(3)
When your business plan calls for a strict e-commerce site, you may be in a rut when it comes to building links. One WebmasterWorld forum member says that his service is superior to his competitors at half the price -- but yet doesn't have the links to validate that claim.
So what can he do? Well, he could ask his customers to give him a link back (if they are webmasters). This is echoed by another store owner who says that his store gets links because people are buying the product and are writing good things about the company. You can incentivize this also -- if someone writes something and links back to you proving something has been written, offer them a discount.
Another strategy would be to have some creativity. Think about Will it Blend? and how BlendTec was able to capture the blender search share. Here's a good quote related to this:
Basically you're looking for ways to make an "unremarkable" e-commerce store "remarkable". People love pretty charts, videos, and LOLCats.
Or, as other forum members suggest, they can just buy links. But even sites with trust are getting caught by Google nowadays, I think. I'm going to say again that yes, I speak from experience.
Forum discussion continues at WebmasterWorld.
This post was written earlier and scheduled for publication on September 30, 2008.
