Get Noticed With Google Alerts!
A-List Calling Card
The Hook:
So you are an unknown blogger with great writing skills and a knack for creating great content. You would love to write a guest blog for ProBlogger, Shoe Money, John Chow or Dosh Dosh. You may have an awesome Gadget review that you would like featured on Engaget or Gizmodo. Maybe your new startup would get some traction if it were featured on TechCrunch. You have a funny cat picture that would be perfect for ICanHasCheezburger.
No matter the niche odds are there is an A-List blogger that you would love to speak with but they never seem to return your emails. I also have a similar experience, I tried contacting John Chow with no response. Yet we seem surprised that they did not respond to our email when they were probably overwhelmed with a thousand similar emails.
The Idea:
So how do you stand out? How do you get noticed? Read on and I will suggest one novel way that may be worth trying.
I have heard from many of the blogs I frequent the value of setting up Google Alerts. With Google Alerts you can monitor a key word or phrase (ex: 'Life Hacker', 'Boing Boing', 'Mashable', 'Seth Godin', 'Jeremy Schoemaker'). This got me thinking, with all the buzz about the power of Google Alerts why cant I leave a calling card through Google Alerts? Well, I think I can...
So can a novel approach catch the eye of an A-List blogger and win me a linkback from their blog?
If you are an A-Lister and you are reading this post then it must have worked.
The How-To:
So how can we use Google Alerts to leave a Calling Card? First lets look at what google says about their alerts:
Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic.
Some handy uses of Google Alerts include:
- monitoring a developing news story
- keeping current on a competitor or industry
- getting the latest on a celebrity or event
- keeping tabs on your favorite sports teams
So Google Alerts is a way to tell Google that you want to be notified if and when someone on the web mentions your specified text. I am willing to bet that many if not most of the A-List bloggers have alerts set up on their blog name or on their real name. So all we need to do is mention their name in a post and leave a linkbait title to catch their eye. Lets see if it works...
The Catch:
There is of course one catch, if the A-Lister you are targeting is inundated with alerts you will need a very catchy title to grab their attention.
A-List Bloggers:
Source: 45n5
Special Thanks:
I would like to give a special thanks to Jeff Quipp of SearchEnginePeople for inspiration for this post. After speaking with Jeff through StumbleUpon he mentioned one way to get links is to create unique content.