Linking is not the only thing to be concerned with

Recently I was participating in a conversation on one of the listservs I am on. As happens from time to time, a thread on blogging and websites is created and people engage in that conversation. And as usually happens, talk of stats, numbers, outbound and inbound linking becomes the focus of the thread.

I find it amazing, especially in a conversation that includes talk about blogging, that the only thing everyone is worried about is linking. I have been blogging since early 2005. Not as long as some of the old timers, but longer than most. I can tell you one thing, if a site does not have good, relevant, up to date content, I don’t link to them. Linking is not the key. While important, it is not the key. If you want a successful blog, and yes I am targeting blogs in this conversation, you have to have good, relevant content. Next is the conversation. Without the conversation created by blogging, there is nothing. Engage your readers in the conversation and you should get involved in the conversation yourself. It should be your goal to comment on at least 1 other blog in your niche or practice area a day. Three would be better, but I would settle for 1 out of our clients.

Internet marketing should not be like a Yellow Page ad

Anyone can throw up a web based Yellow Page ad and that is what a static site is. A static site is passive marketing. Easy to do, but do you get results? I can assure you, a blog will get you some of the best results in the end. Not just from traffic, but from all of the other benefits of blogging. For one thing, if you truly aggressive in your blogging, i.e. posting, commenting and reading other blogs in your niche or practice area, you will be better for it. You will find you are more informed on your niche or market than if you were not blogging. Posting about your area of focus will force you to read, research and get involved in your niche or market.

Next is the non-internet benefits of blogging. Because a blog can get you noticed, you will get calls from the media. You will become known as the place to go for information on that particular niche or practice area. And they will come. If I was to average it out over the last 3.5 years, I would way the media has contacted me at least monthly to talk about at least one of the topics from one of my blogs.

Turn Visitors into Readers

Here is my point. I have a ton of inbound and outbound links on my blogs, I have good page rank on the older ones, I get a ton of traffic and I rank high in the search engines. But that is not the end all to be all. What do you really want, to build relationships with your visitors so they become readers. And than you want them to become return READERS, not just visitors. And because you are providing information in a form and fashion your readers can use and understand, they will be better informed. And as better informed consumers, they will come back to the place that was willing to give them that information for FREE when they actual have an issue or problem that needs solved.

Don’t get so hung up on the numbers that you forget about the relationships you can build with aggressive Internet marketing which includes blogging and other social networking tools.