We have all been there – stuck with an excellent but seemingly dull service or product to sell that doesn’t in itself generate many appealing keywords or entice many links and wondering how to get more traffic coming to us.

 

If you’re facing this challenge, you need to find out a bit more about thinking outside the box and the crafty art of link baiting – so read on here below.

 

Link baiting is a powerful SEO tool and involves using each and every trick in the book to place links on a page specifically to attract traffic to you – without the need for specific keyword or other searches.

With link baiting, you can literally use any technique you can think of. Your only objective is to draw attention and visitors to your page so that they can see for themselves how great your service or product is and so will go on to share your link and get others to connect with you.

 

For example, you could:

• Use Humor: Any kind of joke, photo, funny anecdote, laugh-out-loud video, whatever it is that gets a smile and will be passed on and shared.
• Use Information: Instructions, how-tos, easy-to-follow explanations, news-worthy articles, links to e-zines or any other type of informative content, and all the better if the link is a sight that gets updated frequently.
• Use Newsworthy Events: these mention topical and timely information and you could even follow current news events that are making the headlines.
• Use Tools: inset links to useful online tools that users can download or open from the webpage.
• Use Controversy: make your links eye-catching and intriguing. For example, one web development and design company even uses the link: “boring web development company” and swears by the amount of traffic they get – even though the description is far from complimentary!
• Some sites even use “evil” hooks – deliberately unpopular, mean or even inflammatory comments designed to get a response – even a negative one, the thought being that all responses are good responses and that once they connect with you they are going to like what they see.

 

You’ll most commonly see link-baiting occurring in blogs because these are updated on a regular basis and usually touch on a variety of (vaguely?) related topics relevant to your site.

 

When to Use Link Baiting

• When your web site is “boring”.
• When you want to start off a mini-marketing campaign but don’t have much time or money!
• When you have to compete with many (hundreds?) or other sites all offering the same service or widgets as yours.
• When you’re stuck for more “legitimate” ways to drive up visitor interest.

 

The point about link-baiting is to think far, far outside the box! Like the boring web development company mentioned above, what you are aiming to do is to provoke enough intrigue so that lots of people actually click on your link to see what it is and why it is there.

 

Besides generating interest you are making yourself memorable into the bargain.

No matter how wild your link idea, if it grabs that all important notice and generates traffic to your site, it is a job well done.

Why not take the risk and see what happens?