What about a contest that asks contestants to link to your site - good idea?

[cmeinck]

I noticed this over at iLounge. They have new eBook and ask people to link to the eBook. The person who sends the most traffic wins the contest. This seems like a win-win for the webmaster. You get traffic and backlinks. It is possible, that people would remove links once the contest is over -- that would concern me. There is also the "gaining too many links too quickly" concerns.

If you have a good prize, I'd venture to bet that you'd recieve a lot of links and quickly. And how many people would go back and actually edit their blogs?

Thoughts?

[Janet]

I noticed this over at iLounge. They have new eBook and ask people to link to the eBook.

I think people may remove the links after the contest, but who knows. I guess if you mananged to keep half of them, that would still be good.

[cmeinck]

I figured for people who didn't have blogs, you could reference Blogger, etc.

I'm sure that some of the links would be removed. If you incentivize traffic, then some folks would paste links all over their site. Perhaps a better way would be to say, "blog about (insert site name)" and "complete the form on the (insert site name) with your name, info and where the link appears."

You can track the backlink -- have the contest last 6 weeks or so. Hope that you keep the links after the contest is over. Then randomly choose a winner.

It's tough, because I have one big purchase I'm going to make for this contest and deciding on the links idea vs. forum registration.

-Chris

[xboxundone]

dont do forum registration... as people will register only for prize atleast with links you get something out of it.

[cmeinck]

What if I asked people to:

Blog about the site and link
Register in our forums and post the link in the "contest" thread


If I selected the winner based on traffic, then I'm sure to lose links afterward. This way, people blog about my site, post the link in my site and their done. At the end of 6 weeks, I do the random drawing based upon those who posted in that particular thread (and whose links are still up and running). Helps spread the word about my site, gets people registered (and hopefully active) and a few backlinks to boot. Any chance Google would frown on this or see too many links too quickly?

[wissam]

Good but old Idea, anime graphics websites is doing this, 1000's of members join them and all they give them is an award made using photoshop .

What if I asked people to:

1. Blog about the site and link
2. Register in our forums and post the link in the "contest" thread

That was a long way to join the contest, try something like putting a form the have to fill :

Copy&past code << the contest link

Name
Email
URL
Url where contest code is

and the rest of the info that you need for the contest ....

good luck

[cmeinck]

Good but old Idea, anime graphics websites is doing this, 1000's of members join them and all they give them is an award made using photoshop .


Have the promotions been successful? Links remain and you get a nice backlink boost? Any downside to this type of promotion that you've heard.

-Chris

[Klaas Koopman]

This is done alot at SEO Contests. They pick a subject/ word and require every page to link to the SEO contest! I am sure it will give you alot of traffic and perhaps some staying links aswell!

[usedmac]

I have decided to give this a try. My budget is low right now but will at least give it a shot.

Have a look and let me know what you think.

How does $10 sound? (http://www.onemillionsubscribers.com/2006/07/11/how-does-10-sound/)

[herbalclicks]

I was thinking about doing this on myspace, taking each hit that comes in a making it one entry toward a sweepstakes of a free ipod. Whats the best way to count the traffic? I guess I would have to develop a script to take each hit and make it an entry and then randomly pick a winner?

[dabontv]

I was actually thinking about doing this for my arcade site in a few months once I have more cash and will have a better hosting plan. If you just want to build a lot of traffic this would probably work, but it probably wouldn't help much for backlinks.

[cmeinck]

Thanks for everyones suggestions. I ended up going with a submission form and asked folks to blog about my site, then fill out an entry form with the link. I figure this will help get the word out about my site. I wanted to increase my forum members, but it doesn't make sense to add what might be a large group of inactive members.

The phone retails for $450, so it should garner some buzz.

-Chris

[cmeinck]

I'm rethinking my idea (or someone's idea that I was reinventing). I expected a "quick buzz" and at least 10-15 entries. I had a total of 3 this morning. Two had either no URL or no link. The other was a freshly created Blogger with one sentence and the link. I've pulled down the contest and will rethink my strategy. I think a straight "member registration", random drawing will suffice and add a newsletter subscription option to my forum registration.

-Chris

[cmeinck]

I changed my mind yet again. Getting back to the "KISS" theory (keep it simple stupid), I went to eNewsletter subscription with a random drawing. The welcome email provides a link to the forums and encourages them to join.

Good luck to all who go with the link development concept. In theory, it sounds real good. It might be best to do it with a lower cost item. Lower risk.