Before I proceed with this
make money online article, we need to go over what natural backlinks are.
What are natural backlinks?
There are all sorts of backlinks people use to
make money online: spammy backlinks, comment and forum signature backlinks, “whined for” backlinks… None of those are natural backlinks – and if you want to make money online you will need mostly the natural variety to satisfy the ever-changing demands of Google.
I know, I still didn’t answer your question about what exactly natural backlinks are. I’m getting to it… don’t worry…
Natural backlinks are the backlinks you get from some random person who decided to link to you. You didn’t ask for the link and you didn’t spam anyone to get it; you didn’t comment on a bunch of “.edu” student blogs and you didn’t write a paid post on someone’s blog. The beauty of natural backlinks is that you can often get them from people who have blogs and websites related to your niche. These related, unsolicited backlinks are the most valuable you can possibly ever get. How do you get them?
“Post good content and post it often!” all the blogging gurus proclaim. Most people who try to make money online simply want to make a blog, slap up some Adsense, write blog posts everyday with recycled content when they run out of ideas, get a couple comment backlinks, and waste away their days promoting the blog on social media sites.
“Attract natural backlinks and attract them often!” I proclaim. No, this is not the same thing as posting good content. Let me explain.
My approach to natural backlinks is different. Most gurus and so-called experts say to write spectacular, unique content and the natural backlinks will take care of themselves. Trust me, backlinks (the kind we need and want) never “take care of themselves”. Backlinks are not passive no matter how you slice it. True, your natural backlinks will be unsolicited, but they sure as hell don’t happen simply by writing a blog post. Yippie… another blog post! There are millions of blog posts written about backlinks everyday and no one cares. Due to oversaturation (especially in the make money online niche) it takes more than good content to get natural backlinks – it takes a pioneer approach.
Blogging gurus are mostly full of s%^* and flock to blogging conventions to collect their meaningless awards touting their self-indulged expertise. The real gurus, those who don’t refer to themselves as such, never attend blogging conventions and never flaunt their skills – they simply demonstrate those skills through their actions. As we all know, actions speak louder than words. Most of the real gurus never even show their faces, so we will never know who most of them are. They lurk in the shadows, make their money, vacation in the south of France, and laugh as everyone else follows Darren Rowse’s blog like it’s a cult. Instead of reading about celebrity train wrecks for entertainment like most people do, they read noob comments and blog posts written by Yaro Starak and Caroline Middlebrook.
Content is only a small piece of what it takes to get natural backlinks and in some cases good content has been totally sidestepped. For example, just look at some of the sites that rank #1 or #2 for very competitive keywords! Most of their content is either sparse or heavily regurgitated from the same crap they have blogged about time and time again. Either that, or they hop on over to Grizzly’s Blogger blog to find something they can paraphrase and pass off as their own “expertise”.
Back to the question: How do we get natural backlinks without annoying the competitors in our niche to death? Good content is a great strategy if you use it to attract backlinks, but it needs to be paired with that which makes people want to link to you – it needs to be a tool that they can’t live without (and free is always a great incentive for someone to give you backlinks). Essentially, you are creating a “niche within your niche” so that the people in your niche will not feel threatened by you; they will link to you.
Everyone loves the person who gives away things for free, but no one wants to BE that person. Most of the time, that person who gives away things for free is the one who ends up winning out because ‘free’ is part of their strategy. When something is ‘free’, the assumption that you have ulterior motives suddenly disappears.
Thus, you mustn’t be blatantly selling something if you want backlinks. On the flip side, we all need and want backlinks because, ultimately, we all want to be able to sell something. To put it a different way: We need backlinks so we can rank for our keywords, get targeted traffic, and sell stuff - but no one wants to give us backlinks if we appear to be some money hungry, heartless internet marketer. Do you see the dilemma? If we didn’t want to make money online, we wouldn’t be chasing backlinks like there’s no tomorrow.
I can’t give you a solid answer on what your tool or natural backlink magnet should be. It depends on how creative you are, what your niche is, and how actively you pursue and implement your ideas. My best advice is: Find a hole in your niche and fill it. Come up with some tool or unique information that you can offer for free; in exchange you will attract natural backlinks if you market it properly and if it is truly an asset to your niche.
If you want to know what I’m talking about, I advise you to watch very closely what I do (not just what I say) in the next few months. I have some natural backlink magnet strategies in place and I will be implementing them. Remember that actions speak louder than words.
One last thing about Grizzly… He is a pioneer. I have an educated guess as to why he would offer the world so much priceless make money online information for FREE (besides the fact that he’s a nice guy!). Grizzly, a true internet marketer who practices what he preaches, inherently knows the value of attracting natural backlinks. His blog is a giant natural backlink magnet! Everyone and their mother who is interested in how to make money online links to his blog without the need for him to ask them to.
Sure, when he first started the blog I bet he had to work his tail off to get backlinks, but once he obtained some and people began to realize the value of his knowledge – everyone else did the backlink work for him. It was a snowball effect that pushed him to page 1 for “make money online”. This is a case of content winning out, but only because he has the backlinks and actual knowledge to “back” it up; this situation is rare and I think only Grizzly and a select few others have been able to pull it off.
Grizzly was the first person to really open up about how an average person can make money online – and most respectfully of all: he does it for free. His honesty and helpful attitude have allowed him to stand out in the make money online niche, and this gives me great hope. For once, honesty wins. How’s that for a slap in the face for all the sneaky internet marketers out there?
Remember, you don’t need to be a “Grizzly” to get natural backlinks. Implement the free tool approach in your own way and you will be successful in your quest to make money online – even if you don’t have the means to create great content like Grizzly does.
So let it be written; so let it be done.
Writing to you from San Jose, California,
Janet Smith
(Yes, it’s an affiliate link. If you think I deserve credit for the idea then feel free to use my affiliate link. Or, delete my affiliate code and buy it directly if you can’t stand the thought of me earning a commission from it, LOL!) At the very least, how about a backlink to this article with the anchor text “make money online” or "make money at home" or something like that? :)
