Hi all, here's a few thoughts on link building. I hope you find them helpful somehow. Please expand on this start, and add your own ideas.
Quality Content: Let's not forget our most important link building asset, happy readers.
Obviously, the best link building technique is to have quality content that is worth linking to. Quality sites don't have to spend as much time link building, because their readers do most of the link building work for them.
Ask For The Link: Most of our readers aren't webmasters, and won't understand how important links are to us. We have to tell them.
A brief friendly request for a link at the end of our articles is a really easy link building technique that can pay big dividends (if we're sharing good content). Let's include our photo, make it fun, and get down on our knees and beg. :-)
Make It Easy: Ok, we've got great content and we've asked for the link. Now we need to make it easy for our readers to do what we want them to do, because let's face it, we're all lazy as hell. :-)
Let's make the link information as easy to access as possible. As example, we could put a one sentence summary of our article and the URL at the end of the article, along with the request for a link. All the happy reader has to do is a quick copy and paste, and they've got everything they need.
Say Thanks: One more step. Let's keep an eye on who's linking to us, and take the time to say thanks.
Relationships are important, and people like to be noticed and thanked. It only takes a second, and now the happy reader is even happier, which can only be good for us.
Summary: Happy readers can be our most powerful link building tool. Let's make them smile with good content, and help them do what we want them to do.