Getting links from bookmarking sites and social networks is pretty easy. Any post from any site can be submitted by any person at any time. The question is this: how valuable are these types of links? I’m not going to pretend that I’m an expert and tell you that I know. Does anybody even really know exactly how much weight Google gives to these types of links? The general consensus is that they don’t hold a lot of weight when it comes to ranking sites for specific keywords in Google. The other general consensus feels that social signals and these types of links are becoming ever-more important and are a bigger factor when it comes to Google rankings.
My personal feeling is that they can’t hurt. Links from bookmarking sites and social networks have to send some sort of positive signal to Google. They tell Google that the content is worth sharing and/or saving for later reference. Usually, this means that the content has some sort of value – which is something you would think Google somehow works into their algorithm. Google wants their search results to display the best and most relevant content. They want searchers to find what they are looking for on the first page. This means that Google wants the best information from the best sites displayed in the top 10 for the respective keywords. If content built around a certain keyword is bookmarked and shared a lot, this could be a signal to Google that this particular content is valuable and should get a boost in the search results.
Getting Links from Bookmarking Sites and Social Networks
Links from bookmarking sites and social networks are simply just submissions. For example, if you submit a link to a post from your Facebook or Twitter account – that is a link to that post that counts for something. As far as search rankings go, a link like this doesn’t matter nearly as much as a DoFollow link from a high PR site would. But nevertheless, it still counts for something. So how do you get a whole bunch of links like this?
Stating the obvious, you can manually submit links to your posts to all of your personal accounts. I do this only for a few of the major social networks, like Twitter, Google+, Pinterest and Facebook. But I don’t always post to my personal accounts for some of the content on my niche sites. Some of my niche sites are built around topics that wouldn’t make sense for me to share with people that I actually know. So I rely on other options to get these types of links.
Again, stating the obvious, you can strategically place social sharing icons or buttons on your website and simply hope that others will share it or bookmark it. If your content is riveting or just plain awesome, there is always a chance that it could go viral. But this method is just based on chance and circumstance. I would rather get links in a more “on purpose” sort of fashion. Of course, the natural links and shares are awesome – but let’s face it – some content for certain niche sites isn’t exactly share-able. For example, I could build a site around a keyword that I know gets a lot of searches – something that answers a question that a lot of people have. But, the content produced to answer that question might not be something that they would want to share with their friends or family. Plus, most sites don’t include sharing buttons for the countless different bookmarking sites (like StumbleUpon, Reditt, Delicious, Digg). So, how do I get social shares or links on bookmarking sites for content that doesn’t get it naturally?
Using SocialADR for Easy and Automatic Submissions and Links
I use a piece of software called SocialADR to get these types of links. They have both FREE and paid accounts available. I’ve been using the service for about a year now, and I stuck with the free account for the longest time. I only recently upgraded to a paid account which simply allows me to get more links and spend less time doing so. The way SocialADR is set up, having users with free accounts is actually an essential part of their business plan. You’ll see what I mean after I explain how it works. In an effort to do just that, I will tell you how I signed up and how I use it in a bulleted list format:
- go over to SocialADR and sign up and setup my account
- within SocialADR – set up all of my social networking and social bookmarking accounts
- FREE accounts – this has to be done manually and takes about 2 hours
- PAID accounts – this is done for you automatically and takes about 5 minutes
- FREE accounts – earn credits by sharing other peoples content (easily found in the Sharing Que)
- one click to automatically share random content and earn credits
- or manually choose specific content to share and earn credits
- PAID accounts – credits are automatically deposited into account monthly and/or on a one-time purchase basis
- add my own bookmarks that I would like others to share (as shown in the video below)
SocialADR – FREE vs PAID (or “Lazy”) Account
Like I stated, I used a FREE account for the longest time. Here is how that basically works. You earn credits by sharing other peoples content. So if I pick an article out of the Sharing Que to share, SocialADR automatically submits it to all of the social bookmarking sites that I have setup within the program. I then receive credits for each successful submission. So, depending on the number of bookmarking sites that I have setup, it would not be uncommon for me to easily gain 20 or more credits per day with just a few clicks. Even more credits can be earned if you manually share submissions to your Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and LinkedIn accounts. So, the FREE account takes a little bit of time to maintain and earn credits. I found that I could usually maximize the amount of credits I could earn in a day within a 5 to 10 minute period.
As I touched on earlier, these FREE accounts are essential to the success of SocialADR. They give the social shares and bookmarking submissions a much more natural look, especially when people are using their real social accounts.
After nearly a year of using the free account, I finally upgraded to a PAID account. My reasons for upgrading included:
- I was finally earning enough passive income online that I could justify paying for tools like this
- I could gain many more credits each month with much less effort
- I could stop wasting my precious time doing manual shares when I could buy back that time and use it to do things within my business that will create more profit for me in the future.
Now, the only thing I have to do within my SocialADR account is manually add bookmarks that I would like to be shared on other peoples accounts. As shown in my video above, it takes me approximately 3 minutes to add a URL into my SocialADR account. I simply do that, and then set how many times I want it to be shared and how often. That’s it!
My Results from Using SocialADR
It’s hard to state definitively, personal results from my year long experiment using SocialADR. Not all of these types of links are exactly indexed by Google the same way that text links from other sites are. But I’ve definitely noticed at least some of them showing up in the backlink profiles for the sites that I actually monitor that stuff. So, if I don’t have definitive results, why do I continue to use it? And why have I even upgraded to a PAID account? Because I believe that the service offered by SocialADR does offer a great deal of value. Some might see it as a spammy way to get backlinks, but I don’t see it that way. Sure, it’s not natural – but it’s virtually undetectable by Google. It is, in my opinion, the least spammy way to get easy and automatic backlinks. Even if the links obtained aren’t exactly the best types of links, they seem to be working for the types of sites I am using this for – the smaller niche sites that I am building. And even if these types of links don’t exactly carry a whole lot of link juice, they do drive a little bit of traffic to the posts that I submit. This proves to be very helpful for posts on brand new sites that haven’t been discovered yet. I personally haven’t used it as much for blog posts, but SocialADR can be used in the very same way to effectively get links and traffic to newer or older blog posts.
Try SocialADR Today
Why not try SocialADR for yourself today? You’ve really got nothing to lose (except a little bit of time) if you want to try the FREE version. Doing so will really help you grasp the concept of exactly how it works. Or, if you’re like me and time is of the essence, try a PAID account. You will be setup in no time at all and you can start submitting your posts (like I show in the video above) today! You can easily cancel your account if you’re not seeing the results you expect.
Remember that there are several dumb ways to create passive income online, but only one site that is blogging about it! Dumb Passive Income… dot com.
-Matt
All of the links in this post that lead to SocialADR are affiliate links, meaning I will receive a small commission only when you sign up for a PAID account. I appreciate if you sign up via one of my links and Thank You in advance if you do so. Feel free to ask me any questions in the comments section below and I’ll do my best to answer them.
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