Link building is one of the top ways to market yourself online.  It works in two ways: by bringing you additional traffic from whatever site your link is on, and by boosting your search engine ranking (because the more links your site has leading back to it, the more popular it is, and the better it must be).

There are a lot of different approaches on how to build link popularity successfully.  However, sometimes the road less traveled is the best one — that is, the methods that fewer people are using may get the best results.  Here are a few creative ways to build links — some of them take a bit more work, but all of them get results!

1. Write a guest blog post for a fellow blogger.  Say there’s a blog you either read frequently, or came across when looking for other sites in your industry.  By writing a guest blog post, you establish yourself as a recognized professional in the industry to all of that blog’s readers, and provide a link back to your site.  For instance, if you sell office paper shredders online, you could write a post about choosing between commercial paper shredders for a blog or website that advises small business owners.  Of course, this approach takes a little work, but it’s also one of those cases where the more you put into it, the more you get out of it!
2. Interview a professional in the industry on your blog.  For instance, if you run a home business help blog or website, you could interview the owner of an online office supply store, such as i Shop Shredders.  Think about it.  Said professional is sure to post the link on his or her blog, not to mention email it to everyone he or she knows.  That’s some nice exposure for you, too!
3. Set up a MySpace page.  Social networking sites offer lots of link building opportunities.  Think about the sites that provide free graphics to MySpacers to use in comments on other people’s pages — these graphics always link back to the site where they were taken from.  Think how many links those sites have!  You can emulate this model by creating graphics (with a link, of course) for friends and fans to post on their pages.  Activist websites use this approach all the time to spread the word!

The more different ways you can find to build links, the better off you’ll be.  Remember, the quality of your links counts just as much (if not more than) the quantity, so don’t be afraid to get creative!

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