No inbound links. Should I link-build or create new content?

[UnderRugSwept]

I have a PR4 site with good traffic but the blog is not very popular--the posts do not generate any backlinks and hardly get any traffic. Yet, I continue to kick out a new post every week.

Site: http://www.stadriemblems.com/
Blog: http://www.stadriemblems.com/blog/

I keep posting content so that Google keeps crawling the site and viewing it as fresh (and yes, I'm posting for my human visitors' benefit too!), but I'm wondering if eventually this will hurt more than help if Google detects all these new pages are not being linked to, and therefore starts viewing the site as low quality and devalues it.

So should I:

1. Keep posting
2. Stop posting and build links to the posts
3. Try to promote my blog to get more traffic and hope people link to it
4. Something else or some combination of the above

[Matt-Williamson]

Hi Marisa

If I were you I would keep producing fresh content, but I would also think about how I can go about it. Have you thought about asking authoritative bloggers to do guest posts on your site? This can really help with exposure as they are likely to mention this to their loyal readers and you will start to gain exposure and links from this. I would also think about guest blogging myself on other sites to bring up the interest of what you have to say - that way people are more likely to be drawn to follow what you have to say on the site blog.

I think that you have a very marketable subject - running a judo club myself I would suggest you think about sponsoring clubs with some reductions on badges and embroidery if possible and for this I would ask for a link from their sites etc. I would also think about getting these different clubs and organisations to contribute to your blog if possible. just glancing at your blog I think there are lots of opportunities to gain links.

[UnderRugSwept]

Thanks for your suggestions. What I have been doing is featuring various customers on our blog in hopes they'd share and link to the content. It hasn't gone as well as I'd hoped. I guess I need to reach out to other people who have a larger reach. But I just created a page yesterday with guest-posting guidelines, so I'm starting to go that route. Offering a discount for a link is something we've considered too. Thanks for validating my hunches.

[Matt-Williamson]

I think it will work out if you stick with the guest posting route - it will just take some time and effort to encourage others, but it will be worth it. Just a thought - have you thought about running a patch design contest with the best design winning a quantity of free badges of their own organisation? They would have to be voted by visitors and not your company. You could give them a specific design challenge and then you could contact all your old customers and contact any clubs and organisations inviting them to submit their design and information about them and why they should win. Or your contest might be designing some sort of advert in relation to your brand or what you do and getting visitors voting on which they think would be best. I could see something along these lines helping you with traffic etc - what do you think?

[UnderRugSwept]

I think that's a wonderful idea! I've been trying to market this company for six years; It's nice to have a fresh perspective! Thanks!

[stubby]

I think you should keep posting, and also promote the blog.

But also, I went to your blog page, and there is no link that I found to easily get back to your main site page.  The logo is not even clickable.  I was stranded there.  You might want to change that.

On your blog, who is the target audience?  I don't know much about patches, but it seemed to me that the blog was written to say "hey, here is another use for embroidered patches"  Spice it up a little, so people have a reason to come back.  Humor, possibly.

So, I am just on a tear, so I will try to write or rewrite some of your titles for you:

"Choose Embroidered Patches over Direct Embroidery and Save"  (does anyone talk like that?).  How about something like "Four Reasons why Embroidered Patches make you Smarter and Sexier"

"Biggest Patch You've Ever Seen"  article, on some stupid patch that was the biggest or whatever.  Get people to try to top it with their own super large patch picture that they send in.

"The Great Pumpkin Patch"  near halloween of course.

"The toughest Patch we Ever Made" with some crazy durable surface that you used and it had to withstand rocket fuel or buffalo snot or whatever.  Heck, make a video with you abusing it and it still holds up.

"Most Unusual Use Ever for a Patch" - also get people to comment on other unusual uses, or get them to submit.  Like maybe somebody took a bunch of patches and sewed them together to make a horse sweater or who knows what.

How to Make Patch Pants (maybe you could even use that video?  or make your own)

"Hip (or Chic, or Teen, or Goth, or Punk) Patch Fashion" show some cool way that patches have been used that art

"Funniest Patch You will see This Year"  with lots of possible interaction.

"I bet You Didn't Know This was Patch"  with some offbeat examples, like that tumbler thing in your soccer article.

"Most Patriotic Patch of the Century" article, or challenge.

You could even do things like "How Many Patches Does it take to stop a Bullet"  with slow-mo video.  Stupid I know, but people love that sort of stuff.  Or,

How about a suggestive title like "Oh Yeah, Size definitely Matters for Patches" and then go on to a boring article about how to measure patches for how much information you can put on them or pricing or whatever.

"Do you have a Sexy Patch?"  article, with some patches that have inuendos on them or something.  Try to get people to comment with the best inuendos they've seen, or maybe get them to send in pictures or something (heck make it a contest).  Depending on your market, you might need to tone this one down a bit.

"History of Smuggling Spy Information under Patches" (I just made that up, but what a great place to hide secret info, under a patch that is sewn on.)

"Early Historical Use of Military Patches"  or "Patches used in the Civil War" or "Patches used by the (Navy, Air Force, etc.)"

"Rarest and most sought after Patches" or "Highest Price paid for a patch on Ebay" or something.

The cool thing about all of these is that you can link back to them from future blogs, since they will still be humorous and funny.

Okay, the well is dry for now, good luck.

[UnderRugSwept]

OK, I want your brain! Thanks for taking all that time to write that! I will try some of that stuff. A couple of those ideas I already had in the works.

[UnderRugSwept]

Do you think the fact that they're getting little to no comments and very few social media shares is a signal to Google that it's low quality content?

[Matt-Williamson]

Hi Marisa,

Have you done anything to encourage comments and social media shares? If you have email lists of past and present customers that you regularly use I would send them an outreach email asking for them to click on the link in your email and share your blog posts on social sites such as facebook when they are logged in of course.

You could also incentivise people to comment send them links to blog pieces, such as your competition once you have set it up and ask them a leading question then invite them to respond by commenting on your blog.

I have found increasing social shares and comments on sites has had direct impact on one of the websites that I was working on which was always sat at number 2 for one of my main targeted keywords until I went about pushing its social exposure. Without altering anything onsite other than the number of likes on facebook etc it suddenly moved into the top position and has been there ever since. I hope this answers your question or at least gives you some ideas.

Remember don't be afraid to ask the worst that can happen is you get little reponse or someone emails back saying no - which I haven't found to be the case. My point is that I have found social media impact to have a direct influence on search engine rankings so improving yours would always be a positive move.

Also you could have got the members of each of the different organisations involved with the 10 Impressive Embroidered Dragon Patches by leaving it open to which would be number 1 as it could have been voted for and you could have then posted on the different groups representing these patches pages on social media sites, such as facebook, getting them to vote for theres to be the number one and telling them to like the blog page and pass the message on to friends that would support their group, also increasing exposure for them which could potentially lead to new members. You could have also got asked them to start commenting through this method I think.

[stubby]

To answer your question directly, I think (my opinion only) that Google would not penalize you for not having shares and comments, but in reverse, I believe they will reward you when you do get lots of shares and comments.

I do like your dragon post, I think you are getting more on the right track, it is more interesting for sure than how to save.  To improve even more, build the interaction right into the post (like what Matt is talking about).  The best thing about getting those other companies involved is that a few of them will really take off and tell people to come and vote for their patch.  I think Facebook has a polling program, but there are other ways to do it if you kept it right on your blog too.

My brother was in a submission contest something like this, and he told everybody he knew, all the time, to go vote for his item.  It was facebooked around like crazy!

[UnderRugSwept]

Cool. Maybe I'll contact the people who ordered each of those dragon patches and tell them they're included in the list. I could also add something on the bottom such as, "Want to change this list? Vote for your favorite in the comments."

Thanks for all your great advice!