Linking Etiquette – What Not to Do

Obviously some folks like my friend “Mark” below haven’t received the memo yet.

Generic emails with directions on how to link to a unrelated site are a waste of time. I don’t care if you purchased a email blaster program (see below “Don’t Get Fired…”). However long it took you to write out the email was a waste of time and if you paid for the program… a waste of $.

There are extremely unethical companies and individuals out there roaming the Internet making all kinds of promises. Unfortunately even though they seem “Too Good To Be True” honest and trusting people who are just trying to market their business often get taken in by these claims.

I left off the .com in the email below because spamsite dot com is a brilliant domain name to own. People all over the Internet link to it as an example. All those organic links!!!  … However… We are not going to enable them and be another unsuspecting link.

Who You Link to Counts!

Google is also monitoring whom you link to. Which is why you need to be careful and selective with who you link your site with.

Blueprint for What Not to Do:

 

From: Spam Site [webmaster@spamsite.] Sent: Tuesday, July 20, 2010 7:30 PM
To: info@clientsite.
Subject: I would like to do the link exchange with you.

Hi,

My name is Mark. I recently came across your website http://clientsite./ through search engine and found it is informative for our website’s visitors.
I would like to exchange link with our websites spamsite. and anotherspamsite.

As you are probably aware, reciprocal linking benefits both of us by raising the search engine rankings and generating more traffic to both of our websites.

If you would like to do the link exchange with us, please place our link on your website with the following details.

Title: Spam Site
Description: Find Spam at my Site – Yummy
Link: http://www.spamsite.

Title : SpamSite
Desc : Find Spam at my Site – Yummy
Url : http://wwwspamsite.

Then, please inform me by replying to this email with your details (title and description) or use the following links to post your details. Your links will be shown once we approve them within a few days.

http://www.spamsite

http://www.spamsite

Look forward to hearing from you.

Best regards,
Mark J

If you never ever want to receive link exchange from me from any of my site, please click here to unsubscribe or open the url http://www.www.spamsite/spamsite/unsubscribe.php?id=8a9070cd660dc714b0f43704ebd5d16f in browser.

If you are going to contact another website for a link exchange make sure the site is complimentary to your own. “Mark” up above is not only from another country far from the USA, his business would only be of interest to those on his continent. And the email address he contacted that ELC monitors for this particular client is not even near the same category as his website which makes the link rather worthless.

Examples of Complimentary Websites:

• Florist Site – Garden Center
• Mechanic – Car Enthusiast Site
• Internet Marketing – Brick & Mortar Printed Marketing Site
• Personal Trainer – Nutritional Sites / Local Heath Clubs / Gyms
• Real Estate Agent – Local Businesses / Clubs / Services
• Restaurant – Other Restaurants / Local Businesses

If you can it is always best to try and contact the website you would like to link with via a phone call. I personally think that email is static and unpersonalized. A phone call allows for a personal connection you otherwise would not get with just a email. If you cannot get through to the person, don’t “Stalk” them! Leave a polite, concise message and move on.

Hi I’m – Your Name – From – Your Business – We do – No More Than 6 Descriptive Words – I would like to interview you for a article on our website. Please contact me at – Your Phone #. I am also sending you an email with my contact information.

Make sure to repeat your phone number clearly and slowly twice. Most people aren’t going to re-play your message to get your phone number.

If they get back to you, then it is meant to be. If they do not… move on. The Internet is a big place. If you do connect with the person. You can use the the ICAO pelling alphabet to spell out your email to make it easier on the listener to copy it down.

Good Practices if You Do Request a Link Via Email:

• Don’t be generic.
• Spend some time learning about the site you want to link to.
• Make sure that the site you want to link to is complimentary.
• Don’t forget to use proper grammar like my friend “Mark” up above did.
• Nothing says unprofessional like misspelled words and incorrect grammar.
• Don’t lecture a person on how beneficial linking to you is.
• Don’t keep emailing the person.

Last but not least. Don’t have a page devoted to 100’s of links. If you are going to do a link exchange make it worthwhile. Each site should build a keyword targeted page about the other site. Notice I mentioned an “Article” in the phone message script above. Not only does the other site get a great link, your site gets good content which boosts your ranking and ways for visitors to find your site.

Don’t Get Fired by Your Internet Host or Internet Service Provider!

Also, for those of you just dipping their toe into email marketing… You probably are at risk of violating the TOS (Terms of Service) with either your ISP (Internet Service Provider) or your Web Host depending on how you are sending your marketing emails. For instance, my Web Host MDD Hosting has a strong stance against spamming. My DSL provider does as well. I’m betting yours does also. Most providers monitor your SMTP usage. Send too many emails within a specific period of time you could trigger them to monitor your SMTP practices. ISP’s and Web Hosts don’t want to harbor spammers and be caught up in all of the negative publicity that can arise when a major spammer is found. Learn more about spam and spammers though The Spamhaus.org project.

If you are in need of information on how to do a responsible email marketing campaign and not violate any TOS with your service providers, please leave a comment below by 8-1-10 and we will make it a priority to get that info posted for you.

* Original photo URL on Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/photos/nonoq8/3228761389/