Sometimes you invest in creating a linkable asset, but fail to strategically promote it — leaving value (and links) on the table.
Even the most valuable piece of content can remain hidden from the audience that would appreciate it without the proper promotion. When this happens, link building can reclaim that value.
Link building is the process of discovering relevant audiences for your content and securing the links you deserve. Building links helps your page perform better in search engine result pages, generating consistent traffic and breathing new life into your undervalued asset.
Linkable assets can come in many forms — articles, videos, infographics, and quizzes, to name a few. No matter what, the key ingredient to a linkable asset is unique value. A link-worthy asset is often something that many sites would be happy to link to, if they only knew it existed.
Linkable assets are different from other types of content because they are inherently link-worthy, which is different from being share-worthy. Many pieces of content receive plenty of social shares but little to no links, simply because social sharing is easier. Some content is also better-suited and designed for social sharing rather than linking. Because securing links is more difficult than obtaining social shares, identifying link-worthy assets can be challenging.
Fortunately, there’s a process you can follow for finding and promoting undervalued resources.
How to Build Links with Forgotten Assets:
- Find Under-Promoted Assets
- Use manual research and content analysis tools to check the performance of your content.
- Search for Link Opportunities
- Using Google and your content analysis tools, find prospects worth reaching out to for potential link opportunities and partnerships.
- One-to-One Outreach
- Once you’ve found a prospect, reach out to the website owner with a clear, concise email requesting a link to your page.
Step One: Find Under-Promoted Assets
To identify link building opportunities, you’ll need to discover which assets on your site are underpromoted. There are a few ways you can find undervalued assets, but a manual site search should always be the first step.
Linkable assets may already exist on your site, but they may not be obvious. It will take some digging and analysis to identify the opportune assets. The best place to find linkable assets on most websites is the site’s blog. Resources that have already proven to be popular in terms of social shares might also attract links.
If you don’t have luck with a manual site search, the next option for finding link-worthy pages is using a content analysis tool like BuzzSumo. BuzzSumo reports social share metrics on your site’s individual pages, which can help you determine the popularity of a page. Often, social popularity can also translate to link popularity.
Once you’ve discovered a potential asset, check how many backlinks the page has to determine if it’s truly under-promoted. One of the best options for doing this is the tool Majestic. Majestic will report how many unique domains are linking to your page — a low number of backlinks will show that an asset hasn’t been successfully promoted.
Step Two: Search for Link Opportunities
With an asset in hand, it’s time to find link opportunities. This is also sometimes called “link prospecting”.
To find link opportunities, you need to identify websites relevant to your content. You also need to discover the unique value your content has to different audiences.
A simple search is the best way to reveal potential link opportunities if you have a good grasp of how to use Google and search modifiers. BuzzSumo can also help you find content that’s similar to yours that has already proven popular with relevant audiences.
Once you’ve identified a potential link prospect, it’s time for outreach.
Part Three: One-to-One Outreach
The final step in the content promotion process is outreach — contacting the webmaster of the potential link prospect. Human-to-human communication is the core of manual link building, and a fundamental pillar in all marketing.
Start the outreach process by finding the right contact information. Email is the most ideal way to reach out to webmasters, but contact forms work too. You can use a tool like Findthat or Whois to find email addresses that might not be obviously displayed on the website.
Webmasters are busy, so your outreach message should be as concise as possible while also explaining why your asset presents unique value.
Include these important elements of an effective outreach message:
- Demonstration of value – Explain why a link to your asset adds value to their website or content.
- Clear call to action – Explain what you would like the webmaster to do with your asset.
- Secondary call to action – Use language in your message to imply you expect a response from the webmaster.
In any link building campaign, your goal should always be to secure more than just one link. If a webmaster doesn’t immediately agree to link to your page, that’s okay. It’s a fact of link building — not every prospect will lead to a link. But building relationships with webmasters can lead to other marketing opportunities, so focus on creating positive connections through your outreach no matter the outcome.
Recap
Linkable assets are crucial to securing relevant, worthwhile links. You don’t necessarily need to create new content if there are hidden gems already living on your site. Finding and promoting these forgotten assets can help you secure the links you deserve.
Start your link building campaign by discovering the under-promoted assets on your site, then search for potential opportunities to gain links back to them. Reach out to site owners by creating an effective outreach message, and deliver it using the appropriate contact information.
With these three steps, you’ll be on your way to securing links and building valuable relationships.
