YNOT EUROPE – Link lists, link exchanges and banner farms once represented among the most useful means to increase traffic to adult websites. With the advent of paid search and affiliate programs, those promotional methods are nowhere near as important as they used to be, but that doesn’t mean webmasters should ignore the value of a good link wherever he or she can find it. After all, most search engines still factor incoming links when figuring a website’s search ranking.

Links are particularly beneficial when they appear on blogs and in social media communications. But how does a webmaster with gazillions of other tasks on his or her mind go about getting linked? The most direct approach generally works best: Ask.

When asking for links to your website, be courteous and remember to couch your request in terms of the link’s benefit for the other party, not its benefit to you. No one is going to link to you simply because you have a nice site or you’re new in the business or because you’d like to benefit from their traffic. Instead, do a bit of research up-front to determine the kind of market your link target’s website serves, and then figure out how what you have could intrigue or provide value to that market. Don’t demand, don’t threaten, and don’t spam. As in everything else you do in the marketing sphere, tailor your approach to as narrow a segment as possible in order to obtain the best return on your investment.

There are three basic personas in which one can approach a link target: insider, consultant and fan. Benefits and drawbacks attach to each.

Consultant
A certain professional weight follows “hired guns” in any field. SEO and public relations professionals, for example, are expected to know at least a modest amount about the larger industry and the state of business in general. Conversely, that means if you really are new to the industry, this isn’t the approach you want to take. Offend the target webmaster and you’ve not only lost a potential link, but you may have blackened your reputation with others in the target’s circle of contacts. Gossip travels quickly and ruthlessly in almost any industry.

However, if you can play this role well, you may have some success in convincing potential linkers that “your client” is worth a mention or a link trade. Show your target how linking to your website could benefit them in tangible ways, and you may start a relationship that could lead to other benefits down the road.

Insider
Other positives and negatives attach to being the owner or employee of a website seeking links. As an insider, you’ll be expected to know details about your operation and be able to make deals, sometimes on the spot. Of all the roles to play when trying to form new alliances, this one exudes the most sincerity and “earthiness.”

If you’re going to approach other sites as an insider, make sure your email address resides at the domain you’re representing.

Just as the rewards can be more significant for an insider, so can the risks. One of the biggest is that if you offend the targeted webmasters, they’ll know exactly who to blame. They’re liable to hold any flubs against your entire operation for a very long time, which means you’ll be wasting your effort if you try to approach again later with a better pitch. While link targets often will forgive a company for the actions of an outside representative or consultant, they’re not likely to forgive or forget acts perpetrated by the company’s staff.

Fan
This is the least ingenuous approach, unless you recruit actual fans to accomplish requests on your behalf. Anyone who has been around the industry for any length of time has seen this approach in action — used both legitimately and in dishonest ways — when it comes to public voting for awards. Website A places a banner or a “vote for me” text link or a plea in a prominent place on its pages, and users click through to vote at Website B, which is giving the award. Website B receives tons of traffic, some of which might even convert in a meaningful way.

To put this approach to work in a non-contest environment, consider asking fans to pass along your links in messages to friends, bloggers they follow and social media contacts. An earnest fan who approaches a blogger with a testimonial about a website, for example, stands an honest chance of catching the blogger’s attention long enough to mention a link in a post. Blog posts are forever, even after they leave the homepage, so the link will endure.

Be forewarned, however: Nobody with linking power wants to face a horde of minions. Use this approach sparingly, and only with fans you trust. If you masquerade as your own fan, prepare to be unmasked in a possibly embarrassing way. Never encourage fans to spam, especially on message boards and blog comments, or you risk the message they spread being exactly the opposite of the one you intended.