As a dedicated Twitterer (join me here – http://twitter.com/andycal), I have been following with interest the ways that people use the medium to interact and market their services, websites and products.
Sticking with SEO for now, one subject that came to light was how to build links to your own site. If you have read the free DIY SEO book, you’ll already know a little bit about link building and how it can affect your site positively. Essentially, any site that has a link to your site will generate a little bit of ‘rank’ for your page. Some SEO people call this ‘link juice’ and you’re looking to get as much ‘link juice’ as possible.
But how do you get these links?
Many years ago it used to be easy, you’d just go and comment on some-one’s blog and leave behind a link to your website. You would get a link to your site from theirs – instant link juice. However bloggers got fed up with this as their blogs were becoming no more than a spammers paradise for grabbing as many links as possible. This was especially bad for popular sites, very soon the amount of comments would become overwhelming, ruining it for the genuine commenter and owners alike.
So, they started to implement the ‘nofollow’ rule, essentially a tag on the HTML that would tell search engines to ‘not follow’ any particular link, rendering it pointless to spammers looking for good juice.
Recently on Twitter, Jim Connolly (http://twitter.com/Jimconnolly) a marketing expert in Yorkshire (http://jimsmarketingblog.com/) tried an experiment. He essentially opened up his blog so that all links are now ‘dofollow’. If you post over there, you will gain a little from Jim’s site ranking.
If you go look at it, you’ll notice something straight away – Jim gets a lot of comments. His post on his experiment itself got 172 comments! Time will tell whether the spammers will grab hold of this site and fill it full of link sapping nonsense, but with today’s anti-spam tools getting better every day, we believe it can be kept under control.
If it works, then Jim has happened upon something that could be a real boost for the Internet marketeer. You see, it’s easy to get lots of links to your site from worthless directories or link farms – pay $50 a month that they’ll send thousands your way, but do they help? Although they might not directly harm, they don’t help you to build the reputation you want for your site.
Google (and the other search engines for that matter) like sites that have a good reputation. If your site is well visited and well linked from sites with authority then you will be loved by Google. You begin to build reputation and your reputation spreads. Self promotion eventually turns into automatic promotion as other people begin to link automatically to you.
If you have a site that people look at and immediately thing “blimey, that’s good”, they are more likely to link to you, comment on it or tell others. This will build your links, your reputation and your ranking naturally. You can do this by commenting on other people’s blogs and adding value. By adding value you are not only helping your own site to flourish, you’re helping the Internet grow and become the solid information portal that Tim Berners-Lee wanted it to be.
Oh, and just for the crack, we’re doing it too. If you comment here, you’ll get a link from our site. Let’s see if it’s the start of a new revolution!
Andy:
Great post! Was part of @jimconnolly twitter feed and participated in his experiment. Jim models attraction – one of the things that got me to follow him. He gives tons of value and clearly has fun doing it. Thanks for sharing this and giving Jim a shout out!
Thanks Andy,
I’ve been following Jim for a couple of weeks so I’m part of his recent entourage, one of a relatively small group from the UK!
I follow because of the genuine value he supplies – evidenced by his blog yesterday – Focus on People not Hits http://jimsmarketingblog.com/2008/11/10/focus-on-people-not-hits/
Information has to have value _and_ be focused to be useful, and Jim is blogging and tweeting _consistently_ about a valuable subject, hence you know what you’re going to get, hence you stay – well, I do!
Su Butcher
http://twitter.com/subutcher
The reason Jim’s experiment worked so effectively is that Jim models true relationship marketing. It’s word-of-mouth, old-fashioned “talking over the back fence” in social media. He shares his expertise, people like his attitude and they follow.
When Jim talked about Hits vs. People on Twitter @jimconnolly, he struck a cord with many people. Until you comprehend that no one will be interested in you or your product if they don’t feel a connection, it doesn’t matter how many links you have to anything.
Thank you for explaining some of the history behind no follow. I am new to blogging and am still trying to wade through all of the jargon. When I began my blog my mission was simple. It is to promote and help the nonprofit organizations in Western PA to get the word out about the good work they do. My niche is very small but it is also all about caring people. As a result, I will also participate in the experiment of removing no follow
I surely hope that technology can keep the spammers at bay so that this do-follow trend continues. Perhaps it will push readers to be contributors which can be a good thing in the sharing of information. The flip side of that is that people who are genuinely interested in developing community and writing for people will post no matter what. This may only lead to a bunch of copycat posts designed to get links. Time will tell.
Following you on Twitter and found this post. Good stuff here – thanks! Just about to download your free ebook. Always so much to learn.
I said this before, and I’ll say it again. The backbone of SMM is helping those who help you. I love this idea, and as long as blogs don’t start bubbling over with spam, it will continue to work. I am optimistic that this WILL continue to work since the spammers will be reprimanded by active users of the sites being commented on.
I think Jim has taken the bull by the horns and has demonstrated the value of trust. In this age of interactivity….Way to go…Jim.
I also didn’t realize the history behind the “no-follow” rule. Seems that this “no-follow” issue makes link building just that much harder…so just how are we supposed to go about it? Thanks so much for your post.
I follow both @Jimconnolly and you. Jim recently tried the power of his Twitter influence by giving our blog and site an endorsement. Within an hour our following had grown by more than 50! Obviously he is quickly becoming a mnajor voice in the space. His approach is refreshing because it is not so much an SEO approach as a personal one.
This whole Social Media movement is really new and an experiment in itself. I am always interested and surprised to see sociality evolve in real time.
Thank you for this post.
Virginia
I’m a recent follower of Jim on Twitter, and his blog post entitled “Focus on People not Hits” resonated with me. Although I’ve been to an internet marketing seminar, and have purchased my fair share of “tools” and “secrets” to success in Internet Marketing, I have found very few programs, projects, or tools that I can honestly promote. Jim’s blog, however, made the cut, because he recognizes that at the other end of each transaction is a human who deserves to be treated honestly.
My feeling on the follow vs no follow in comments is this: if you care enough to blog, you can care enough to monitor and “prune” the links so only relevant comments are allowed to stay. This allows you to reward (with a do follow link) those people who take the time to compose a topic specific message which adds to the conversational value of your blog. It’s a totally win-win situation, and makes possible more heart-to-heart connections as like minded people find each other through the do-follow links.
I, personally, love to find a thoughtful, well-written, on-topic comment in a blog’s conversation, and will often follow that person’s link to find out more about him or her.
Now that I’ve said all that, let me add that I now follow YOU on Twitter, and if anybody wants to follow ME, I’m CCGAL on Twitter, too.
Jim sent me here with a Twitter DM. He is shking things up a bit. So are you!
-Stiennon
Thanks for writing! Love Jim – he is a wiz! Thanks for sharing the “link love”.
You can follow me on Twitter too!
http://twitter.com/CreativeWisdom
Thanks for doing this! You rock!
Thanks for the comments, all. It will indeed be a great experiment and we’re hoping that some of our corporate customers will latch on to it.
Social networking is extremely new (heck, the internet is new!) and my personal belief is that the whole ‘nofollow’ thing is a sign of the times. Once it was a pain in the backside, now I think it can be used for ‘good’.
I admire Jim’s and your stance on this and I hope his experiment works out.
It’s interesting that Julie Walraven talks about Jim’s “talking over the back fence” marketing – I arrived here from one of his Tweets
Enlaces entre amigos…
Está de moda compartir enlaces entre amigos, quitando la etiqueta “no follow” de los comentarios. Según el artículo la compensación de entregar enlaces a cambio de comentarios ayuda a crecer en la red tanto al dueño del blog, como al que comenta…
Very good idea, congratulations on the decision.
The free DIY SEO pack is really useful, i found it a great read so thanks.
oh, and i’m now following you on twitter
Thank you very much for offering free ebooks! I will check it out when I have time.
cheers,
Thomas
i’m new to seo and i started using all-in-one seo pack for wordpress.
might be trying to use diy.
cheers from holland,
Jan C.
HI I happen to read this article, and I am new to all of this. Is it through an rss and more details? I wish I would learn something here.