Fresh Link Building Tips: New Search Filters = Easy Link Research

If you are looking to build links one of the easiest ways to do so is to place yourself inside a conversation that is already wildly spreading. Sites like Techmeme and Del.icio.us show what stories were recently hot, and you can find some bloggers who cited those stories using Technorati and Google Blogsearch. Google has a date based filter on news and recently launched a date based search filter for their regular search results which allows you to find fresh content on any topic. If you follow up on a popular story and contact these people you might find a few easy to acquire high authority links.

Find a Popular Idea and a Hook

Lets run through an example of how to do this. So on Techmeme right now Google vs Facebook is a popular story. The thesis of the story is that Google is going to create an open API. So I ask myself if I have an original take on Google and openness. I remember my post about Google not being very open.

Polish Your Story

I can polish that post and market it, or I can take the best bits of it and rewrite it as a new post that cites some of the popular people posting on Google vs Facebook, insert pictures and a chart comparing Google to Facebook, and then start emailing some of the websites I came across on Techmeme, Google blog search, Technorati, and recent results in Google's regular search index.

Polishing your story, aggregating data in a pretty format, citing sources, and stroking egos are crucial to helping your story spread.

Avoid Brand Damage

It might be harder for me to succeed with this on Seo Book since Google branded SEOs as being scumbags. If my site was not about SEO it would be far easier for me to get links from those other sites, but it is hard to push market an SEO site to high authority tech channels without expecting some brand damage as a result.

Even if your site covers a lovable topic you still can get burnt if your ads are too aggressive, your contact email looks automated or spammy, or you contact mean spirited people. Use your gut instincts for judgement calls on who you should contact and how you should contact them, and don't place ads on your linkbait.

If your site is brand new then you likely are not risking that much if one person responds with a hate post. I once had a person link to me from a PageRank 8 site with over 1,000 inbound .edu links as the punishment for contacting them. Sorry to offend and thanks for the high authority link worth about $500. :)

Use Blog Comments Too

Another option would be to leave blog comments or have a friend leave relevant blog comments, but these are typically much less effective than personalized emails at building links. If you leave insightful comments without looking like a link spammer you are more likely to get links from your comments.

Many Ways to Filter Blog Search Results

When you search on Technorati and Google Blogsearch you can search for people writing about a specific subject and then organize those results by freshness or authority. You can also search for blog posts that cite a specific post related to your post. Another option with using date and blog search filters is to go back to some of the people who cited one of your recently popular posts and ask them to look at the post you are trying to spread.

These Tips are Timeless

You can use all these search tips to aid your link research using seasonal stories that spread a month ago, last year, or three years ago.