Ah, relationships. Good relationships are strong, meaningful bonds that act to hold people or objects together.  Like the furniture maker’s forgotten “dovetail” joint that once held a strong piece of furniture together and is now replaced with weak staples between faux wood fiberboard, relationships seem to be the forgotten glue that once held the business world together. Oh relationships, where have you gone?

Actually, relationships are alive and well, out there, calling your name with opportunities awaiting just beyond that first handshake. And why do we love relationships? Relationships lead to links online! Some of the best links that a business can acquire to their website are those developed through real-life relationships.

The best advice to grab these links is to get out from behind that keyboard and monitor (don’t worry, you can take your iPhone or BlackBerry with you) and go meet some real PEOPLE.

By meeting people and developing real relationships with them, you have the opportunity to garner quality links to your website. If you’re networking in the right places, these links are often targeted and of relative high value for SEO and for traffic purposes.

What do we mean by “real-life” relationships? These are relationships with people that you’ve spoken to on the telephone or have met in person. These are actual people you’ve developed a rapport with at some point at an event or in online social networking.

How does one go about garnering links from real life relationships?

First, you need to initiate or develop the relationship:

• Start by attending industry conferences and social events. Those who you meet at industry conferences, if you have a similar philosophy, will allow you to link to them and visa versa. The great thing about industry conferences is that you meet targeted prospects for link opportunities. Sometimes there are dot-org (.org) website owners who run trade or industry sites and are willing to link to you.  We all love .orgs, don’t we, for many of them are trustworthy and non-commercial in nature.

• If you’re not able to afford major industry conferences, it’s helpful to look for local networking groups and informal gatherings within your industry. It doesn’t have to be a huge once-annual event to attract a strong, focused group of attendees.

• Within industry magazines, find vendors who are offering related products but aren’t direct competitors.  Approach them and let them know that they have an opportunity with you.

• Within industry trade journals, find other businesses and organizations that you can call on to work up a relationship. Offer up lunch in your neighborhood and then discuss with them your online opportunities.

• Look to your local Chamber of Commerce, get involved and become active as a volunteer / member. Make sure to get some linking going from the Chamber website.

• Use online social networking sites like Meetup.com, LinkedIn.com and even Twitter.com to network with users who have like-minded interests.  The search features in these sites are solid and can lead you to some of the most valuable relationships anywhere.
  • Visit targeted users’ websites from their profiles to see if they could be a good linking candidate.
  • Find local MeetUp groups with people who are interested in like-minded topics or even topics that are slightly related.  For example, if you’re in the art-supply business, find a MeetUp of artists such as photographers, painters and/or sculptors.  Attend the MeetUp, be friendly and good things will happen.
• Twitter can be a great resource for finding links because the search is efficient, targeted, pretty much real time, and the initial pitch only has to be 140 characters in a direct message!

Once you’ve established a relationship, simply brief the target linker on the potential of the relationship.  If you think it’s a good linking partner based on audiences (and not solely on SEO weighting), chances are this is a very easy pitch and beneficial to both parties. Engage and see if there can be a meaningful way to share information between sites and help each other out in whatever form would work for both parties.

Granted, in a fair amount of cases you may end up with reciprocal relationships, but a targeted and natural-looking reciprocal link may be better than no link at all, both for SEO purposes and for actual traffic over time!  In many cases too there are simple, overlooked opportunities to garner one-way links directly back to your site and content.

Linking is a cumulative effort. Don’t expect to get hundreds of links overnight from this method. This is an organic, methodical process and not one which will bounce you to page #1 for all of your target or most competitive keywords in a day, or even a week. BUT, if you start out and say to yourself, “I’m going to garner quality, meaningful links over the course of time through hard work” - and set your goals to do so – it will happen. If you take the opportunity to ask for a link from most encounters and relationships you develop in your industry, good things will happen.

Relying on real-world networking, going out and pressing the flesh and meeting people in your industry (both at events and in online social networking websites) allows you to start on this path of natural linking success.  You’ll find that your business “dovetails” with some of the best places on the Internet!

Social networking and the establishment and maintenance of relationships isn’t new to marketing. Businesses have been doing that for years. However, only recently have we moved to a new method of interaction – online participatory marketing.

Business to Consumer (B2C) and Business to Business (B2B) marketers still have to interact with their audience, but now they’re doing it in a much more personal way thanks to the proliferation of online Social Networks. They can now meet their potential customers on their own turf. Whereas, consumers used to only have advertising forced upon them through mediums like television, magazines and radio.

Roles have also evolved thanks to the Internet. For example, consumers now hold the trump card – the card of choice. Pop-up ads can be blocked, spammy emails can be filtered, and annoying Twitter users can be blocked. That has led to a marketing approach that requires authenticity, trust and transparency.

How B2B Marketers Can Take Advantage of Social Media

• Recruiting
• Evangelizing
• Lead Creation

How B2C Marketers Can Take Advantage of Social Media

• Support
• Announcements
• Providing Consumer Resources
• Lead Creation

Without the use of Social Networks, all of the above reasons would require face-to-face communication. There are now several Social Media sites you can use to engage potential customers. The list below provides just a few of the social networking options available to businesses.

• LinkedIn – Establishing and developing business connections (for all industries)
• GovLoop – Social networking for government employees
• LawLink - Social networking for attorneys
• Fohboh – Social networking for those in the restaurant industry
• Sales Spider – Social networking site dedicated to the small and mid-sized business owner and executive

Social networking and the establishment and maintenance of relationships isn’t new to marketing. Businesses have been doing that for years. However, only recently have we moved to a new method of interaction – online participatory marketing.

Business to Consumer (B2C) and Business to Business (B2B) marketers still have to interact with their audience, but now they’re doing it in a much more personal way thanks to the proliferation of online Social Networks. They can now meet their potential customers on their own turf. Whereas, consumers used to only have advertising forced upon them through mediums like television, magazines and radio.

Roles have also evolved thanks to the Internet. For example, consumers now hold the trump card – the card of choice. Pop-up ads can be blocked, spammy emails can be filtered, and annoying Twitter users can be blocked. That has led to a marketing approach that requires authenticity, trust and transparency.

How B2B Marketers Can Take Advantage of Social Media

• Recruiting
• Evangelizing
• Lead Creation

How B2C Marketers Can Take Advantage of Social Media

• Support
• Announcements
• Providing Consumer Resources
• Lead Creation

Without the use of Social Networks, all of the above reasons would require face-to-face communication. There are now several Social Media sites you can use to engage potential customers. The list below provides just a few of the social networking options available to businesses.

• LinkedIn – Establishing and developing business connections (for all industries)
• GovLoop – Social networking for government employees
• LawLink - Social networking for attorneys
• Fohboh – Social networking for those in the restaurant industry
• Sales Spider – Social networking site dedicated to the small and mid-sized business owner and executive