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Ann Smarty Answers About Link Building and Featured Snippets

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Although the live event is now over, you can still come see all the great questions and comprehensive answers Ann Smarty provided about Featured Snippets, Link Building, and the effect of commenting on our sites.

Ann Smarty Shares Tips on Link Building and Featured Snippets

See the questions below and go to the Mastermind Community for her responses and images.

Join us in the BizSugar Mastermind Community this coming Wednesday, February 6, 2019 from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. EST.  Ann Smarty will be answering your questions about SEO, link building, and especially landing more than your fair share of Featured Snippets.

This is one event you won’t want to miss. I’ve been collecting questions and relevant links to ensure small businesses, bloggers, and the consultants and freelancers who work with them learn all they can.

Already a Member? Use this link to go directly to the Featured Snippet event.

How Do I Get into the BizSugar Mastermind Community?

Haven’t joined yet? Go to https://www.bizsugar.com/mastermind, enter your name and email, and then click on the confirmation email. If you have any trouble at all getting in, contact me and I’ll assist you the same day.

If you message me on Skype (username growmap), I am often available to immediately help you out. Don’t use Skype? Leave a comment here, or in the BizSugar blog, or message me at https://www.Linkedin.com/in/growmap or Facebook.

What You Need to Know About Link Building

As a writer and strategist, I would like nothing better than to totally ignore everything to do with SEO. I really would. But the problem is if you own a site, you really can’t.

Even if you never build a single link, your site could end up with an unnatural-looking link profile. That could result in triggering a Google penalty, particularly Penguin, and cost you much or all of your search traffic.

That could be particularly problematic for bloggers who regularly comment on other blogs. If your only incoming links are from blog comments, could that cost you traffic? That is one of the many questions I’ll be asking Ann.

Vazoola published a comprehensive Ultimate Link Building Guide in 2018 and will be updating it annually. It is as good a place to start as any for non-SEOs, bloggers, and small businesses. If you don’t have time to look at it now – save it as a great resource for later!

Why Featured Snippets?

Did you know that Ann Smarty, who is well-known to bloggers as the Founder of Viral Content Bee, works for Ninja Tools. They’ve developed a really cool Featured Snippet Tool. That is a screen capture of it in the featured image above.

It is a super easy way to find out what searches your site already has Featured Snippets for – if any – and also what keyword phrases are close to ranking. Improving the content related to those phrases is your first priority to get your site more traffic!

By getting your site into the Featured Snippet section of Google, studies show a 20-30% increase in traffic and a higher click-through-rate (CTR). With that one tool, you could easily focus on ranking for those without having to learn to use any other fancy paid SEO tools.

How Easy is It to Use the Featured Snippet Tool?

Can you paste your site’s URL into the tool and click a button? That’s all there is to it. The tool spits out the information. Then you just have to make some time to focus on improving your site content to get higher rankings and more traffic.

It is a powerful tool and it would take longer to figure out how to implement all the goodies available in it. But anyone can get started and figure it out. Plus, here’s your chance to ask questions.

New BizSugar Mastermind Community Manager: Gail Gardner

Did you know I’m the new Community manager for the Zoho BizSugar Mastermind Community? I volunteered because I see it as a great way to provide answers and strategies to even more small business owners, managers, and the consultants and freelancers who provide services to them.

Consider this your personal invitation from me to you to join me there. Want to know more? Read these:

We have free tools including a Billable Rate Calculator freelancers and consultants love to use. It helps you determine how much you would need to charge per hour to make a particular annual income.

Weekly events include how to set your goals using free Goal Setting Templates. In the forums, we’re currently working on a collaborative effort to create the best Key Performance Indicators (KPI) Manual possible.

So if you have expertise you’d like to share, or questions you need answer for, or just want to see what is going on, do join us.

Interesting Posts We Could Discuss:

  1. The Future of PageRank: 13 Experts on the Dwindling Value of the Link (2014 Roundup of SEO experts’ predictions on the value of links)
  2. Matt Diggity: SEO Link Pillowing: The Definitive Guide
  3. Vazoola: Ultimate Link Building Guide – It is as good a place to start as any for non-SEOs, bloggers, and small businesses.
  4. BuzzSumo’s New Topic Explorer results for Featured Snippets.

If you don’t have time to look at the links shared in this post now – save them as great resources for later!

Questions Mastermind Members Asked

Wonder what’s going on in the Live Event? Answers to all these questions can be found by members here.

  1. Skylon Limousine asks: “My Website is on first page but can’t get into the top 3 … Please guide me how be on top.”
  2. Philip Verghese ‘Ariel’ of NewsandViewsforYou asks: Is it good or risky to republish existing content with a new date?
  3. If you are a regular commenter on other bloggers’ sites, or in response to content published in your authorships on many sites, would you recommend NOT linking to your own site from those comments? Or linking from 1 and then not from others?
  4. Would being a regular commenter in blogs and linking back to your site in the name and/or CommentLuv field reduce your Majestic TrustFlow score?
  5. Pros and cons of encouraging comments versus turning them off. What about using different commenting systems? Do you believe they will help or hinder getting more Featured Snippets – or not matter at all?
  6. David Leonhardt of TheHappyGuy asks: “what’s the relation between featured snippets and schema mark-up. I’m wondering if there are useful (profitable) searches I could set up with schema to get featured snippets.”
  7. Iris Grossman, SEO Manager for Flipsnack, asks: “I have a question regarding Featured snippets vs YT Video snippets. Are video snippets more likely to rank for certain searches? Does it solely depend on the user intent or do other factors come into play? For example for the query “how to make a brochure”. Because based on similar intents I’ve seen both types of snippets, including for “how to” queries. “
  8. Julie Weishaar of NewHorizons123 asks: “How can we best take advantage of the “People Also Ask” information that Google provides?”
  9. Gail Gardner said, “In between questions, I’d love to hear more and Ninja Tools Featured Snippet Tool and what we can do with it. That is a screen capture in this forum post that I made when I ran my site in it during the beta. Maybe we should share the videos or the link to the main site or resources there?”
  10. Julie Weishaar asks: “Do you think focusing on getting Featured Snippets is more likely to generate leads than running Facebook or Google ads?”
  11. Martin Lindeskog of TeaBookSketches asks: “How could a verified fact box (as an author) impact the search engine results? I did an ego search on my name, and the title of and information about my first book came up.”
  12. Should writers who have subject matter expertise in a primary topic need to use a separate author identity if they write about anything outside that to avoid damaging what Google sees as your primary niche?
  13. Lisa Sicard of InspiretoThrive asks: “Are Featured Snippets the same as Rich Snippets or different? “
  14. Ahmad Raza​ of WiseToast asks: “Most of my posts are already on Google Snippets, what confuses me the most is why are they pulling snippets from one domain and image from another, is it a bug or they are doing it intentionally?”
  15. Ileane Smith asks: “Do you know if podcasts ever show up as results in featured snippets?”
  16. Casey Bjorkdahl, CEO of Vazoola, asks:  “How long do you think it typically takes to start appearing within featured snippets that are pretty competitive or common. What would you say is the #1 factor for it?”

Want to know the answers to these questions? Join our Free Mastermind Community here and visit that forum post here.

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Gail Gardner

Small Business Marketing Strategist at GrowMap
Gail Gardner is the founder of GrowMap.com. She is a Small Business Marketing Strategist she mentors small businesses, bloggers, and freelancers. After 23 years in the field with IBM and 5.5 years managing AdWords accounts, her focus shifted to small business marketing strategy. GrowMap.com is listed by Cision as a Top 100 Site for Marketers and has received three Small Business Influencer Awards from Small Business Trends. Named by D&B a Top 50 SMB Influencer on Twitter, you can follow Gail @GrowMap and on LinkedIn.
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Comments

  1.  Thanks alot for the interesting post concerning link building.
    You are a genius,i like to read content from someone who actually has something to say – rather than content that feels like it’s just there for the sake of being there.

    Reply

  6. hey,

    Link building is very good for the website (SEO) Because link building improves domain authority, Alexa Rank, and getting traffic from link building backlinks is the heart of the SEO.

    Thanks for sharing these tips.

    Reply

    • Hello Rohit,

      It is never easy to attract links and today it is harder than ever. Most major sites are less likely to link to blogs from other countries. In addition, Google has forced most of them to nofollow all contributor links.

      There is no shortcut. You have to publish something so amazing that others in your niche want to link to it. Then you have to make sure they see it. The best way to do that is to identify influencers active in your niche and actively interact with them.

      Follow them on social networks. Share their content and comment in it. First give to them and then – IF you have something excellent to show them -they are more likely to share it and possibly link to it. There are no guarantees.

      If you cannot create something exceptional yourself, you may have to pay someone else to do it. If you don’t have the funds for that, find someone you can benefit by sharing and commenting for them and maybe you can get them to collaborate on something exceptional.

      Other methods that can get you visibility even from a site with very low DA and few links and almost no audience are:

      • Make YouTube videos that answer popular questions on Google – sometimes they will land on page 1 in the search results
      • Write on sites like Medium, LinkedIn and Facebook. Develop audiences there. Using your profile to get people to your site will get you more shares on LinkedIn and Facebook than if you put outgoing links in your posts. This is because those sites don’t want to send people off their sites – they want to keep them on them.

        • Building a site that attracts links takes a long time and you can’t just do it on your site. The people who claim you can publish exceptional content and it will magically get found are just wrong. You have to get it out there somehow.

      Gail Gardner would love you to read ..WordPress Gutenberg Mandatory Change Dec 6 2018: Why You MUST DO THIS NOW!My Profile

      Reply

      • “The people who claim you can publish exceptional content and it will magically get found are just wrong. You have to get it out there somehow.”

        This is 100% true, specially niches that are way too complex are harder to get backlinks on its own. No matter how good your content is, close to none will link to your site because they are also competing for the same keywords that you targeting.

        Reply

        • Hi Archie,

          Yes, that is part of the problem. There are other issues. Many contact site owners with an attitude of entitlement that get their requests deleted. Others use gmail and provide no additional information so that a site owner could vet their request. (There are people impersonating others online using gmail.)

          Serious businesses should have their email on their own domain. Personally, if I can’t verify who someone is, I don’t reply to random email requests.
          Gail Gardner would love you to read ..Why You Should Join Me in the BizSugar Mastermind Community TodayMy Profile

          Reply

  16. Thanks for sharing great links building strategies it completely changes the style of my working. It makes the relevant authority.
    I like to visit your website for learning.

    Reply

  19. Hi Gail,
    Glad to be here again. 🙂
    Indeed that was a wonderful time together with Ann Smarty and you.

    The answers Ann made to the queries was excellent and to the point.

    I once again thank and appreciate you for making this event happen.

    The interaction and the guidelines you made in between the session was really worth mentioning.

    Keep up the good work.

    Meanwhile thank you so much for dropping by with a value added comment on my latest updated post. 🙂
    Keep sharing.
    Best
    ~ Phil
    Philip V Ariel would love you to read ..Philipscom Comment Authors In January 2019My Profile

    Reply

  21. Hi Gail, Thanks a lot for this blog. This post is extremely useful for all those who wish to master the art of link building. The ranking of the website, audience reach, conversion and ultimately sales, everything goes hand in hand with link building. Thus, Off-page and On-page SEO are the two main pillars of digital marketing.

    Reply

  22. Always i am Struggle with link Building, It’s actually a great and useful piece of info. I am satisfied that you shared this helpful information with us.

    Reply

  27. Ann rocks Gail. I know this call will rock too. Why? Both you and Ann know and embody this truth: link building is content building and relationship building. Create content. Build friendships by helping bloggers, and by expecting nothing. Your creations and connections lead to sweet link juice.

    Reply

  28. Hi Gail,
    Gald to be here again.
    Good to read more about BizSugar new developments as well as other activities among mastermind members.
    Again happy to know that Ann Smarty’s interaction on 6th of Feb in the said column.
    Link building is an important subject and is sure all online users should make note of the importance of link building.
    I have already posted a question there on Forum on Ann Smarty’s Tips on Getting Google Featured Snippets.
    Waiting for the D Day for the feedback.
    Keep Going.
    Thanks for sharing this information with your readers here.
    Best Regards,
    ~ Philip
    Philip V Ariel would love you to read ..The Power of Blog Comments And Other StoriesMy Profile

    Reply

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