Use voice instead of email to reciprocate and try contacting people by voice instead of email. More people are inclined to respond to your request when you introduce yourself by phone and let them know that you were visiting their site. Ask permission to link to their site. In return, you might state that a link back is appreciated but not required. Assuming they say yes, then you simply link up to them and confirm by email once you have confirmed. Warm personal voice contact goes a lot further than a cold email or even a warm email letter.
Pre-qualify the people you solicit for reciprocal links. They must have links from other sites like yours, and they must have the ability to make changes to their own site. If they don't respond to your solicitation, at most send ONE second request. Otherwise move on and take their site off of yours. Send a thank you note if they give you a reciprocal link.
Search for sites that rank high for search terms that are important to you, then look through the search results for sites that do not compete with you. These sites should be high on your list of link targets. Piggy back on their high ranking.
Check the link popularity of your competitors, and find out who are linking to them. Contact those Web sites, and ask them to link to you in return for a reciprocal link.
Search the sites of the people who have linked to you for other possible link partners.
Find URLs that are currently linking to one or more of your pages and ask the appropriate Webmaster if they might also find value in other pages on your site (that you might suggest).
Manually search for Web sites that have the same theme as your Web site. When requesting a link, make sure to highlight what your site has to offer their visitors and why they should link to it. A compelling case will increase your success.
Review any Web site to which you want to link *before* writing to its Webmaster asking for a link. Like all SEO, do it manually. Automating the task is asking for trouble, especially if you haven't reviewed the site before asking for the link.
If someone says they can not or do not wish to link to your site, I would still ask their permission to link to them. Instead of sending them a confirmation, try sending them a pleasant thank you for permission to link to their Web site. Don't be surprised if they DO link back. |
