You wrote a post, gave it a snappy title, tagged it with a category and keywords appropriate for the subject, checked and double checked spelling, added an image and alt text description, wrote the short summary that will show up in Google searches, and scheduled it to go live tomorrow morning when people are turning on their computers, drinking their coffee and reading their RSS feeds.
In other words, you’re all set to publish, right?
Wrong. You forgot one very important thing.
Links.
For a post to be ready to publish, it’s got to have links. Links are words that act as hypertext to take the reader to a different page on the net, and they’re what makes the internet the internet.
If you’re not including links in your posts, you’re missing out on big opportunities.
Why? Here are 8 essential reasons to include links in posts:
1. It’s a short-hand way of showing readers what you’re talking about. Say you’re writing about reading Harry Potter, watching the latest episode of “Mad Men” or what’s happening in the Middle East, you could link to Amazon, AMC and CNN respectively so readers can learn more about what you’re saying.
2. It’s good internet etiquette. Linking out is good manners. When you talk about something – see above – you’re making it easier for readers to find out more bout it rather than making them hunt it down for themselves. Don’t worry about sending them away from your site – they’ll come back, if you post consistently about topics they’re interested in.
3. It saves you from having to include definitions of things. Instead, you can just link to them – like I did when I linked to the World Wide Web Consortium definition of hypertext earlier in this post.
4. It shows readers you’re part of the conversation. You might not have as many blog followers as Ree Drummond, aka, The Pioneer Woman. But if you read her blog about home on the range and are a frequent commenter, you could write a short post about a comment you left and link to it. Or write about something you read on The Pioneer Woman, link to it, and invite your own readers to tell you what they think. It’s all about the conversation.
5. If you know how to handle links, you can write link posts. Link posts are basically a list of links to material that’s related in some way and lives elsewhere online. Why write link posts? They’re a great standing feature – my Friday recommended reading for writers and Saturday blogathon recap posts are essentially link posts. They’re a quick and easy way to come up with a post on a day when you have other things going on.
6. It drives traffic to your older posts. If you’ve had a recent bump in traffic or subscribers to your RSS feed, those new readers have missed all the great content you’ve already written. When you write about a subject that you’ve done previous posts on, link back to them. Penelope Trunk, the Brazen Careerist blogger, is a master at this.
7. It shows you understand what it means to curate content. Being able to curate content means being able to assemble information on a specific topic – news stories, blog posts, photographs or video – in a way that adds value to what’s already out there on the subject. Example – this post I did on the current controversy surrounding Greg Mortenson, the author of Three Cups of Tea. In the media business, content curation is fast becoming a skill reporters and editors are expected to have. Why not practice on your own blog?
8. It shows people you’re smart because you know where to find the good stuff. “Essentially the idea is that you find things that interest you and share them. If you become known as ‘always finding the good stuff’ people will eagerly follow you even if you don’t do much in the way of original content,” says at David Meerman Scott in this post on content creation at his blog, WebInkNow.
If you’re not sure how to add links to blog posts, here are a few resources:
- How do I make a link to another webpage? (Blogger.com)
- Links (WordPress.com)
- Writing effective links for your audience and SEO (Blogging Basics)
Thanks for this information. I will try to add more links to my post. It does require an extra step that is sometimes time-consuming. I have heard that links to past blog posts also count. Is this true?
Definitely include links to past blog posts, especially if they’re on a similar or related subject. It’s just another way to steer readers to the other works you’ve done.
Michelle
Links seem to be the last “step” I seem to forget. This is such a great reminder.
How many do you suggest to put in your post? If you are posting on a new subject and you don’t have any past posts on the subject, do you suggest looking around the web to find one outside link?
Thanks.
I don’t know what the experts would say about the ideal number of links to put in a post – I’m sure you could search online and find info on that. However, I try to include at least two or three, and some posts have many more than that.
If you haven’t written about a subject before, link to someone who has. But be careful who you link to. You can’t go wrong linking to news site, companies, nonprofits and other known entities. You could also link to a much more well known blogger on your topic – that’s one way of getting their attention and even getting them to visit & comment on your blog. If you’re linking to another blogger who’s not as well known poke around their website a little first to make sure they’re legit and it’s not a robo-blog, spammer or someone else you wouldn’t want to be associated with.
Michelle
Thanks for this post, Michelle. I just read and thought that I was doing okay (I do insert the occasional link to another website or old post). However, when I just read your followup comment, I realize that I still may not get this.
I do check and confirm that the blog post has interesting content or links to relevent information. I think that I can pick out spammers and don’t link to those. What is a rob0-blog, though? Are there characteristics that demonstrate the person is a likely roboblogger?
I did google the term, but it is being defined as artificial intelligence, and I’m sure this is not what is meant here.
A robo-blog is a machine-generated blog that scrapes content from other sites.
Thank you so much for this post Michelle. It’s very simple information that I sometimes forget. The other item you mentioned that I don’t know how to do: writing a short description that shows up in Google searches. Have you written a post about that? Thanks again for the informative post!
Alison: The short summary that you’re describing is called a number a things: a short summary, meta description or deck, among them. My blog runs on WordPress, and in the WP Dashboard, there’s a spot for me to write a summary. As with titles, Google only recognizes so many characters for a summary, so you have to figure out how to best describe what the post is about in less than 160 characters, but without just repeating what’s in the title.
Michelle
Michelle,
Excellent post! Linking and proper attribution are so important. Links are like high-tech footnotes that automatically zoom your reader to the source. This lends credibility and helps you avoid the copyright issues you would encounter if you were cutting and pasting the source information into your blog.
Best,
Alison
Thanks so much for this entry. I knew linking was important, I just didn’t know how to do it. Merci, dziekuje bardzo, as we say in Polska.
You’re quite welcome.
Michelle
Very informative. I am using this in my blog. However, one needs to take care that only relevant links are given.