How to go about link exchanges with popular sites?

[Rainman]

It's difficult to get links from popular websites unless you've got some great information which would be of interest to the people who visit those sites. The only problem is sites like huffingtonpost will curate your content and get all the credit. So there's no way you're going to convince the owner of a popular website to link back to you [unless they have something ($$$$) to gain]. It's easier therefore to dedicate your time to churning out ONLY informative articles that visitors to your site will find useful. If you're very good, be sure that people will start talking about you and the big boys [webmasters of the popular websites] will want to know more about you. They'll quote your articles and link back to you so that when you mention them in any of your posts in future they can get $ome traffic from you.

On the net traffic=$$$$. So if you desire to exchange links with popular websites that get a lot of traffic then you need to prove that you can send traffic their way.

[nowicki2013]

Link exchanges are a very effective way to get your name out there and get some quality traffic, as well as a better Alexa rating. What you want to do is go to the "contact us" link on whatever website you want to possibly do a link exchange with and contact the admin. Most of them will be happy to exchange links with you since it will get them more exposure as well. However, if your site isn't very popular they might not want to exchange with you because if they are linked to a not so popular site it could hurt them in the search results. Good luck and stay persistent!

[jubvman]

I don't know much about link exchange but I understand it can be a very valuable marketing tool. My problem is finding blogs / websites like mine to exchange links. Since my website is fairly new (about a month now), it's hard to find other websites that are also in this stage. If anyone has a similar site and would like to exchange links just contact me through my website (link is in my signature).

[cpefley]

That can be difficult because there isn't much of an advantage for a popular website to exchange links with a much less popular website. Have you tried Facebook ads? This might help you get your links out there for a nominal fee, and you can test it out to see if it is worth the fee.

[delusional]

Does this still work? I know from the past that getting linked was a really big deal for traffic but lately the internet is indexed so fast, everyone can find every site that wants to be found.
People also tend to type a new query faster then they would click a link on a totally unrelated website.

[wahmbrenda]

Before you go doing link trades it's important to make sure that you have your site in order. Make sure you have a link page and some good, solid content. These are things that others are going to look for if they're going to link to/with you.

[DomDom]

Before you go doing link trades it's important to make sure that you have your site in order. Make sure you have a link page and some good, solid content. These are things that others are going to look for if they're going to link to/with you.

This and popularity. The only way you are going to make it if the other owner will get some $$ in return. That means you have to build your sites popularity before and then you can start bargaining with other popular sites and the snowball will keep rolling!

[esdanand]

Link exchanges do not work any longer. What I would suggest is think of SEO as PR (public relations). If you had a PR manager, what are the 'hooks' they would deploy to get your business written about by popular newspapers/magazines - they typically use your quote in a relevant trending news item, or use a new feature you have launched on your website to be a topic of discussion - building links for SEO is no different. Use these traditional methods and you will be able to get links from websites; big and small, with relative ease (and Google likes this type of linking too).

[DomDom]

Thanks for the info! I have found that many hugely popular sites with a high page rank in your niche have discontinued link exchanges. Some asked if I wanted to buy one, but mostly for a ridiculous fee.

This is really great and useful information, I shall copy the text to my useful documents. Thank you for your information Mr. Rick!

[Andy1982]

Very interesting thread OP. I am currently at the ground stages of opening a food forum, with a drive on quality, fresh burgers and I'm converting an old caravan into a catering business. The two I would like to combine my passions of food and community and finding people to link exchange is something I will be looking into int the next couple of weeks, once i've built a bit of content. I'm keeping tuned to this for more replies or if anyone wants to link exchange with me if you're related to food in any way.