Six Link Bait Ideas That Will Improve Your Website’s SEO
When it comes to earning links naturally, Google advises webmasters to develop valuable content that will encourage websites to link to them. However, when it comes to creating ideas for link-worthy content, many webmasters become stuck. Great white-hat SEO stems from implementing a smart content marketing strategy. Below are a few inspirational link bait ideas that have earned websites an influx of organic links from authoritative sites.
Six Link Bait Ideas for Your SEO Strategy
Idea 1: Create a Site Function That Will Help Web Users
To create the best opportunity for your site to become link-worthy, it needs to be valuable to the web user. What better way is there to provide value than by making their lives more convenient? SkyBet created a smart campaign where they created a pop-up page for employees, dubbed the ‘Boss Coming, Look Busy’ button. Pressing the button launched a fake page full of spreadsheets that most office users work on when they are actually busy. The campaign earned several natural links from several blogs and forums.
Idea 2: Do a Video Demonstration With a Twist
Demonstrate the products or services that your business offers and add a twist to it. The guys from Blendtec executed this perfectly with their video series ‘Will it blend?’
The campaign was a viral hit, accumulating millions of video views on YouTube and ‘crème de la crème’ links from premium sites like The Daily Mail, Adweek, Mashable, Gizmodo, and Crunchbase. The site has accumulated thousands of authority links, which significantly improved their SEO competitiveness and helped turn their brand into a household name.
Idea 3: Create an Interesting Web Game That Appeals to People in Your Industry
Your business can have a simple game created that resonates with the sentiment and interests in your industry. One website created the game ‘Whack a Cutts’, which featured Google’s Head of Webspam Matt Cutts. The game is based on the Whack a mole game and allows users to vent their frustration by earning as many points as possible by whacking Matt Cutts head as it popped up out of the ground.
Whack-a-Cutts Browser Game
The web page has generated high authority industry links from sites like Search Engine Roundtable, Search Engine Land and even Matt Cutts’ own blog!
Idea 4: Take an Interesting Spin on Popular Content
Improve your site’s link baiting success by using popular content and presenting it in another format. In the SEO industry, one webmaster created the site ‘The Short Cutts’, which succinctly explains SEO points that have been made from every video Google’s Matt Cutts presented. The idea is a simple one, but it has generated over 300 shares on Linkedin, 2000 shares on Google Plus and links from prominent websites like Search Engine Land, Search Engine Journal, and several other SEO industry sites.
Idea 5: Develop an Online Application
Sometimes, a simple web application can have an enormous impact to your site’s link-worthiness. Functional applications like calculators or comparison engines can quickly earn bookmarks and shares across different web platforms.
A great example is the Elf Yourself site that was developed by OfficeMax. The site allows people to create an elf version of themselves, family or friends to share during Christmas. The links that the site has acquired from this campaign has enabled their Domain Authority to skyrocket to 72. It has also generated several links from sites like Tech Insider, Forbes, and Mashable.
Elf Yourself by OfficeMax
Idea 6: Develop a WordPress Plugin
People are always on the lookout for WordPress plugins that can improve the value that their site offers. Widgets such as a customizable contact form could earn your site hundreds of links from high authority development websites. One of the major success stories is the Yoast SEO plugin, which features on thousands of websites and is linked to thousands (if not, millions) of times from web development blogs and platforms.
Cracking the code for generating natural links may take time, but if you publish link worthy content regularly and promote the content to relevant audiences, your site will start to earn links naturally every week and will build in authority very quickly. Take a look at the link bait opportunities available in your industry and start implementing a content marketing strategy that will earn you the authoritative links that will make your SEO ranking skyrocket to long-term page 1 rankings.
Conclusion
Hopefully, you didn’t read this article expecting that we bring you ideas that could just be realized without effort. Instead, all you can do comes at a price. But this price is well worth it.
Should you need further help with SEO, there are a plethora of agencies out there eager to assist you.
