An Out of This World Example of Why You Must Have a Reciprocal
Linking Stratergy to Succeed
Let me tell you a story set in the future which illustrates why
it is essential that any Internet marketer worth his salt will
set up a link exchanging strategy. It may seem a bit 'out there'
to begin with but I promise it will make sense in the end.
Imagine that 1000 years in the future due to global warming man
has had to leave Earth. With Jupiter being the largest planet it
has been chosen by many to make their new home. If Jupiter were
hollow it could contain over 1000 earths (Google has many uses!)
so land is no problem and people happily settle down in giant
pods to protect them from Jupiter's elements. Some join their
pods together to form communities others set up in near
isolation.
Due to Jupiter's high velocity winds flying is too dangerous. To
travel therefore humans have created giant highways that
interconnect the pods first joining the large communities and
then over time the more isolated settlements. People travel
along these highways in their space cars from their communities
to visit pods containing shops, services, leisure facilities
etc.
I hope this you're still with me it will all make sense
soon!
Within 50 years of colonizing Jupiter there are thousands of
settlements / businesses / leisure facilities connected by these
highways. They have been joined together into a network - much
like the internet is today (see I told you there was a point -
thanks for staying with me so far).
It is in Jupiter's 55th year as a human habitat that you decide
to set up you business on there. You buy a bit of real estate
that is big enough to build a living pod as well as a shop pod.
Your shop you decide will sell rocket boots. Everything from
rocket boots for work, rocket boots for leisure and rocket boots
for fashion.
You set up your shop (Rocket boots 'R Us') and finish it with a
great big neon sign advertising it's presence on the frontage.
You open up and wait for hoards of people to arrive and buy your
products. Unfortunately very few people come and those who do
seem to have come by accident and leave rather quickly hardly
even looking at your goods let alone buying them. You're a bit
confused as to why no customers are arriving when you have such
a great set up with great products.
You spend a small fortune on a 'Jupiter business adviser' as
business is bad and you need help. The problem is he says that
atmosphere of Jupiter is very gaseous and your business can't be
seen from more than a Kilometer away. So although highways and
other settlements surround you you are in fact an island that
few people know about. Due to the gaseous atmosphere your shop
is all but invisible and people will whizz along the highways
not even knowing you exist.
The adviser goes through a list of marketing methods that will
bring in customers to your shop. Unfortunately you have used
your last money in hiring the adviser and all these methods cost
money. You tell him you need a way of bringing in customers that
doesn't cost money.
The adviser pauses for a moment then tells you something that
will go on to change your life.
What you need to do he says is to build some highways between
you and other pods. At the start of each of these superhighways
you can put a bright flashing signpost telling people where the
highway finishes (your shop) along with a short description of
what the destination pod contains. He says that many pod owners
will be happy to build a superhighway connecting your two pods
along with one of the sign posts as long as you put a
corresponding flashing signpost at your end of the highway
advertising their pod.
He says he has a another customer who sells 'Rocket Boot' fuel
who would be happy to set up a superhighway between his pod and
yours as the two products you sell obviously complement each
other. He would pick up customers from your customer base and
you from his. He gives you his number.
You give him a call and after a brief chat you both agree to
that setting up a superhighway between your two pods would be
mutually beneficial. Within a week the superhighway is built
along with flashing signposts at each end.
On the first day you get several enquiries from people who when
looking to buy fuel for their rocket boots saw the flashing sign
advertising your Rocket boot shop and decided to check out your
shop before going home. On the second day you get several more
and make a couple of sales. You go on to get at least 10
visitors a day from people who having visited the Rocket boot
fuel shop see the sign to your shop and follow the highway to
check it out. About 20% of these visitors turn into sales.
This gets you thinking if you get 10 visitors a day from one
Rocket boot fuel shop why not set up superhighways with other
shops of the same genre. Looking in you Jupiter directory you
find 150 such shops and make try to make contact with their
owners. Many owners don't return your call, some do to politely
decline but 22 owners reply saying they think it's a good idea.
By the end of the month you have gone from 0 superhighways
coming into your pod to 23 and the amount of customers has risen
by 1000%.
Over time you strike up relationships with owners of 'Rocket
boot Repair' shops and 'Rocket boot cleaning' shops before you
know it you have over 100 superhighways coming into your pod all
bringing customers on a daily basis. As your shop becomes better
known shop owners come to you requesting a superhighway to link
your two pods, some just build a superhighway to your shop
without requesting a flashing sign at your end as your shop has
now got a good reputation and they are keen to be linked to you.
All these incoming highways bring in thousands of customers each
day and it's not long before you hire more staff to keep up with
demand.
5 years later down the line you have expanded into other fields
buying several more pods and start each venture by linking them
to other pods in the same way. They grow as did your original
rocket boot business
As you sit back one day in your luxury habitat pod bought with
the profits from your several businesses you recall with a smile
the day the business advisor gave you the advice 'the best way
to bring customers to your pod without paying money is to link
to other pods'.
Ok you might ask if the author of this article is insane - the
purpose of this article is why you must have incoming links to a
website. You may be right on the insanity charge but if I say
from my story :-
The planet of Jupiter is the internet - the WWW
The pods are websites
The superhighways are links between websites
The flashing signposts on the superhighways are the
descriptive anchor text to the links.
Then (hopefully) you will see the futuristic analogy I have just
described.
The simple fact of the matter is that to have a website with
lots of targeted traffic you must set up a reciprocal linking
program. It is the one best way of getting targeted traffic to
your site with no cost except your time. It will also help with
your Search Engine rankings.
If you don't set up a reciprocal linking program you will either
have to pay a fortune on advertising or like the rocket boot
shop in the beginning get but a few lost soles who will leave
your site as soon as they arrive basically rendering your
website a ghost town.