**by Garrett French**
Without an ordered approach, careful research and custom tools, it
can be difficult for link builders, writers and content strategists to
know what content will attract links in a target market.
Here, we'll provide a process and tools for developing and
distributing linkable content, based on the content that has proven to
attract links in your target keyword space. You should be able to
answer these questions using the accompanying tools for your market:
What content topics receive the most links?
What are the attributes of the most-linked content?
Who is the "linking audience" of your keyword space?
Who links the most frequently to content in your keyword space?
What are the attributes of mid-linkable content?
What reoccurring topics and themes suggest possible content
directions?
What content is missing (eg: top 10 or 100 lists, resource
collections)?
Who links to topics similar to content you've already created?
Now that you know what you're looking for, it's time to begin the
linkable content research phase. In this article, we investigate the
link building content space using two keywords: and
. Though we're pretty familiar with the space,
we're going to approach it as if we were not.
Here are the tools we recommend for this exercise:
The Linkable Content Analysis Worksheet
<http://link-building-tools.ontolo.com/LinkableContentAnalysisWorksheet.html>
(3rd Download)
URL Occurrence Counter Tool
<http://link-building-tools.ontolo.com/URLAndHostnameCounter.php>
+ SERP Dominators Analysis Guide
<http://searchengineland.com/the-link-builders-guide-to-analyzing-serp-dominators-for-link-opportunities-21076>
The Link Qualification Worksheet
<http://link-building-tools.ontolo.com/download-link-qualification-worksheet.html>
+ Guide
<http://searchengineland.com/a-guide-to-qualifying-link-prospects-for-relevance-value-potentiality-17637>
Yahoo Site Explorer <http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search>
(YSE)
SEO for Firefox
<http://tools.seobook.com/firefox/seo-for-firefox.html>
Process for gathering linkable content data for analysis
Read through the process first and then follow along from home with
your Linkable Content Analysis Worksheet.
Step 1. Identify the top information sources in your keyword space
First, you must identify which content is considered most valuable in
your target keyword space. Our example is fairly
simple because so many people have written so much about it. If you're
in a less-discussed content space, you may need to look at more
keywords, or perhaps look at more informational keyword phrases [how
to + target keywords].
Google search: Google search:
You could also use the URL and Hostname Occurrence Counter Tool on
the SERPs of resource oriented queries for finding more of your top
info sources. Further, we've used the blogrolls of highly-prominent
bloggers as a starting point for analysis of unfamiliar spaces. The
goal here is to find your industry's most prominent, important and
trusted resources.
Step 2. Extract resources from the Top 20 results
Next, you'll need to extract non-salesy resource URLs and hostnames
from the top 20 results. You're looking for how-to resources, thought
pieces, entertainment pieces - anything that's ranking and doesn't
have a "buy now" button on it (unless of course, you're
investigating highly-linkable product pages).
Capture both sub-pages and hostname results from the resources you
find. Any sub-page titles and URLs can go right in your worksheet. Use
SEO for Firefox to find and record inbound link count to these pages
into sheet 2, the Highly-Linked Content sheet.
For each of these sub-pages (and only the sub pages, we don't want
site-wide inbound links here) export the inbound links as detected by
Yahoo. Paste these inbound links into the "link tank" sheet of the
Linkable Content Worksheet (sheet 4).
Also, be sure to copy and paste out the hostname of the sub-pages
that appear. For example, the URL for Aaron Wall's How to Build Links
Fast: 101 Tips & Strategies (#1 for ) looks like this:
http://www.seobook.com/archives/001792.shtml. You'd want to record
that URL on sheet 2, and the hostname, www.seobook.com onto sheet 3.
Copy the hostnames into sheet 3 – they need more processing.
Step 3. Identifying linkable content from the top resource domains
Take your top hostnames and explore them with Yahoo Site Explorer
<http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/>
(YSE). In our experience, YSE shows pages from sites *roughly* in
the order of the number of links that they have acquired. In a new
tab, open up 10 or 15 pages that appear high in the list and that have
promising titles.
For example, here's Debra Mastaler's old blog in YSE
<http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search?p=thelinkspiel.blogspot.com&y=Explore+URL&fr=sfp>
. The second page listed is her classic Help! I'm New, I Need Links,
What Can I Do?
<http://thelinkspiel.blogspot.com/2007/09/help-im-new-i-need-links-what-can-i-do.html>
post. Using the SEO Toolbar, we can see clearly that this particular
page has 260 inbound links. This article is clearly a giant of the
link building content space and so title, URL and inbound link count
all went into our work sheet. Next, we export the 260 inbound linkers
to her article and paste them into sheet 4 – many of these links are
from people who appreciate high quality content, and we want to get to
know them better.
From the first page of YSE for Ms. Mastaler's blog, we can see a
number of articles - to keep this exercise manageable by hand, we only
selected the top 10 or so. For more thorough linkable content
analysis, you could go to 20, 30, or even export the top 1000 results
into a TSV file if you've got the tools, time and talent to handle
that much data.
To reiterate: copy title, URL and inbound link count into sheet 2 of
the Linkable Content Analysis Work Sheet. Copy inbound links (only
inbound links) to that URL, excluding the domain itself - into sheet
4, the link tank.
Repeat hostname analysis with YSE until you've worked through your
list of hostnames (from sheet 3) that appeared in the top 20 results
for your keywords.
Linkable content analysis and strategy creation
Once you've gathered your highly-linked content and the pages that
link to it in the Linkable Content Analysis Worksheet, you can begin
the work of identifying your linking audience and charting out your
content creation strategy.
What topics receive the most links?
When you sort your Linkable Content Analysis Worksheet based on
number of inbound links, you'll easily determine the "big head" of
linkable content. We put 58 pages into our Linkable Content Analysis
Worksheet based on the two searches above, along with the processes
outlined. The top 5 most-linked content breaks down like this:
101 Link Building Tips to Market Your Website
<http://www.seobook.com/archives/001792.shtml>
(2760 IBL)
Link Building Wiki <http://www.linkbuildingwiki.com/wiki/Main_Page>
(864 IBL)
Link Value Factors <http://wiep.net/link-value-factors/>
(608 IBL)
Link Building Strategies: 69 Solid Tactics For 2009
<http://wiep.net/talk/link-building/link-building-strategies/>
(408 IBL)
Five Link Building Strategies that Work
<http://www.copyblogger.com/link-building-strategies-that-work/>
(362 IBL)
(Congrats, Wiep…you showed up twice!)
Now, even if we were new to the industry, we'd know some of the
most-linkable documents within its keyword space.
What are attributes of the highest-linkable content?
What exactly makes these 5 articles the most-linked articles within
the keyword space of and ? That's
the question of a good linkable-content strategist! While we have our
own ideas based on our experience in link building and SEO content in
general, here are some things you could measure if you were new to a
space:
Core topic
Number of words
Reading level of content
Embedded media (images, video, podcast, etc…)
Outbound links on the page? Are they reciprocal?
Scope/thoroughness of content
Information structure (top 10 list, "ultimate guide," info
aggregation, etc…)
Apparent target audience
Apparent target audience skill level (basic or advanced?)
What stage of the buy cycle does it target?
Look for patterns that might be significant for your space. For
example, when it comes to link building content, it appears that
having large numbers in the title may incite links. These large
numbers (101 and 69) further indicate that the linking audience for
this content prefers thorough coverage, and a quick read shows this to
be true. A quick comparison of word count for each of the top-linked
pages shows an average of over 4000 words per article, with 2000-3000
being the most represented. That's a lot of words for one article.
We would not recommend that everyone begin writing content pages that
are 3000 words long. But we would recommend that everyone check out
the attributes of highly-linkable content in their keyword space
(including but not limited to word count) and consider that as a
starting point.
Who is the "linking audience" of your keyword space?
By now, sheet 4 of your Link Qualification Worksheet should contain a
powerful audience of inbound linkers - people who link to specific,
high value sub-pages and not just the home page. Begin looking for
opportunities to build relationships with the owners/operators of
these sites. Ideally, they become a vital part of how you distribute
your content and build links.
Your opportunities may look like:
Guest posts (note: this article is a "guest post" on SEL)
Blogroll link requests, blogroll link exchanges
Add to RSS for comment conversation participation
Contributions to existing resource pages
Contributions to email newsletter
Distribution through Twitter, StumbleUpon, Digg, Etc…
For more thorough link prospect qualification, follow the process
outlined in "Qualifying Link Prospects for Relevance, Value and
Potentiality
<http://searchengineland.com/a-guide-to-qualifying-link-prospects-for-relevance-value-potentiality-17637>
."
Who links the most frequently to content in your keyword space?
Conduct a host name co-occurrence analysis of your inbound linking
URLs from sheet 4 using the Hostname Occurrence Tool. Paste your
results into sheet 5.
The sites that occur the most frequently are the sites that link out
most often to highly linkable content. Those with a higher value as
measured by the Link Qualification Worksheet and that demonstrate a
high propensity for linking typically represent the most important
sites for establishing a relationship. Sites that link frequently but
don't display a high value metric may be sources of quick and easy
links that may not convey much search influence.
What are attributes of mid-linkable content?
Now remember, not all of your content needs to be a grand slam, or
even a home run. Base hits are great. In our quick survey, we found 58
highly-linked URLs. By grouping and evaluating the mid-level players,
it's possible to identify a "linkable-enough" level of content, as
well as a "core linking audience."
Consider this: the top 5 most-linked articles will have links from
sites not typically interested in link building. The sites linking to
the top 5 will be less likely to link to other link building resources
especially if they are more narrowly focused. The sites linking to
articles with more moderate levels of inbound links are likely to
represent a "core linking audience" of link building.
Our inquiry into 10 mid-linkable link building resources with 100
links or less showed Wiep.net and Search Engine Land, along with a
high frequency of bookmarking and social sharing sites at the top, so
not super fruitful unless you're looking for social sharing and
bookmarking sites.
What reoccurring topics and themes suggest possible content
directions?
By spending some time with your Linkable Content Analysis Worksheet
you can begin to tease out some potential article topics. What's
wonderful is that a) part of your research for the article is already
done for you and b) once the article is done you'll know exactly which
sites to approach to share your new content and request links.
Based on our quick survey data, we identified a few topic trends, or
reoccurring topics and themes. You can do this simply by looking at
the titles. A more thorough dig would mean reading and categorizing
all the highly-linked content in your space. We highly advise this.
Here are some examples of reoccurring topics we could now use for
creating adjunct content, trump content, follow up commentary,
etcetera.
Link bait
Linkbait, Linkbait, Linkbait
<http://www.jimboykin.com/linkbait-linkbait-linkbait/>
(170 IBL)
Link Baiting: Which Hook Attracts the Right Fish?
<http://wiep.net/talk/link-baiting/link-baiting-which-hook-attracts-the-right-fish/>
(125 IBL)
Link Bait Kool-Aid? <http://www.ericward.com/articles/linkbait.html>
(61 IBL)
Directory analysis
Is That Directory Worth Submitting To?
<http://thelinkspiel.blogspot.com/2008/06/is-that-directory-worth-submitting-to.html>
(67 IBL)
Hi I'm Debra And I'm A Directory Addict.
<http://thelinkspiel.blogspot.com/2007/10/hi-im-debra-and-im-directory-addict.html>
(65 IBL)
Assessing Site Linkability
What Makes a Web Site Link-Worthy?
<http://www.ericward.com/articles/linkworthy03-03.html>
(95 IBL)
Dude, Your Site Is Boring No Links For You
<http://thelinkspiel.blogspot.com/2008/04/dude-your-site-is-boring-no-links-for.html>
(84 IBL)
When you pick the topic of your next article, create a Link
Qualification Worksheet and add in all the pages linking to the
resources that you use and cite. Further, let's say we wrote an
article on link bait. We could start with collecting inbound links to
the link bait articles we found above, but then conduct some searches
on and and gather backlinks to any
high-ranking subpages. This article would look something like: 17 Ways
to Accelerate Links to Your Link Bait (and Other Highly Linkable
Content)
<http://www.searchenginepeople.com/blog/17-ways-accelerate-links-link-bait-linkable-content.html>
.
What content is missing?
Finding "missing link" content is easier if you have a good
editorial sense and/or you know a space well. If you're starting with
content expertise in the woodworking space and want to create
highly-linkable content in, say, the link building space, perhaps
you'd begin with an article on link building tips for woodworking
magazines (or forums, blogs, etc.).
If the content/keyword space you are investigating lacks massive
numbers (100 ways; 1,000 tips…) then perhaps this could be a good
direction too. Also, check if anyone has extensively aggregated the
top resources in your space. Now that you've done all this research,
you're pretty well positioned to do so. Keep your eyes open and work
to aggregate or trump what's proven to attract links elsewhere in the
space.
Ideally, the unique, informative content you're creating also helps
to sell a product or service your company offers. Can your content
differentiate along the lines of your products and services? We think
so.
Who links to topics similar to content you've already created?
If you've already created a body of content, look for article or
content titles that suggest some similarity to yours. Visit the pages
and see for yourself. Can your content compete on linkability
<http://ontolo.com/blog/b-15-ways-to-measure-and-grow-your-sites-linkability.html>
? Further, does your content provide good counterpoint, or fill in
missing material or viewpoints? If you think so, begin commenting,
emailing or even calling linkers to simliar content and let them know
that there's more to the story.
Finally, for distribution, reach out to the sites that link
frequently to top content in your space. Wiep puts outreach very
nicely in The Perfect Link Request Email Template
<http://wiep.net/talk/link-building/link-request-email-template/>
.
What's missing from this article is a broader look at content
marketing and how informative content can help you reach business
goals. This article could compliment the research process for any
content strategists seeking to add value to their content by making it
more linkable and distributable by a target audience.
Opinions expressed in the article are those of the author, and not
necessarily Search Engine Land.
Garrett French <http://searchengineland.com/author/garrett-french/>
is co-founder of Ontolo <http://ontolo.com>
, a link building agency and co-author of Link-Building-Guide.com
<http://www.link-building-guide.com>
, which leads motivated readers through the methods and processes of
large-scale, crawler-based link research, link acquisition and
linker-targeted content strategy.
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