Link Building 101 for Your Business

Link building is one of the most important parts of online marketing and one of the hardest parts for most online marketers.

Link building is one of the most critical parts of online marketing as the links that you acquire will eventually help you crawl up the search engine rankings and will ultimately help you rank better for the important key words, that you desire.

The task of link building might be hard, but if you use the resources of your site appropriately link building isn’t nearly as hard as you think.

The following four link building opportunities will help guide you and your internet marketing through the link building process and beyond.

1. The first link building opportunity that every website has is their social media profiles. Most social media accounts allow a link or two, and sometimes even three, back to a destination of your choosing. Use these social media buttons to point people to your website. You should probably be on the big 3 (LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook), but depending on your content and your business you might be able to find other opportunities.  Social media opportunities for link building include YouTube and Google+
2. Once you have your social media accounts created it’s important to think local. Google’s geared the latest versions of Google search to put an emphasis on local businesses and companies. So it’s important that you claim your Google local page sooner rather than later.  It’s also important to note that Google local is not the only local directory out there.  Explore the local directories in your area for link building opportunities, but also don’t forget location based services.  Opportunities for this include Yelp and Foursquare among others.
3. Now reach out to your affiliations, you do pay them money to begin with so it’s not wrong that you get a link on their website as well. Most affiliations and groups that you are a member of  allow you to create an online profile so be sure to include your link.  These link opportunities include the BBB.org as well as your local chamber of commerce.
4. Finally think about your content and your company. What are the unique selling points of your company? Once you start thinking about the general marketing of your company, link building opportunities will come to you. A scholarship or a non-profit partnership is always great for link building. If you’re looking to increase your company add links on Monster, CareerBuilder, and all of the other job sites. Once you start thinking about your company the possibilities are endless.

Now these are just a few link building tips to get you started, but once you’ve explored these four activities other opportunities will start to sprout up.