Howto: Request Link Exchanges

The whole link exchange thing seems a bit hazy these days. If you get sent a link exchange request, you’d hesitate; and more than likely hit your “report spam” button in gmail. So what does it take for a link exchange request to be successful?

Let’s analyze one I got a few days ago.

To Whom It May Concern:
We came across your website today and would like to exchange links with you. If you are interested, please let us know how you would like to be listed. Our website, (name removed), is dedicated to listing resources helpful to those who search our website on various subjects. We currently get over 300 visitors daily.

We were hoping that you might consider linking to us and invite you to review our website at your convenience. If you think that a link to our website is appropriate, please add it to your site at your discretion. We suggest the following link and description:

Link details blah blah

First of all, does this look very formal to you? Formal to me means that it was generated from a program, most likely some sort of back link generator program. I like to think my sites are respectable and are of value to my readers. I don’t want to link with someone who won’t even take the time to construct a personalized email.

Now here’s my point, it’s all about the personalized email.

I take advantage of my “Australian nature”. If you’ve ever received a link exchange request from me, it starts with a “G’day” and ends with a “Cheers mate”. By doing this, it’s quite obvious that I’m not a program but a human who has taken the effort to ensure a personalized invitation has been constructed.

But how do I find people to exchange with? Thanks to webmaster forums, there’s a wealth of information posted by other users looking to exchange links. By hitting the webmaster forums, you’re eliminating people who won’t even consider your link. Some webmaster forums that provide a link exchange forum include;

• Digitalpoint (my personal favorite)
• V7N
• Webmaster-talk

Should you reveal traffic details?

Some webmasters are wary of sending traffic details, for fear of not living up to the other person’s expectations. If you’re exchanging links for PR purposes, then traffic serves little purpose. But that’s the catch isn’t it. Shouldn’t webmasters be concentrating on getting traffic and not PR?