It's clear that most businesses understand the value of inbound links, and what they can do for search engine optimization and referral traffic. What isn't clear with businesses is finding the best way to get those inbound links. It seems that many businesses believe the best way to get those inbound links is to have other, better ranking, websites link to you, either through guest posting, article marketing, link exchanges, and other similar techniques.
Guest Posting for Links? You're Doing it Wrong.
Although those are ways to get inbound links, they certainly aren't the best and the easiest ways to get inbound links. First of all, link exchanges are frowned upon by the search engines, and doing it for the sake of building inbound links and trying to game the search engines is an absolute no-no. Second of all, while guest posting and article marketing are legitimate, they are costly and time-consuming. You have to find appropriate websites to write/pitch articles to. You have to write those articles and those pitches. You then have to wait for a reply, or make corrections based upon that website's guidelines, and that's if you actually get a reply (or a reply in a timely manner). Even if the article is ready for publication right away, there's still the time between acceptance and publication, which could easily be days or weeks. On top of that, if your goal in all this is to get links, you could pay anywhere from $25 to $250 and up to publish an article that has includes back to your site.
What a hassle! And to think that these shenanigans are what some businesses consider their primary method of getting inbound links! With business blogging, a company can skip all those hoops and hassle. In the matter of a few hours, they can write an article and get it published on their business blog for a fraction of the cost. No need to please a third party. No need to wait for replies and approvals. No risk of duplicating content. No more months of back and forth of trying to get one specific article on one specific website.
Business Blogging is Way Better!
Business blogging accomplishes the goal of inbound links, and much more! With business blogging, every blog post is one more opportunity to rank for a keyword and to get found online. Sure, article marketing can kind of accomplish keyword rankings and getting found online, but readers aren't necessarily finding you. They are finding Blog X and Online Publication Y, with no guarantee readers will click on those links that you paid so much to have. There's also no guarantee that they'll associate that article you wrote with your company, especially if your links have keywords as anchor text.
Besides, business blogging ensures that when people do find your site and do click on your links, there's something of quality for them to read and to engage with. What good are the inbound links if you are leading them to promotional pages and other pages that readers don't want to go to or won't find interesting? What good are those increased rankings if all web visitors find is poor quality content and a horrible web experience? Business blogging eliminates this problem by being a place of value, by being a place that has something for readers and web visitors, instead of being one more place to make a sale.
How Does Business Blogging Get Inbound Links?
Simple! Creating quality, engaging content encourages people to share it, to link to it, to quote it in their own blogs. Over time, you get more and more inbound links because people will figure out that you are worth linking too. This may seem harder than the other way of doing things, but business blogging is the organic way of getting inbound links. You're not paying anyone for links. You're not wasting valuable time that could be spent writing more quality content or working on other projects. You're not trying to game the search engines. You're doing what you're supposed to be doing: providing the information your readers and potential customers need and want to move through the buying process.
If you want inbound links, then get business blogging! If you're already doing the other inbound link methods, then you are already producing content that can go on a business blog instead of other thankless websites. These inbound links are organic, and if you are consistent with your business blogging, you will get more of them in the long run.
Need help coming up with business blog ideas? Then download our list of 101 Business Blog Ideas! Not only could you use these ideas right now, but there's enough here to fill your blog for one full year!
