Last week I talked about my favorite link gathering tips which is mostly about making sure your site is ready to accept new links and why people want to link to you. Now I want to talk about my all-time favorite methods of building links. The advantage here is that I’ve actually done these things so you know they work and I hate to pay for links so the only cost to use these tips is your time - not your cash.

1. Ask

Did you ever experience the situation where you had a crush on someone and thought there’s no way they’d go out with you only to later find out they liked you too? The same thing happens with link-building. A lot more people are willing to link to your content if you just ask. You will occasionally get rejected and should never make anyone feel uncomfortable or obligated but if you can get past your fear of rejection there are literally hundreds of people ready to help you out.

2. Link out generously

This is a “put up or shut up” situation. If people see that you link out they are more inclined to link to you as well. If you are stingy with your links, people will be stingy linking to you.

3. Make friends online

Friends are naturally interested in what you are doing and will naturally link to things they think are interesting.

4. Create a resource or authority document

This can be a tutorial, special report, insider’s guide or whatever fits what you do best. I’ve had the most luck building links with “authority articles” that are published shortly before an industry trend hits. If you are first on the scene you will be rewarded. Added bonus is these are links viewers actually click through to see the “source” document so you can get direct traffic as well as an SE boost.

5. Interview People

People like to see their names in print. If you interview the right people they will promote the interview by linking to it. And if the interview is especially noteworthy other people will link to it too.

6. Flatter Someone

Like the interview, if you appeal to someone’s vanity they will want to share how great they are with everyone they know!

7. Write a testimonial

I recently sent my web host a “thank you” note for withstanding the Digg-pounding one of my sites got. They liked it so much they asked if they could add it to their testimonials page along with a link!

8. Review websites, products and businesses

Make sure the review is honest and informative and you will often pick up links from the site you review and anyone interested in the thing you reviewed. Online reviews are so powerful you can even get paid to do them now!

9. Write Press Releases

This is especially potent in tight-nit industries where you can get your story picked up by industry newsletters or periodicals. If you are lucky, your story could hit the mainstream media giving you even more exposure.

10. Guest Write

Write a guest post on a blog or contribute an article to a website. You should be able to link within the article and get a byline with a link to your site.

11. Bring on guest writers

Guest authors will often reference they posted at your site and their fresh perspective may add some life to your blog enticing regular readers to link to it.

12. Talk to your vendors

Your vendors are usually looking for ways to help you out. After all, the more successful you are the more money they will make off you. Let them know you’d like a link.

13. Leverage Social Media

Easier said than done and it does take a network of friends to help you out when the time comes and you have something really great to push for the Digg and del.icio.us home pages. My quick advice is to check in with these sites every week or two and find stories you think are interesting and vote for them. If you show some activity your future votes and submissions will be looked on more favorable. Also, get a friend to start the process for you. My first encounter going popular was done without my prior knowledge!

Anyway, these sites are worth the effort. My last popular story picked up about 60 links and 30,000 extra visitors and a couple hundred new subscriptions to my RSS feed.

14. Set up Website Profiles on Squidoo and similar sites

These member-based sites require time to set up and more time to promote. I suggest you set up the profile and then move on. It doesn’t make sense to promote somebody else’s website unless there is something in it for you.

15. Publish an RSS Feed

Good feeds get syndicated acting as temporary links and sources of traffic.

16. If you have an RSS feed get it in Technorati

And other sites that offer a “featured feed”. I had a site hit the front page of Technorati for 20 minutes and it sent buckets of traffic. Also, tag your posts to come up in Technorati’s search.

17. Give away cool stuff

This site gives away free links, some web designers give away free templates. Whatever you give away make sure it fits within your industry and is something people want and will think is cool.

18. Sponsor or contribute to a cause

This may cost you a couple dollars but you get good-will and backlinks from potentially powerful websites. Sometimes you don’t have to lay out cash if you contribute in other ways.

19. Offer a useful tool

This one is a classic. Make sure the tool helps people in your industry and solves a real problem. Or if you build off of someone else’s idea make sure your tool is better than theirs. This is another one that may cost you a couple dollars if you can’t program yourself but is worth the expense.

20. Submit to free directories

Ok, these links are not very powerful but when you are establishing your website these links can help a lot for indexing and to get things moving. Don’t forget about DMOZ. And my advice for all of these sites is “submit and forget”. Either you will pick up the link or not. It isn’t worth fighting for or fretting over.

21. Forum Sig Links

Many forums give members the opportunity to include a link in their signature file. Just be sure to follow the rules to avoid penalization and embarrassment. Again, these links are not very powerful but they can be a source of direct traffic and if you are very active the links do add up to something.

22. Comment on blogs

Often these links have no real value for the search engines (because they are nofollowed) but they can get you noticed and send direct traffic.

23. Swap Links

Reciprocal links are not at powerful as they were but used sparingly can help. Just try to partner with relevant sites.

24. Search for places to submit your site

This is something I do with new sites or when I’m killing time. Go to Google, type in your keywords +”add url” or +”submit site“.

25. Investigate your competition

Do a search for link:yourcompetitionsite and see where they got their links and if you can pick any up yourself.

26. Get translated

Articles I’ve written have been translated into 8 languages with links citing the original source. The best part is I didn’t have to solicit these translators - they came to me. I just had to say “yes”. But you could probably develop a better system for syndicating your content into other languages.

27. Build mini-sites

You can custom craft your own link partners for less than $15 a year by throwing up a WordPress or Blogger site. It does not take much time but you can have the mini-site specialize in an area of your industry your main site does not/can’t target. And then you can cross-link.

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