There is nothing on the web that compares to a good
reciprocal linking when you are talking about building
steady streams of traffic to your site.
Did you know that good reciprocal linking can bring
you more daily traffic than a #1 position on a search
engine? It’s true!
Did you also know that there are sites out there,
thousands of them, who rely solely on the traffic they
get from reciprocal linking with other webmasters? There
are! I call the webmasters of these sites “Link Minded”
people!
No webmaster in their right mind would argue that
reciprocal linking isn’t the lifeblood of the internet.
A search engine is only a directory of links. A
reciprocal linking directory on your domain is also a
search engine when you use the proper technique of
creating a “themed” category listing.
The internet offers tons of automation solutions, and
even reciprocal linking has had a couple of valiant
attempts and even successes at a certain degree of
automation. But exchanging meaningful, traffic-driving
links with other webmasters is and always will be a
personal, one-on-one thing. It is like a mini joint
venture with other webmasters and you have to address
them without bulk mail or spamming in order to even have
a chance at getting the mother of all reciprocal linking
someday!
When you look at reciprocal linking (the
oldest original form of advertising since the web began)
it is really surprising how few marketing experts deal
with the topic. I wrote a book about the whole
phenomenon simply because there were so few people
looking into the science of reciprocal linking swapping!
Reciprocal linking is not link farming or posting to
400,000 Free-for-All links pages. (A most detestable
practice used for awhile by all newbies, then abandoned
after the damage is done.)
In short, you really have few choices on the net
better than starting a reciprocal linking directory and
asking webmasters with relevant content to your site for
a link swap. Unless you have a huge budget and can
afford to pay someone to get your site optimized and
ranked in the top ten on all the big engines, there
aren’t other alternatives. Banner exchanges suck
visitors from your site. Traffic exchanges bring you
hits, but totally uninterested visitors. Ezine ads are
an important linking strategy, but that is an ongoing
process you do to get quick spurts of traffic, not
ongoing, steady streams of it. Plus it is hard to know
where to get the best ads and usually the best ads are
pretty expensive on a small budget.
My recommendation for people who really want their
site to be noticed to the tune of 1000 hits a day or
more, who are on a budget and are just starting: start a
reciprocal linking directory on your site and have clear
instructions on how to swap links with you.
Then, search the net for your reciprocal linking
partners, send
them personalized emails asking for swaps, set up top
listings for those willing to be “link partners” and
keep going until you have at least 100 links to your
site! (Verifiable at altavista.com by typing in “Link:yourdomain.com”)
Then, stop and take a break and start again. It’s
work. Even with automation software. Nothing good comes
on the net without work. Did you EVER in your life see a
successful business owner who said “It really was easy,
no real work at all to get where I am today!?”
But the payoff here is guaranteed: Reciprocal linking
will bring you traffic and increase your site’s link
popularity and ranking on the search engines. Any
webmaster willing to do what it takes to succeed should
be willing to work their fingers to the bone to get a
huge amount of traffic through reciprocal linking swaps!
