Link building for a 'boring' eCommerce site
-
Hey all,
I'm in need of some serious inspiration and I'm hoping one of you generous people can help.
We're looking to do a spot of link building for an eCommerce site which I would describe (without putting it down too much) as 'boring'. This isn't our fault per se as the site sells printer cartridges and there's only a certain amount of excitement such a product can create.
As a result natural linkbuilding is quite tricky, especially when it comes to creating links to anything other than our homepage. For the past couple of years we have focused on creating good content and indeed have a thriving database of hundreds of helpful articles and videos on the site. These are generating decent traffic (and rank #1 for many different help related search terms) but the problem with these articles is that they don’t convert in to sales at all well. I’m also conscious that it will ultimately end in us developing a link profile which would classify us as a printer repair resource rather than cartridge sales website.
I have read numerous guides on Moz but they all tend to focus on products which are a little sexier than those that we sell. Getting someone to share and link to a truly unique product would be incredibly easy compared with asking someone to engage, share and link to the latest Epson cartridge.
I started writing articles on some decent quality business blogs however the links given don’t look particularly natural and the link would always be to our homepage.
We have the staff and the time but we built a whole host of rubbish links back before Penguin and I want to ensure that we are going to head in the right direction before embarking on something new. If you had a site which was really dull how would you devise a link building strategy that was relevant and, most importantly, natural?
Thanks for your help.
Chris
-
Hey, thanks for getting back in contact.
Yeah, we were contemplating doing that. It does seem to be further diluting the emphasis on people making a purchase however which was our real concern - If someone does a search for a DX4050 printer then it seems relevant to just yield a list of products rather than loads of additional content that is unrelated to their purchase.
I guess pretty much anything we do is going to potentially detract from the user experience in the name of giving the possibility of people linking to us. Making something that is truly relevant and natural while at the same time adding to the user experience and attracting the possibility of external links would appear to be the challenge!
-
Linkable Asset Idea: Offer Free Printables (Coloring Sheets, Birthday Cards, etc).
You might not be able to easily get someone to link to your product page, but focus on getting more links to your domain for now. Can you put a linkable asset on your category page?
-
Hey Chris,
I hope all is well? Been some time
As I know your site, I am more than happy to give you a few pointers if you want to shoot me an e-mail over? You might have to visit my new site to send this though as I rebranded last year and pretty sure you wont have it.
Cheers,
Andy
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Question about reciprocal link building. I'm not an SEO professional, just a local service business owner.
I did a link page on my website 13 years ago and never took it down. Should we scratch that page all together? Is it ok with Google to do a page on Recommended local service providers. Maybe I can keep some of those reciprocal links if that's the case...
Link Building | | FVLMS0 -
India link building - any good ?
Hi Everyone We have clients that have very small budgets. We thought about outsourcing our link building to India to help with costs... Can anyone recommend any good Indian Link building companies that are well priced and that you have seen good results from ?? Any help would be much appreciated Thanks Guys Gareth
Link Building | | GAZ090 -
What's the best seo link building company after May 2013?
Which is the best and most trustworthy seo company if I want to outsource my link building after being severely hit by the google penguin 4 update?
Link Building | | naimelhajj0 -
Root Domain Link for Affiliate's Link
It seems my affiliate link: http://www.hrmsplugins.com?partners=21 is not being considered as a "root domain" backlink when this link is used on their website. Is there a reason for this?
Link Building | | delphia0 -
Link Buildinf for new sites
Hello friends, I would like to know what link building strategies you recommend for a newly created websites? Thanks a lot!
Link Building | | pasape0 -
There is a New link to my Site but I can see it on link report ?why ?
Hi I found out using link campaign and Open site explorer that my competitors where getting links from this page http://www.visitgreece.gr/en/activities/land_sports/golf So I conatc the admins and added our golf courses too Is the dunes and the bay course in the middle of the page But this happened 3 weeks ago and still this linking domain is not appaering in my campaign why is that any ideas ? does it take so much time to appera to SEOmoz ? Or the problem is because they are linking 2 diffrent sites ? my site is www.costanavarinogolf.com Thanks a lot in advance for your help
Link Building | | grzontan0 -
Link building monitor
Hi i am trying to find a good link building monitoring tool, all the ones I have looked at are terrible. Basically i want to import my list of links so they can be monitored then emailed when failing. Can anyone suggest one they have used?
Link Building | | TomBarker820 -
Why aren't links to my site showing up in open site explorer?
My site is http://www.thesquarefoot.com Google analytics shows many more (though more than a handful of links that we have gotten recently still don't show up there). Definite newbie here so please be kind... Thanks!
Link Building | | TheSquareFoot0