don’t just limit your self to the social media, identify bloggers who might be interested in publishing the same and reach out to them with a polite email – you will be surprised at how many of them would love to republish it ( and of course with links to your website ).

Local Business Directories : Not all of them but most of them. You need to be picky. Wherever your business is located, it shouldn’t be heard to identify a bunch of directories that specifically list businesses in that area. These are in most cases well maintained and can also send you some good business besides being a viable link opportunity.

Niche Industry Directories: Based on what your business is, chances are that there are niche websites that lists service providers in your specific vertical, some of them might also have option for users to review your services. These directories are full of contextual information and are cool options to get some links.

Job Posting : Are you hiring ? Well, this could be a good link opportunity too. There are tons of job portals and other websites that post relevant industry specific job opportunities with proper links pointing to the employer website. Posting your job openings on them not just increases the chance of getting more qualified applicants but can also get you some cool links.

Help a Charity: Good deeds never go unnoticed. Consider making a donation to some charity that has an active blog or a donor’s page. Most of them would be happy to publish a small thank you note on their website with a link pointing to yours.

Give a Scholarship: Helping a needy student is a good deed indeed. Offer a genuine scholarship and contact the Universities with the details. Most of them would have a section of their website that would post such scholarship opportunities for students and link to the company that is offering the same.

Don’t forget your Journo friends : We all love PR. Identify local newspapers and magazines that also has an online version. Digg down your network and see who do you know in there and then work with them to understand what are the different types of story that they are working one. Provide them with industry insights, expert opinion , researched data etc, basically make their work easy wherever possible and they might be willing to quote you in one of their stories.
While it is good to think of getting published/quoted in top national newspapers and magazines, it is extremely difficult to make it happen, whereas your local publications are more likely to consider you.

Documents Worth Sharing : Wrote a good document that you are proud of ? Something that could be useful to people? Convert it into a link opportunity. There are tons of websites like SlideShare, DocStock etc where you can put up all your documents for the world to view and the contributor/author profile links back to the website. Sharing high quality content documents could also be great for establishing your credibility in the domain.

Leverage Your Connections : As a business and also as an individual you are dealing with a wide range of people – friends, families, business partners, clients, vendors etc It is not uncommon to find that many of these people do have their own website. Connect with them and explore how you can get them to link to your website ( For example, give a glowing testimonial to some of your vendors / suppliers and encourage them to put it up on their website with a link to your website ).

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Check out the About SRC Page for more details about Saptarshi Roy Chaudhury.

1 Comment to “10 Genuine Penguin Friendly Link Building Techniques”

  1. Excellent ideas for link building.

    I would add Local chambers of commerce

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