A great and innovative way of gaining some backlinks is to write a testimonial for a website. Think about all the products and services you have purchased over the past year. Had the air conditioning fixed? Why not offer to write a testimonial for the company that installed the air con. “My employees have never been happier now that we can escape from the hot air outside”, of course you take the opportunity to include a link back to your own website.
The first step is to locate your target, write them an e-mail explaining how happy you were with their product or service and how you would be honoured to write a nice testimonial for their website. Don’t mention anything about backlinks, you don’t want them to think that there is a catch involved. I have found that whenever I have e-mailed a company saying how happy I was with their service that they almost always respond. They love receiving messages from happy customers.
Once the lines of communication have been opened and they have agreed on the testimonial idea… Go to town on it. Make it good, don’t hold back on how great they are! Once the testimonial has been done just add your name and website URL to the bottom of the testimonial. They’ll think nothing of it. After all you did just take the time to write them an awesome testimonial; I know if this happened to me I’d have no problems linking back.
An alternative is to write a testimonial on your own site and then tip the company off that there is an awesome review that they might be interested in. Chances are they might link to it via their own site, at the very least you might get a Twitter mention. I know for a fact that the corporations I have worked for love to retweet content that puts them in a good light. @ mention them on Twitter with a link to your review or send them an e-mail. The best targets are companies that are active on Twitter, have a blog, or some kind of testimonial page.
Remember to always strive for those hard to get backlinks. Forget blog comments, directories and the easy stuff. If you have any ideas you would like to share with me (hey, you never know) I’m always open for a chat on my twitter @seoguelph. If you like my stuff and want to write a testimonial, well hey… I’m open for that too. Free backlink opportunity right here folks. 🙂