Link building and crowd marketing

The technology that helps promote a company’s products on the internet is called crowd marketing. Promotion is carried out through links that are inserted into comments, website content, posts on news portals, and forums, in places where potential consumers can see them. Advertising links are placed by a specialist – a marketer who knows how to do it in a way that crowd links are not intrusive but presented as recommendations.

Crowd marketing services are performed as follows:

• The marketer finds thematic online portals with a high volume of the client’s target audience.
• They select relevant topics on these web resources.
• They write a post or review about the client’s product or company, adding a crowd link to the content.

At the same time, the marketer carefully monitors the quality of online platforms to avoid wasting the client’s budget.

An example of crowd advertising

Let’s consider a simple example of crowd marketing. In one of the social media platforms, a woman requests reviews about a specific moisturizing cream. The crowd marketer writes to her: “This cream is not bad, but there is a more affordable alternative. It works just as well, and right now, there’s a discount on the product. Take a look…” and provides a link to the cream.

What does the customer receive:

• The customer receives an increase in traffic through link clicks.
• The customer gets an increase in conversion rates and search engine ranking.
• The customer gains improvement in the company’s reputation and brand recognition.

This type of non-intrusive advertising is suitable for almost all entrepreneurs. However, there are exceptions. If its main goal is PR, then crowd advertising is not applicable to the following types of businesses:

1. Small offline businesses. A narrow customer base reduces the likelihood that a consumer will see the link.
2. Online stores with a high average order value. It is unlikely that a high-value purchase will be made based solely on a review read online.
3. B2B (Business-to-Business) sales field. Here, there are different rules of sales.

What are the differences between link building and crowd marketing?

Link building involves increasing the number of backlinks to a client’s website through donor web resources. Crowd marketing is just a part of the extensive functionality of link building. It also includes:

• acquiring links from third-party backlinks;
• content marketing – placing valuable content on platforms where potential customers are present to increase the company’s expertise level.

Thus, link building and crowd marketing are two distinct tools: the first increases the client’s website’s link authority, while the second focuses on PR and brand recognition.

A variety of crowd marketing.

You can order crowd marketing in the following types:

• comments and reviews with active links;
• brand mentions without clickable links;
• posts on review platforms.

Based on advertising goals, you can choose a sales-oriented or reputation-building strategy, as well as one that focuses on increasing link authority. Regardless of the chosen type of crowd marketing, a marketer studies the target audience to select web resources with the most interested potential buyers or clients.