When I started my full-time job at an SEO agency, my perception about “good” backlink building changed pretty quickly.
Up to that point, I had only known things like article marketing, web 2.0’s, commenting, social bookmarking, and all the other forms of “spam building.”
Many years ago, they worked to a certain degree for low competition niches, but in today’s SEO landscape they do more harm than good – no matter the competition. You do need high quality links from HARO or outreach to get high Domain Authority these days. And while HARO usually yields the best backlinks, it’s pretty expensive and has a learning curve, so if you are just starting out, you might want to try outreach first.
And while there are many different forms and variations to outreach link building, I’m going to show you the simplest way that you can start doing today.
First, let’s go through what a GOOD link is…
In it’s simplest description, a good link is:
- On a REAL website.
- Difficult to get.
- Unscalable.
A backlink profile with backlinks that consistently meet these standards of quality is worth a lot of money. It’s sustainable, it’s difficult for competitors to replicate, and it’s POWERFUL.
Think of the link building that you are currently doing, or have done before to your blogs. Do the links you build fit that description?
You can’t build such links with blog commenting or by purchasing link building gigs on Fiverr.
You can either earn high-authority backlinks naturally if you have a popular blog or by sending outreach emails to the relevant blog owners.
These are long-term and valuable backlinks that are very hard to replicate for your competitors. Once you get them, you’ll keep benefiting from them for years in the form of referral traffic and increased search authority.
Low-Quality Links Won’t Take You Anywhere
It’s kind of disappointing to see that most link building methods discussed amongst new internet marketers are still:
- Built on weak, irrelevant web properties.
- As easy to get as ordering a link package.
- Extremely scalable, and can be automated with software.
These types of links, even if they might boost your rankings for a while, are short-term ranking links.
They’re weak, they’re easily replicated by competitors, and because they’re scalable they have patterns that Google’s spam algorithms are able to detect and penalize.
Email Outreach: A Valuable SEO Skill
Knowing how to outreach for links is an extremely valuable skill in the SEO industry. It is one of the main ways how link building is done at the top SEO agencies around the world.
If you ever apply for a job at a reputable SEO agency, knowing how to outreach effectively will stand you out from the crowd of applicants who only talk about commenting, software, link packages, and private blog networks when asked about building links.
Believe me, I’ve been on the other side of the table.
While I wasn’t the one doing the decision making, I was able to participate during the interviews when we needed to hire a new SEO strategist… and everyone had no clue when it came to link building.
Of course, when doing outreach at an agency there are a lot of steps involved.
Everything from using multiple different paid tools to finding link prospects, gathering the data into spreadsheets, and reaching out to them in an organized fashion.
But it’s not totally necessary to get that intense with the method for just link building to our blogs. I’m going to show you the basic way of the method, which is just asking and receiving.
What Is Email Outreach And Why Is To So Effective?
So what exactly is email outreach and why is it so hyped up in the SEO industry?
Email outreach is a link building strategy in which you reach out to other high authority blogs, tell them about your content, and show them the value they’ll get by linking to it in their content.
Sounds simple, right?
For most people, however, it doesn’t work.
Why?
Becuase people send outreach emails the wrong way.
The point you need to understand is that email outreach is the final piece of the puzzle in link building. But before you actually start an outreach campaign, you need to have certain things in place.
Let me quickly list them down for you.
- Shortlist the blogs you want to get links from. Ideally, go for the sites with higher domain authority than your sites.
- Now analyze your target blogs and see if they have published content about the topic that you’re about to write on.
- If they haven’t published anything about your topic, great. But if they have, then look for any potential improvement areas or gaps in their content that you can improve.
- This improvement can be in the form of an infographic, more examples and case studies, a research study that the blog can link to or any other link-worthy piece of content.
- Once you create a high quality and link-worthy piece of content, it’s time to reach out for backlinks.
If you follow this process and then start an email outreach campaign by highlighting the value of your content and how it will benefit your target blog, you’ll be able to get lots of high authority backlinks.
But how exactly should you structure your outreach email?
I’ll explain this in the next section.
How To Ask For Backlinks In Outreach Emails
The most basic form of outreach is simply to ask for a backlink. You’re basically just emailing other webmasters and asking them to link to you — offering nothing in return (i.e. a guest post).
There are some subtle steps that make a world of difference in your success rate.
The Wrong Way To Perform Backlink Outreach
Let’s pretend that I’m in the SEO niche.
In the email below, I’m reaching out to another site in the SEO niche asking them to link back to my content.
Read the email carefully and tell me if it sounds convincing
Hello,
My name is Chris and I run the website over at www.madeupwebsite.com. I am contacting you today to ask you for a link to my website.
I have some great tips on SEO and social media marketing, and I think it would be the perfect fit for your readers.
Would you please take a look at my website and link to it?
Please link to www.madeupwebsite.com using the anchor text, "best made up website".
Please contact me if you have any questions.
Thank you.
Regards,
ChrisWould you reply to something like that? Would you make an effort to even check out their site and then link to it?
Neither would I.
I’m surprised that a lot of big blogs are still recommending emails like this for outreaching, when they’re SO INEFFECTIVE.
For starters, stop using outreach email templates that your favorite bloggers have shared on their sites. Thousands of people are already using them and your prospects have probably seen them dozens of times.
Using such ineffective templates kills your chances of getting backlinks
The biggest problem of such email templates is that they’re all about YOU. Why would any blogger care about reading your email if you’re only asking for favors?
They don’t know you, they haven;t read your content, they don’t know if you’re a spammer or a real marketers
Why would they link to you?
As a result, the general consensus on outreach is pretty negative. Most internet marketers think outreach is about spamming emails to webmasters… and it would be if you sent out emails like that.
It’s also not effective at all. You’ll get such a low response rate, it’s not even worth doing outreach if you do it like that.
The Right Way To Send Outreach Emails For Backlinks
For your outreaching to be successful, you have to build at least a small form of connection to the webmaster you’re contacting.
Get personal, and never ask for anything in the first email.
Hey John!
Just read your article about the top 20 ways you can use Twitter to get links naturally. Great stuff, I had no idea Twitter was such a powerful tool for link building.
BTW, what do you think about Facebook? I've tried some similar things with Facebook and saw some good results, but not as great as I would like. Would love to get your thoughts on it.
Anyways, just wanted to reach out and say hello. Keep up the great work!
Regards,
ChrisI didn’t ask him to link to my site. I didn’t even tell him I have a website.
All I did was praise his work, and use a question to encourage a reply. Not many people ignore emails that say good things about their work and ask for their expert opinion on a related topic.
When they respond, I usually like to go in for the ask.
Here’s what that email would look like.
John,
Great points. Thanks a lot for the suggestions (responding to his answer to my question in the first email). I'll be sure to try them out.
I actually just stumbled upon your site a few days, but now I'm a major fan and just spent the last few hours binge reading everything on your site, haha.
I also write about backlinking and social media strategies on my own blog, and recently wrote up an ultimate guide to Facebook marketing, www.madeupwebsite.com/facebook-strategies.
I spent a lot of time on it and I would love if you could check it out and give your thoughts on it? If you decided to share it with your own audience, that would be even more amazing :) I really want to get this out there and help as many people as possible to see what Facebook can do for their businesses.
Anyways, thanks, John!
I appreciate the help and feedback.
Regards,
ChrisThe second email is when I usually go in for the ask. But notice how I don’t ask for a link at all. I ask for a share.
We’re in a world today where “sharing” is a common word and action. It’s part of our daily lives. And sharing is connected with “interesting” and “helpful.”
Asking for a share gets a lot higher success rate than asking for a link.
People know why you want a link these days. More people are aware of SEO, and you don’t want negative connotations on why you’re asking for a link from their site.
Instead, I ask for a share in a very non-aggressive way. All I do is ask him to take a look at it, and that if he decided to share it I would be thrilled. But notice my wording.
Every sentence is written with a purpose.
I also note that I want a share to HELP people. I make it clear that I want to reach as many people as possible in hopes that it will be of help to them. I’m not just looking for free traffic off their audience or a free link on their site.
Benefits of sharing
When you ask for a share, 60% of the time, they’ll also link to it on their blog. Sometimes you get both, sometimes you get only a share, and sometimes you get only a link.
Let them decide how they want to share it… “Hey can you share this on your Twitter account, and if not your Facebook page?… Of course, a link on your site would be the best :)” –> That just sounds weird.
If you only get a share and no link, it’s still a fantastic result. You get a sudden surge of traffic from the exact audience that you want reading your stuff.
Also, it puts you on their radar so if they decided to link to a post in the future, it’s more likely to be yours.
Email Outreach Tips To Increase Your Chances Of Getting Backlinks
Here are a few quick tips based on my experience (and several studies) to improve the ROI of your email outreach campaigns.
1. Use A Subject Line That Stands Out
If your email subject is weak, it doesn’t matter what’s inside because people will simply ignore your message and move on.
How do you write effective email subject lines?
- By keeping them short, ideally under 24 characters as shown by this CoSchedule research study.
Using a number or digits in your email subject gets you an open rate of more than 53% (2% higher than plain subject lines)
Don’t write vague or overly formal subject lines. Informal and conversational subject lines work better. For example, “I have a question about your article” or “Can you clarify something”, “I have a tip for your article” etc.
In my experience, writing in small letters gets you a higher email open rate.
Don’t use spam words like FREE, Amazing, Introducing, etc.
These are general tips, but do keep a close eye on what kind of subjects work the best for you.
2. Personalize Your Email
Email personalization can dramatically increase your email response rate.
Research shows that personalized emails get a 5% higher response rate than emails with no personalization
Here are a few ways to personalize your emails
- Address the person by their name. Hey Dave sounds much better than Hi There or Hey.
- Reference something specific from their blog or social media posts sot htat they know you’ve actually written this email for them only and it’s not one of those mass email outreach templates.
- Give them subtle compliment like “your posts have helped me several times” or “I rarely read emails but I never miss your newsletter”
A big issue with email outreach these days is that you need to come across as a genuine connection and not another link builder. Personalizing your email messages is a big step in that direction.
3. Skip The Long Intros
Seriously! No one has the time to read long intros. Just quickly introduce yourself and get to the point.
For example an intro like
“Hey Andrew, I’m Sean, a regular reader of your blog and an SEO enthusiast who has benefited several times from your content.
I want to……”
4. Build A Connection First
Before asking for favors, you should always focus on providing value in some way.
The first step is to build a connection by asking a specific question and showing them you’re genuinely reaching out.
After that, give them something valuable like
“you mentioned that bloggers struggle at writing intros and I can actually confirm that in my case. I also read a survey study where bloggers mentioned intros as the toughest part of the content. Here’s the survey if you want to add a reference to it (It’s not my site I just thought it’ll make your article more credible).”
You’re only giving value here without asking for anything.
Most people would love that.
5. Pitch Without Forcing
When they respond to your initial email, that’s your time to pitch but without forcing it on them.
For example, you could tell them that
“You briefly mentioned blog commenting as an outreach technique and I agree it’s really effective. I’ve actually written a 5000 word article about it that can be a really good additional reading source for your audience. Here’s the link in case you’re interested in reading it”
Also make sure that you add links to your website and social media accounts in your email footer because it gives the blogger a chance to explore your profile and see the benefit in connecting with you.
Again, you didn’t ask for a link or push them to feature your content. Since you already have a connection with them, they’re likely to respond to this by either sharing or linking to the content if it really offers value.
6. Stay Connected
Don’t just vanish once you get a backlink.
Use this opportunity to nurture your relationship with the blogger and grow your network.
You never know when the next opportunity comes knocking.
Conclusion
Just taking a small extra step to create some personalization to your outreach strategy, you can vastly improve the rate at which you are able to acquire links through the method.
Does it take more time than methods like building web 2.0 properties and commenting?
For sure. But is it worth the time and effort to go through the process for a single link or share? Absolutely.
The backlinks you get through outreach are going to be ones that actually make an impact in your rankings.
It’s going to help establish your site’s authority. Best of all, they’re going to be long-term, powerful links that can’t be easily replicated by your competitors.
Although the method here is really basic, it’s still an effective strategy that works.
If you take the time to network with others, you’ll find that outreach link building is fun, effective, and definitely worth the effort.
Excellent post. I, too, have read about blasting dozens of website owners with blunt requests for links, and never believed it could possibly be that effective … no incentive for them to do it for you at all.
By just making a connection first and then emphasizing that you’re primarily concerned with helping their readers when you ask for the “share”, you’re showing that you treat your site visitors as actual humans instead of just numbers.
Good stuff!
Great points, Paul! Thanks for reading.
Who doesn’t like to hear their hard work on a website is appreciated!
Funny, that you are writing on this, I just landed a link from a dating website, doing something similar. I didn’t think I had a chance in a million years, but it worked.
Awesome, Brad! Yeah, outreach is really effective in getting links that would probably be impossible to get through any other way.
Thanks for sharing.
Great information and finesse to asking or nudging for the share Chris.
Bookmarking for future reference.
Keep up the blog, recent subscriber and enjoying your stuff.
Mark
Thanks, Mark!
It’s really very basic, but a genuine relationship can do a lot. The getting in contact or that pre-warm stage could be done as a blog comment, Twitter interaction or doing unasked favor depending on the situation.
How are things with your Adsense going?
Great points, Richard. Thanks for sharing.
Things are going well. Really been focused on growth the past few weeks and it’s paying off. I’ll talk more about that in the next income report.
Great article Chris
I really like your blog and articles..I also have few niche sites but sometimes i am overwhelmed with work..I see that the key here is to have really good schedule.
I wanted to ask you how much time do you spend on your sites? I mean do you write posts everyday? Do you sometimes get overwhelmed too with so many sites?
Thanks, Elena. Time really varies from day to day. Working from home, I’m not great at scheduling myself. Some days I’ll work for over 10 hours, and some days under 5. It really depends what I’m working on at the time. I don’t write posts everyday. I started outsourcing smaller articles, and that freed up my workload a ton.
Hello Chris,
Great job.
I will try to implement this link building strategy taught here.
Thanks so much.
Tony
Awesome!
Hello Chris. Are you using backlinks from blog comment for your niche sites ?
Hi Drake. I rarely set separate time aside to make comment links for my niche sites. If I do, it’s more so for traffic, and not SEO.
wow, this is the first time i really understand how out out-reach link building work ….
before i thought its the same as guest posting…
thanks a lot Chris
Awesome! No problem, John Paul 🙂
Hello Chris,
Thank you for the article. It helped me to understand the value of a relationship with people.
I have two questions,
1) Would you approach people linking to your competitors? The reasons I am asking is I just used Ahrefs to get all the backlink data of my competitors and I am writing them to let them know I have a better piece of content that could be linked.
Do you think it is better to go ahead and say something like ”Hello x, I saw you link xxx, I think I wrote a better one, here it is yyyy.”?
2) Do you have any numbers to share on this approach such as ”I emailed 100 people and got 30 replies, 3 links”. It seems very hard to get a link from people who you do not ask 🙂
Thanks in advance for your reply,
Cheers,
Enes
Note: Can you write a new article on link building techniques you use?
Hey Enes,
Glad it was helpful!
1. Yes of course!
2. You can usually expect a range of 5-10% depending on niche, and your outreach techniques.
Awesome post Chris!
How did i stumble on this post only in 2016 😀
Quick question, will you use the same approach to get a link from a brand featured in a post?
Or will it be more straightforward like how you reach out to Jack Herrick from Wiki?
Hey Jimmy! It depends on what the editorial process is like for the site. If it’s pretty straightforward, you can reach out directly like I did with Jack.
Hi Chris
By far one of the best post I´ve ever read on this blog. It’s open my eyes on one of the most effective link building strategies for SEO and I will definitely be using this system. This has helped me so much!
Anyway, great post and keep up the great work.
Imer
Awesome!!
Great article Chris!
I’m looking forward to getting your next course in January. Does it include an updated steategy on link building?
Thanks for sharing all those information.
Dominik
Thanks Dominik! It’s currently a work in progress. Not sure if it will include an updated link building section at the moment.
Hey Chris,
How do you usually go about finding a prospects for this kind of outreach where you should read their article first? What kind of search operators are you after?
Am I missing something here if I say one can send around 20 highly personalized outreach emails per day, which makes 400 emails sent per month with the 5% success it would be 20 high quality backlinks per month?
I am asking because 20 backlinks to one’s pillar post makes it outrank competitors in 2-3 months in alot of niches.
You can simply google blogs in your niche, or topics around your niche on wider topic blogs.
Some search operators you can try can be found in this post (in the yellow box): https://www.buzzlogic.com/seo/broken-link-building/
Most helpful and thoughtful post. It worth sharing with my audience and lists. Thanks for the time you have taken to educate your readers on the benefit of quality outreach. I will take action this week.
Thank you Ndifreke!
Excellent… This is my first comment on your blog chris! Coz I feel so cool after reading this. You are just a blessing to me and so happy to find your blog..
Keep on the good work
Cheers
Horla
Thank you Horla! Glad to have you here 🙂
Appreciate it, Kay 🙂 Thank you.
What an excellent post the best information on how to acquire quality links!! Thanks for sharing loving your blog. Very informative and I’ve read a whole lotta blogs this by far is dam awesome. I’m inspired!
Thanks Karen!
Hi Chris,
I discovered your blog about a week ago.
I have to say your posts are exceptionally high quality, probably the best stuff I have read about SEO and link building.
I started my website Fitwirr.com, a couple of years back and SEO has been a real struggle for us since we initially kick-started with social media and managed to get a lot of traffic that way. Although the social media traffic did us some good, we experienced unstable traffic ourselves and are working to build stable, long-term traffic with SEO. We truly believe now that SEO is the way to go to build an authority, trust-worthy site like you pointed out here, if and when done the way you recommend.
For the next few months, I will be focusing on link building strategies for Fitwirr and reach out to niche sites to get backlinks.
By the way, your sample email conversations with Thiam Hock were super helpful. As a webmaster myself, my inbox gets flooded with outreach emails every day, and I can usually smell their intentions from miles away. But the email you got from Thiam Hock was a pure gold.
Thanks again.
I look forward to next blog post.
Best,
Djohny
Awesome! Really happy to hear that. Thank you Djohny 🙂
Hey Chris,
Found your blog through Authority Hacker.
Nice tips. It’s all about connecting in the end of the day.
Thanks Vini.
Thanks Chris, for your great SEO articles,they are quite elaborative and easy to understand.
Very helpful
No problem, Nixon! Thanks for reading!
Hi Chris,
Thanks for writing such an awesome post.
I have 1 question. What’s the best approach to get this stuff work for Ecommerce sites? No one likes to share or link to product/categories page.
Thanks in advance
You would need to create linkable assets.
Hello Chris,
First things first, this was an excellent post! Not many people talk about building backlinks through outreach. Well, at least not in a good way. So your article was extremely helpful.
Examples of what to do and what not to do when reaching out to people made a great point, too. I appreciate it when I can learn from other people’s mistakes, as well as accomplishments. We also discussed this topic in our The Easiest Link Building Techniques (https://prospected.com/the-easiest-link-building-techniques/) article. Someone may find it useful.
Thanks for sharing Katarina!
Hi Chris,
Great Post! Would this work for eCommerce sites, as in linking to a product/category page? Or is this just more for blogs/content?
Thank you and keep up the great work!
It’s going to be difficult to get links to product and category pages. This is more for blog content.