Link Building 201: Trolling with Stinkbait
February 26th, 2008So I’ve been really enjoying the Greatest Real Estate Agent in the World contest. I’ve met some new people online, and there have been some fantastic analyses of different link building techniques.
Greg Boser took the controversial approach, and is sitting pretty at #3. He did this in the (much more competitive) Dave Pasternack contest last year, and the technique worked really well for him. Greg says he’s not competing, but I think he can’t keep himself from making sure the on-site is right for his GREAITW page, and the people he’s friends with definitely know how to make sure the anchor text linking back to him is on point. I’m sure that, if he really wanted to win, he’d hit up some 301’s right before the contest ends, and take home the gold. If he does that, I wonder what he’ll do with the REW prize?
Matt Cutts wrote a great post about linkbaiting a couple of years ago that still rings true today. He talks about the controversial angle a couple of times. At the beginning, he states:
“You can also say something controversial to generate discussion (this last one gets tired if you overuse it though).”
The contestant from Seattle is sitting @ number 2 right now, using a technique I’d like to call “trolling with stinkbait.” Ardell commands a decent sized audience, and they love to say, “me too!” She started off with a post bashing the contest for offering up what she considered to be a “bogus prize.” This got her more than few links…she found a perceived weakness, and it got people talking.
The contest sponsor (Morgan) saw Ardell’s take, and remedied the perceived problem she highlighted. So Ardell threw a few more lines into the water. Blog commenting, she blasted SEOs as people who “game the system” with one hand, and had friends encourage others to link to her with specific anchor text with the other. She talked more smack in blog comments & blogs, and went 100% negative while failing to offer any constructive criticism.
What was that Matt Cutts?
“You can also say something controversial to generate discussion (this last one gets tired if you overuse it though).”
February 26th, 2008 at 3:17 pm
Just a small point.
Your link to “blasted SEOs” wasn’t written by Ardell. It was written by me. I did link to her article in mine, though.
If you read my blog back for the last few years, you’ll see that I’ve blasted SEO competitions before – it’s not that I think that SEO is a bad idea – it’s that I think that such competitions are a bad idea.
For the record, I was pointed to the competition by Lani A-R from a comment she made on twitter.
I’d never heard of Ardell, or for that matter the sponsors, until the day I wrote the post. I’m in the UK, where we don’t even use the term “real estate” (though we tend to speak enough American to understand it.)
Oh, and I don’t use any SEO techniques myself (unless regular blogging linking back to my main site is ITSELF regarded as SEO), but I do score highly for the phrase “UK property negotiation” on Google UK – 8 out of the first 10 responses link to me
February 26th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
My bad…edited the post – I was referring to her tired comments.
February 26th, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Mark, these contests are the only times when you really see what SEO is about IMO. Nobody on the top 3 pages “just wrote a post and accidentally got on top”. I don´t care what they say. It´s fun and interesting to watch what other people do to get ranked, and what works and how all of a sudden they fall back because overdoing it.
I think I have enough to write a book. Once the contest is over.
February 26th, 2008 at 7:31 pm
Actually Eric, although Boser could most certainly win the contest (It is not my contest) REW reserves the right to refuse services (Paid or won) to anyone – Greg Boser cannot win the REW prize #1 because he is not a Realtor (One of the stipulations of the prize) and #2 Because he sells a derivative service (I was going to say competing service but his services consist of skinning and hosting a wordpress platform and providing advise via a private forum) but he is going after the same kind of client and #3 because he is the king of stink bait
February 26th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
I watched that RainCity thread in real time while cracking up last night. She is a book of contradictions. Love how she amended her article to be “anti-spam” while she actively engages in it.
Eric, I was actually writing about this when I found it here, again I was beat by you.
Morgan, I hear you need a “chill pill”…. Think she’d consider taking a “Narcissistic Personality Disorder” Pill?
Mark, you wrote “SEO is inherently a zero-sum game.” — That would be hard to explain to the millionaires we’ve created.
Good post, Eric.
February 26th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Same here, I was tired but kept refreshing and looking at the screen to see what you guys would say next.
February 27th, 2008 at 8:50 pm
Knox,
Let me explain “zero-sum game” then
A “zero-sum game” is a technical term from economics – it’s a situation where, for every winner, there is a loser.
Two kids arguing about how to share a chocolate bar is zero sum – for every extra ounce that Bobby gets, Billy gets an ounce less.
By comparison, most types of business AREN’T zero-sum… If you create a business, then (assuming you’re any good) there’s more wealth into the world as a result. Creating, say, a chip company that turns sand into microprocessors creates more wealth, because it turns low-value resources into high-value resources. (Most people would pay more for a bag of Pentiums than a bag of sand.) It’s the whole “secret sauce” of the market economy we’ve had in the West for the last 2-300 years that value can be “created” like this.
No-one can create an EXTRA slot on the first page of Google (OK, apart from Larry or Sergey.) So for every person you HELP get onto that top page, someone else gets pushed down.
It’s that “Google ranking” that’s zero-sum.
Actually, in the process of writing this, I’ve realised something…. Where SEO _stops_ being zero-sum is in the money it can make. If someone who is better at creating wealth out of clicks gets a good slot on Google, the for the economy as a whole, it’s NOT zero-sum.
As a (UK) millionaire myself, I’m very much in favour of people making money
I’m not anti-SEO, I just think that these competitions are a waste of time. I’m not pro or anti- Ardell – I’d never heard of her until this competition.
March 12th, 2008 at 4:35 pm
Hey Eric,
I just noticed you got me on your blogroll. Thanks
March 12th, 2008 at 4:38 pm
No worries – It’s a really good read.