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How to build quality backlinks

The information shared in this post was originally written April 18, 2019 when Nerissa Marbury submitted to a HARO request. However, her words and knowledge were not shared with the masses until June 2020.

Links are earned, not bought

First and foremost, any SEO agency worth a grain of salt takes a white hat approach to building links. This means links are earned and not bought. Earning links is at times a slow process, yet it is much more effective in the long-run. The more high-quality domains linking to your website the better. Below are five additional action steps to ensure backlink success.

Create Content

Write great content that offers value to your intended audience.

Investigate competitors

Look at your competitors backlinks and see if you can get links from them, too.

Do outreach

Contact the top influencers, journalists, bloggers, etc. in your specific niche or industry and “pitch” them your content.

Be Authentic

If the content resonates with the influencer, journalist, or blogger, you will get a mention of your brand and typically you’ll earn a link too.

Find “dead” links

Fix and reclaim links with 404 errors with a 301 redirect or request the referring domain to change the link on its page.

Interested in reading how other companies build backlinks? Check out this article by SEO National. The juicy gems above from One Epiphany are referenced in this article as well.

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Thinking of a DIY Website Migration? Think again.

I pride myself in being a daughter of a mechanic. As a result, I like to know what happens “under the hood” in many aspects of life and work. One example of my tinkering has been with my website. The one-epiphany.com website has been a “pet project” or more affectionately – a labor of love. It’s how I cut my teeth so many years ago so that I could understand and learn to speak developer language. In fact, I use my website for the same purpose even today.

 

My latest endeavor occurred in January when I undertook migrating my website from one host server to a new one. I simply enjoy learning the basic ins & outs of what my development team does even if I never plan to fix or update each & every component or feature myself. No, the website isn’t perfect. No, I’m not a programmer. And no, I’m definitely not the person who will write the code for the next technical project you graciously award One Epiphany :-) .  Now that the focus of my business is evolving and I’m driving more traffic to the website, the purpose (and appearance) of my website will have to change to be representative of the quality of work I provide my clients.  But let’s leave that story for another blog post. Today I am sharing my adventures as a do-it-yourself small business owner; a role I’m sure many of we all take on from time to time…..and shouldn’t.

 

Now, I had been planning to change host servers for months! The task was never made a priority until I realized the migration was the roadblock (real or otherwise) for why I wasn’t ready to implement the very blog you are reading now as well as some other website updates you’ll see in the coming months. Well, when I make up my mind to do something, I want instant gratification, immediate results. So of course, this was no different. Although there were folks I could call and have the job done in a matter of hours, it was late on a Friday and it was unrealistic of me to think I could find someone to start a job right as the weekend was kicking off.  Even though I had never migrated a website to a new server before, I vowed I would do it myself and get it done before the weekend was out. I honestly expected the migration to take me – a “never ever” – a day, maybe 1.5 days at the most. Well, fast forward 3 days later and I finally got it done! It gave me a huge sense of accomplishment. I even went walking around to find somebody, anybody to celebrate my recent victory over the battle of the server migration. However no matter how victorious I felt, the experience was one of the most frustrating ones at best. Frustrating because….

 

  • it ate up an entire weekend plus a work day
  • not everyone from the hosting company considered customer service to be king
  • I wanted the bragging right of saying I did it all by myself
  • stubbornness prevented me from waiting a few more days for “done for me” assistance
  • if I had my developer do it, it would have been finished 3x faster

 

Thankfully for me, what I learned from the experience has helped me with a personal website project I started (& completed) just a couple of days ago. Even so, I don’t recommend you follow my lead of being that stubborn business owner. You know the one who is too proud to ask for help or too stingy with money to realize when something is an investment versus an expense. If I had to do it again, I would hire someone to do the migration for me and learn how to do it myself at another point in time. It takes up too much time and energy to learn a new skill set you don’t plan on using repeatedly.  Instead use your time on something more productive and preferably revenue generating.

 

Lessons learned:
  1. Do not try to learn something new when time is of the essence
  2. Do not let pride get in the way of efficient progress
  3. Do ask for help, even when you want to do it yourself

 

Keep an eye on future blog posts related to being a small business owner and my own company website refresh project. If you want to discuss your particular online marketing concern or would like me to elaborate on anything described in this post, schedule a “virtual coffee date” with me by clicking the button below.

 

Schedule your “virtual coffee date”a 30 minute consultation & it’s FREE!

 

Photo Credit: Andrew Eason

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Kick Start Your Email Marketing in 5 Simple Steps

Recently a small business owner reached out to get some advice on email marketing after reading Cynthia Price‘s article The 8-Second Challenge: Email Marketing for Our Shrinking Attention Span on Entreprenuer.com.  Here is what business owner said:

 

8 second attention span? Yikes. Who markets via email? What tools do you use and how often do you send emails? Do you segment your audience? Do you do a newsletter?

Email marketing is something I’m planning to do more of in the future. Whether it is for my business or a client’s here is what I recommend:

  1. Use a email marketing provider (MailChimp, AWeber, Ontraport, Emma, etc.)
  2. Add an email opt-in pop-up or “hellobar“ to your website if you don’t currently have one
  3. The frequency of emails should be based on the needs of your audience; however, also consider what you can commit to doing consistently.
  4. Absolutely segment your audience. Segmentation could be based on the type of content you create or the type of audiences you target.
  5. Consider creating a blog for your website versus a newsletter alone. This will allow you to create content that will drive your ideal client to your website as well as give you something to share or reference in your newsletter.

The above is just a quick high-level response to the small business owner’s questions. Keep an eye on this blog feed future blog posts will include email marketing provider reviews, thoughts on subscriber or opt-in tools, and more! If you want to discuss your particular online marketing concern or would like me to elaborate on anything stated above, schedule a “virtual coffee date” with me by clicking the button below.

 

Schedule your “virtual coffee date”a 30 minute consultation & it’s FREE!

 

Photo Credit: RaHuL Rodriguez
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Overcoming Perfection Paralysis

I came across a blog post by David Smethie from GrowthOnFire.com while working on another blog post for you.  He talked about how he always thought he had to perfectly master something before actively pursuing it. However, he decided to take imperfect action and just do the best he could.  His post really resonated with me as I have had a similar realization. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if many of you are on a similar path or journey as well. That being said, we need to push our perfection paralysis aside and move forward with what we know and be confident that our good intentions will win out at the end of the day.

 

This website & blog is a perfect example of what I mean. The visual design isn’t what I want for the long-haul, but it’s doing the job until I get it to where I want it to be in the end. Instead of waiting for everything to get perfect and then do a big reveal, I plan to do a combination of baby steps and big leaps to reach the goal. I preach what I practice to my clients too. Sometimes you have to leap before you’re ready and learn from what works and what doesn’t to achieve the progress (and revenue) you desire.

 

What challenge, task, or ‘to do’ has stopped you cold or caused you to drag your feet because it isn’t quite how you want it?

What did you do to overcome your bout with perfection paralysis?

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