Best in Show:
Tools for Building Links
AKA: Solving Problems with Tools
JOHN DOHERTY
DISTILLED NYC

@dohertyjf
I have a confession to make

@dohertyjf
The reason I write posts like this
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/linkbuilder-gmail-productivity-setup-and-outreach-
examples
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/linkbuilder-gmail-productivity-setup-and-
outreach-examples

@dohertyjf
And build tools like this
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/category/excel-for-seo

@dohertyjf
And have friends like @ipullrank
http://ipullrank.com/tools/social-scrape/

@dohertyjf
Is because I hate linkbuilding
Ok ok, hate is a strong word. But linkbuilding is tough

@dohertyjf
Tools speed up parts of linkbuilding so we can concentrate on the important and
harder parts, like outreach (and there are tools for that too)

@dohertyjf
There are a million and one tools out there on the Internet.
Image Source

@dohertyjf
We have to know when to use them.
Otherwise, you can get overwhelmed quickly.

@dohertyjf
Let’s talk about a linkbuilding campaign

@dohertyjf
A linkbuilding campaign involves many stages
of planning and execution, and takes two
kinds of tools.

@dohertyjf
Structuring a Linkbuilding Campaign

@dohertyjf
What
Track Why
Who/Competitor
Scale
Research
Outreach

@dohertyjf
Two Types of Tools

@dohertyjf
Paid tools

@dohertyjf
Free tools, Excel templates, and a strong dose of HUSTLE

@dohertyjf
Three Levels of Tools

@dohertyjf
Levels
Free Tools Paid Tools Enterprise-Level Tools

@dohertyjf
Tools for Budget Levels
No budget- $99 $100-$500 $501+

@dohertyjf

@dohertyjf
Starting a campaign with a new client (or as a
new in-house SEO)

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“What am I, or my
competitors,
ranking for or
targeting already?”

@dohertyjf
Analytics + Rankerizer (Free)
Rankerizer is a free tool to download (just provide
your email address) that you can use to check
rankings quickly. I have found it to be quite accurate
and because it’s a free tool, very useful to people
who need rankings quickly.
http://www.rankerizer.com

@dohertyjf
KeywordSpy (Free and Paid)
KeywordSpy will give you the
terms that the site is ranking for.
This is useful both for your own
site as well as competitor sites.
http://www.keywordspy.com
http://www.keywordspy.com

@dohertyjf
KeywordSpy (Free and Paid)

@dohertyjf
KeywordSpy + Excel Magic
Spreadsheet - http://dis.tl/semrushpivot
Excellent Analytics - http://excellentanalytics.com/

@dohertyjf
http://www.distilled.net/excel-for-seo/

@dohertyjf
SearchMetrics (Paid)
SearchMetrics Essentials is a paid
tool that we use at Distilled. This
is where I go after Analytics to
get a full picture of their SERP
and keyword landscape.
http://www.searchmetrics.com/en/

@dohertyjf
SearchMetrics Essentials
http://suite.searchmetrics.com/en/essentials

@dohertyjf
SearchMetrics Essentials
http://suite.searchmetrics.com/en/essentials

@dohertyjf
Rank
Checkers/Trackers

@dohertyjf
Authority Labs (Paid $24-99/month)
http://authoritylabs.com/

@dohertyjf
Raven Tools (Subscription)
http://raventools.com

@dohertyjf
SEOmoz (Subscription)
http://pro.seomoz.org/campaigns or http://ranktracker.seomoz.org/

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“What links do I
need?”

@dohertyjf
LinkDetective (Free) + OSE (Subscription)
Link Detective is a new tool that categorizes your
backlinks into types.
Take those competitors you found and plug them in
here.
http://www.linkdetective.com/

@dohertyjf
LinkDetective

@dohertyjf
Run backlink profiles of competitors (OSE)
and check their anchor text in Excel.
Once you can see what anchor text your
competitors are targeting, you can better know what
kind of content you should be creating in order to
rank for those terms!
You’ll need this: https://seogadget.co.uk/categorising-your-links/ from this
guy - @richardbaxter (he’s frickin smart)

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“Where are my
competitors getting
links that I should as
well?”

@dohertyjf
LinkResearchTools Competitive Landscape
http://www.linkresearchtools.com/

@dohertyjf
SEOmoz Competitive Link Finder
(Subscription)
A Labs tool that returns you the
sites that your competitors are
getting links from, but you are not.
http://www.seomoz.org/labs/link-intersect

@dohertyjf
MajesticSEO Clique Hunter
(Subscription)
Majestic’s Clique Hunter also does
a good job of showing you who is
linking where within the compared
sites.
http://www.majesticseo.com/reports/cliquehunter

@dohertyjf
http://www.majesticseo.com/reports/cliquehunter

@dohertyjf
OSE Export + Excel
Export your backlinks from
OpenSiteExplorer and put them
into this Excel sheet. With a little
Pivot Table magic, you get the
unique LRDs that are linking to
your competitors, but not you.
http://dis.tl/exceltrifecta

@dohertyjf
http://dis.tl/exceltrifecta

@dohertyjf
Starting

@dohertyjf
Who?
Link Prospecting

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“I just need more
contacts!”

@dohertyjf
Advanced Queries + LinkClump (Hustle)
Use your advanced query skills
(such as “rock climbing” “guest
post”, with an Advanced Search
(50 results) and combine w/
LinkClump (Chrome) or
MultiLinks (Firefox). Dump into
Excel. Rinse, repeat.
Geoff Kenyon wrote this post: http://www.distilled.net/blog/seo/finding-link-
opportunities-with-advanced-search-queries/
Adjust search settings: https://www.google.com/preferences?hl=en

@dohertyjf
Citation Labs (Free Trial, then Paid)
Citation Labs, by Garrett French
(@garrettfrench) lets you put in
your keywords and the type of
prospect you want, then it returns
your prospects in a CSV file.
http://linkprospector.citationlabs.com/

@dohertyjf
Citation Labs (Free Trial, then Paid)
Export the CSV to Excel and manipulate the data (sort by PR, etc)


@dohertyjf
Problem:
“How do I find sites
interested in
content?”

@dohertyjf
Let Ontolo make queries for you
Ontolo’s Linkbuilding Query
Generator V2 (free tool) will build
your queries for you. Simply put in
your keywords and type of content,
download the CSV, and go!
Pro tip: Advanced Search with 50
results.
http://ontolo.com/link-building-query-generator-V2

@dohertyjf
Insert your
Ontolo Results
keywords and
asset (aka
content) type.

@dohertyjf
Tool: http://dis.tl/Hd4OJi
http://www.distilled.net/blog/seo/finding-link-opportunities-with-advanced-search-
queries/

@dohertyjf
BlogDash (Free)
BlogDash is a free tool that helps
you find bloggers. Add them to
project lists, see posts that you’ve
sent, and connect up Twitter.
http://www.blogdash.com
If I was building links for a website about outdoor leadership, I’d use BlogDash because
it allows you to sort bloggers by keyword.
Pro tip – You can sort by Google TBPR or Klout score.

@dohertyjf
http://www.bloggerlinkup.com/

@dohertyjf
Search by Author
I created a bookmarklet a few
months back that allows you to
search for posts written by a
specific author. Use it to find
where they have posted, then
reach out and get a post yourself!
http://dis.tl/author-search-bkmrklt

@dohertyjf
Search ‘em, scrape ‘em, sort ‘em
By using Advanced search operators,
plus Advanced Search (set to 50
results), and Neils Bosma’s SEO
Tools, you can quickly find the
relative strength of sites to reach
out to.
Combine w/ Citation Labs for #win.
http://nielsbosma.se/projects/seotools/
https://seogadget.co.uk/amazing-seo-tools-for-excel/

@dohertyjf
Copy to Excel, run =GooglePageRank()

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“How do I find
influencers?”

@dohertyjf
FollowerWonk (Paid and Free)
Followerwonk is the best Twitter
social mining tool available. Both
paid and free.You’re limited with a
free account to how much data
you can pull. If you’re enterprise,
the paid is worth it.
If I was building links for a website with outdoors equipment, I’d go to Followerwonk
and search by keyword (like [skier]).
Pro tip – Sort by # of followers or influence.

@dohertyjf
FollowerWonk (Paid and Free)
Followerwonk will also help you
find the intersection between who
people follow. If you identify a few
influencers in a space, then run the
Compare Users report to see
who all of them follow.
Pro tip – Especially look for “choosy” people, as they are more likely to follow high
quality people.

@dohertyjf
Basically, you should follow all these people.

@dohertyjf
Twitter Scraping Then take the tool that I built, throw in a list of
Twitter usernames, and pull out their websites,
complete with Moz metrics (bring your own API
key).
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/link-prospecting-with-twitter-tools-and-apis/

@dohertyjf
@rosshudgens
Pro tip: When you find an influencer on Twitter, scroll to the
bottom of who they are following. Those are the people they
have been following the longest.
Sometime earlier this year

@dohertyjf
Alltop (Free)
Alltop has topics for many
different categories. These blogs
can be a good place to start to
find pretty reputable sites.
http://alltop.com/

@dohertyjf
Topsy Experts (Beta)
Topsy has an awesome beta tool
that lets you search by keyword. It
then returns you the Twitter
usernames of the influential
people.You might be surprised
who you find!
http://topsy.com/experts

@dohertyjf
Lists + LinkClump
Another good way to find
influencers is to use high powered
Google queries, and then scrape
them.
Like: "influential" "cycling"
"blogger" "list"
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-power-of-using-lists-for-link-building

@dohertyjf
Lists + LinkClump
Brought me this post:
http://extanz.com/2011/08/26/top-
50-most-influential-cycling-
bloggers-celebrating-the-cycle-
chic-movement/ with 50 cyclists.
Linkclump and dump. Boom.
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-power-of-using-lists-for-link-building

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“I have way too
many contacts!
Help me sort
them?”

@dohertyjf
Ontolo
http://ontolo.com/link-building-search-prospects

@dohertyjf
Excel Spreadsheet
I built out an Excel spreadsheet
that allows you to put in your
prospect sites and their
information. Then, it divides your
prospects into DA “buckets”.
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/segmented-link-outreach/

@dohertyjf
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/segmented-link-outreach/

@dohertyjf
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/segmented-link-outreach/

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“Contact details are
hard to find! Can I
do it faster?”

@dohertyjf
Citation Labs (Paid)
Input a list of URLs (keep it under
1,000 for best results). The Contact
Finder returns you emails or the
page where you can find the email.
Combine with ToutApp for
maximum efficiency.
http://citationlabs.com/tools/

@dohertyjf
Buzzstream Contact Finder (Free)
Enter the person’s first and last
names, as well as their company
and website, and search.
You will receive results like:
“fred wilson” “@avc.com”
http://tools.buzzstream.com/link-building-email-research

@dohertyjf
Prospecting

@dohertyjf
Why?
People don’t just link. They have to have a
reason.

@dohertyjf
Find the content being created
So use this SEOgadget tool to
create the content that people
are asking about, according to
the keywords you want to
target.
https://seogadget.co.uk/content-strategy-generator-tool-v2-update/ via @dbseo

@dohertyjf
Answer the questions they’re asking
Oh hello Quora scraper.
Find your keyword’s URL on
Quora, plug that into the RSS URL
in the tool, and this tool returns
you the most recent 20 questions
about that topic.
http://dis.tl/quorascraper
Quora RSS URL: http://www.quora.com/(keyword)/rss

@dohertyjf
Quora Scraper
http://dis.tl/quorascraper

@dohertyjf
Ontolo Content Idea Generator
http://ontolo.com/content-marketing-research-successful-content

@dohertyjf
Ontolo Content Idea Generator
55 linking root domains!
You should have these
links, not them!
Brought me up this article with 55 backlinks: http://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifehack/twitter-
use-it-productively.html

@dohertyjf
Salesforce Should Have These Links
http://www.salesforce.com/uk/socialsuccess/social-media/

@dohertyjf
Content

@dohertyjf
How?
Outreach

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“How do I connect
with new link
prospects?”

@dohertyjf
NEW TOOL ALERT: ENGAG.IO (Free)
Engag.io is your inbox for your
social media conversations.
Connect up Twitter and Facebook
and track your conversations.
http://www.engag.io/welcome

@dohertyjf
 These people love Engag.io
http://www.engag.io/welcome

@dohertyjf
Rapportive
A Gmail plugin that allows you to connect broader
socially with your contacts. Also useful for finding
email addresses if you know the domain. Or check
when they last tweeted.
http://rapportive.com/
http://www.johnfdoherty.com/rapportive-linkbuilding-tool/

@dohertyjf
Give them something.

@dohertyjf
Coffee (a couple bucks)
We sometimes forget that our best linkbuilding
tactic is building relationships. Try taking a blogger
out for a cup of coffee. Or send them a custom
flash drive. If you’re not making the connection
via email, get in front of them in real life.
Brought to you by: your friend, “hustle”.

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“Need more links,
have no time. ”
Aka how do I
achieve scale?

@dohertyjf
None of this

@dohertyjf
Buzzstream (Paid)
Buzzstream makes your life as a linkbuilder so much
easier. When you find a prospect, buzzmark it. They’ll
find the contact details for you if they can. It will also
pull in other important metrics. And you can keep
track of the relationship as you go to verify if they
are linking or not. And it integrates with
Gmail/Google Apps.
http://www.buzzstream.com

@dohertyjf
Keep your prospects organized, assign prospects to other team members, verify the
status of links, get an email when links drop off so you can reach back out to recover
links.

@dohertyjf
Canned Responses + Buzzstream = WIN

@dohertyjf
Streak (Free Beta)
Streak is a new in-your-Gmail
CRM that you can adjust to help
you track your linkbuilding efforts
using custom states.
http://www.streak.com/
Use it for linkbuilding: http://www.maplenorth.com/2012/03/27/link-outreach-tracking-gmail/ via
@maplenorth and @pointblankseo

@dohertyjf
ToutApp (Paid)
ToutApp allows you to template emails
and email people from your own email
address and directly from the page.
You also receive statistics around open
rates.
$30/month (for serious linkbuilders,
worth it!)
http://www1.toutapp.com
Justin mentioned it here: http://justinbriggs.org/18-tools-to-speed-up-link-building

@dohertyjf
If I was going to email Rand, I’d go to a profile page that might have his email. When an
email is found, the Chrome extension lights up with a number. Click it, click the email
address you want to use, and an email window pops up.

@dohertyjf
“Can I scale
passively as well?”

@dohertyjf
Zemanta (Paid and
Free)
Zemanta is an in-blog content
recommendation that passively
helps you build links. It integrates
with Wordpress, Blogger, Tumblr,
TypePad, Posterous, Movable Type,
and Drupal.
http://www.zemanta.com/
And it’s whitehat! Rand wrote about it here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/4-valuable-
link-building-services

@dohertyjf
Buzzstream
Buzzstream will send you a report
of your backlinks weekly with
statistics about them, such as how
many have fallen off, new, etc. No
more worrying about losing good
backlinks.
http://www.buzzstream.com/

@dohertyjf
Ontolo
With Ontolo, you can mark
certain links as your most
important. If anything changes
(aka they drop off), you will
receive an alert.
Reclaim those important links!
http://ontolo.com/link-building-backlink-monitor

@dohertyjf
Problem:
“How do I
remember to follow
up?”

@dohertyjf
FollowUp CC (Free to start)
Pick when you want the email to
be returned to your inbox (9
hours, a day, a week, etc). Bcc that
amount of time and don’t worry
about forgetting to follow up.
http://www.followup.cc/
TheNextWeb loved it: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2011/07/19/in-depth-with-followup-cc-
reminders-calendar-and-task-list-in-one/

@dohertyjf
Boomerang (Free)
Boomerang will return your email
to your inbox at the chosen time
so that you can follow up.
Pro tip: Select “Only if nobody
responds”.
http://www.boomeranggmail.com/

@dohertyjf
Outreach

@dohertyjf
Tracking

@dohertyjf
Excel
If you don’t have budget, you have
to organize yourself.You can track
your progress and relationship
stage in Excel with this
spreadsheet (we use it internally
at Distilled).
http://dis.tl/progresstracking

@dohertyjf
Google Docs (Free)
Or use Google Docs to do it.
When I worked in-house, we used
a similar sheet to the one in the
post below.You can use it to track
relationship stages with multiple
people working on the project.
(Credit: @ethanlyon)
http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2011/09/01/scale-linkbuilding-with-google-docs

@dohertyjf
Linkstant
Emails you every time you get a
new link. For smaller clients that
would be able/willing to install it,
perfect solution.
http://www.linkstant.com/

@dohertyjf
OSE or Majestic
If you can report monthly, and not
on individual links, use
OpenSiteExplorer or Majestic for
your monthly numbers if you are
building at scale.
http://www.opensiteexplorer.com or http://www.majesticseo.com

@dohertyjf
Sometimes, we need to sit back and think about what we need and not rely on others
to build tools for us. Sometimes tracking IS as simple as writing down EVERY link you
get.

@dohertyjf
Tracking

@dohertyjf
John Doherty
SEO Consultant – Distilled
john.doherty@distilled.net
http://twitter.com/#!/dohertyjf
SEO Consultant at Distilled NYC.
Traveler.
Rock climber.
Company Blog: http://www.distilled.net/blog/
Personal Blog: http://www.johnfdoherty.com/

Thank You
Questions?
JOHN DOHERTY