UK Based - Link Building Ideas for home improvement market? Brainstorming

[ocelot]

Hi

I am looking for some advice / lists of recommended local search directories / citations that I can add our double glazing window site - as part of our strategy to improve local search rankings and increase our visibility on the web through SEO for phrases such as 'pvc windows'  'pvc doors' 'double glazing' and 'conservatories'

For example I have added the business to the likes of

Yelp
Qype
Tipped
Ufindus
Hotfrog
Freeindex
Brownbook

But are there any specific home improvement sites that I should add the business to also.

I would also be interested in sharing recommended strategy for this market in relation to link building, for example I have thought about offering staff in local goverment / universities / hospitals a genuine discount on our products as part of their staff discount schemes

Many Thanks

[SEODinosaur]

I would recommend finding home improvement forums and making connections there. I have a good amount of success on a construction site from doing this.

People on forums are discussing everything you just have to look for them and engage them in a way that they cant turn down. My approach is usually humor.

you can introduce yourself like this: You guys want to know what the owner of the best pvc windows company eats for Breakfast...  pause .... well today for breakfast I had some fruit and granola. Giving value + helping others = relationships

Relationships + Link Building = SEO results

First you make friends on forums/blogs/google+/facebook/linkedin then you can guest blog or ask them to mention some of your articles.

Since you are based in the UK I would suggest looking for sites there... Here is a great post Rand Fishkin released not too long ago, it should help you find good sites. http://www.seomoz.org/blog/nonintuitive-search-queries-resources-for-link-building

[ocelot]

Any other ideas for the UK market?

Outreach is easier when you have a product to give away to bloggers, review sites etc to review the product etc

But for builders, plumbers and in our space pvc windows, doors and conservatories this is more difficult as we cant use the above approach.

So to summarise am I just looking at

1.) local directories

2.) web based directories that are primarily used for seo purposes

3.) Participating in DIY forums and posting comments on DIY blogs?

What is the best what to find DIY forums/ DIY blogs in the UK

The only popular DIY blog for the UK market is

diynot.com  and some of these blogs have nofollow for links

[SEODinosaur]

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/nonintuitive-search-queries-resources-for-link-building

Read #4 it will help you find blogs and forums in your area.. I also use omgili.com to find blogs and forums.

I would also recommend guest blogging. Check out myblogguest.com make sure you read the guidelines before making friends to exchange link building strategies with.

BTW IMO no follow links can be just as good. It shows the engine that people are naturally linking to you. In your quest to build links I would highly suggest using different variations of your keywords. This will help mask your site from appearing optimized to the search engines.

[Hannah_Smith]

Hello there,

I'd definitely encourage you to think about how you might go about getting some higher quality links to add in to the mix.

Guest posting (as Donnie suggested) would definitely be something that I'd encourage you to engage in, plus I really like your ideas for getting links from government / universities etc.

Something similar could also be applied if you were providing services for companies with websites.

Other opportunities might include:

Press release opportunities (either local or national).

• Do you have an interesting story to tell about a particular project you are working on? Are people in your company doing something for charity? Obviously it will need to be a genuinely good story in order to get coverage - but local press are often easier to engage with than national.

'Linkbait' Content

• Can you create some content to garner links? Perhaps something environment-related around window recycling or decreased heating bills? Or something around home improvement?

Competitions

• Could you run a competition to give something away? Doesn't necessarily have to be a full set of windows

Sponsorship

• Are there any local events that you could sponsor? This sort of thing can often result in both links from event websites, plus links from local press / other sites which cover the event.

Speaking at local events

- Similar benefits to sponsorship (see above).

I hope this helps,

Hannah

[ocelot]

Hi Hannah

Great response - many thanks. I am just looking for some clarification on some points you made - hope thats ok

What do you mean by

"Something similar could also be applied if you were providing services for companies with websites"

If we ran competitions how would that help a local audience - we are not a national provider just in a certain region of the UK.  Also I thought this appraoch would only lead to temporary links as once the competition is over the likes of loquax, prizefinder etc would remove the competition entry

Thanks

[Hannah_Smith]

Hey,

No worries

I meant you could also ask for those companies that you've provided windows for to link back to you.

Re competitions - I mean actually frame your competition around link building.

For example you could run a competition with bloggers to give something away - to enter bloggers simply need to write a post and link back to you with the winner drawn from the hat.

See - http://bit.ly/znm31w for an example of what I mean.

I hope this helps,

Hannah