Link popularity analysis is one of the best ways to measure the impact of your presence on the web.  Link popularity refers to the number of links or "votes" that a search engine has found for your website - i.e. links from other sites to yours.

Marketleap has provided us with this link popularity tool to provide you with a useful benchmarking report to display where you stand in comparison to your competitors and other major online players.

As link popularity values constantly change, the values reported by Marketleap for your site(s) are collected live each time a request is made.

What will be displayed using the MarketLeap Link Popularity tool:

» Total number of pages in each search engines index that contains a link to your site, including your own website.

» You'll then be able to click on the links under each search engine to display who is linking to you. You'll then also be able to pinpoint other sites that they link to and perhaps approach those sites for a link to yours.

» How are your competitors performing in search engines? If they are performing well, you can look at the sites that are linking to them and then approach those sites for a link to yours.

Making a link request

If you have identified a site that you would like to link to yours, send the webmaster a link request email. These basic tips may be of value to you:

1. Be courteous. 
All too often the anonymity of email tends to encourage rudeness and arrogance. Remember that the webmaster you are approaching owes you nothing - be very polite in your request

2. Grammar and Spelling 
Your link request should be professional and give the impression that you have put some thought into the approach. If your request is full of errors and is impersonal, the site owner/webmaster will assume that your site will be of low quality and won't bother to investigate.

3. Ensure your site is complete. 
A site still under construction will be ignored by webmasters who have quality sites. 

4. Patience 
Don't expect an answer immediately or harass the other webmaster - after initial contact, wait at least 14 days before making a follow up contact.

5. Study the other site 
Inspect the site you wish to link to you carefully. Identify some positive points and mention them in your note in the form of a compliment. Also identify what your site can offer to the visitors to the webmaster's site.  If the site has a "Submit your URL" page, ensure that you use it and read the guidelines for submission carefully. 

6. Give to gain. 
Very few web masters will give you a link if they receive nothing in return these days. Establish a "resources" page on your own site and add the links of the sites you wish to link to you before you approach them. Have no more than 20 links and descriptions on each resources page (you can replace them if the sites you approach don't respond).  When you contact the other webmaster, point them to their listing and ask them if it is suitable. Don't use the ploy that some use, i.e. "if you don't put a link to my site on yours within X days, then I will delete my link to you" - extortion is not a good way to start a linking partnership ;).

7. Not every request will work. 
If you are officially denied a link, don't get too upset - perhaps that site owner was having a bad day.  Leave it for a few months and then try again.

Linking and reciprocal linking are some of the most effective and cheapest ways to promote your web site. The number of sites linking to you also plays a role in the ranking algorithm of many search engines.  For more information about reciprocal linking and general promotion tips, view our web site marketing tutorial.

Michael Bloch
Team ThinkHost
http://www.thinkhost.com
Thinking Hosting? ThinkHost!

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