Letter Writing Guide: Fill & Download for Free

Background (based on 25+ years on graduate studies/admissions committee at three universities, and deep engagement with academic systems worldwide):Every committee is different - some allow for a good bit of subjective call, others go by straight quantitative criteria (in reality, quantitative criteria form a baseline- not meeting a key criteria of minimum required courses in the subject, minimum GRE and minimum GPA or class standing will result in rejection, and for those who remain, subjective criteria may be appliedCommittee composition may play a role; in a reasonable number of cases, professors from the respective part of the world (primarily because they may know the quality of the institution, can interpret communications skills better, etc.) would make a recommendation or a decision based on subjective criteriaWhen I see a decent application from an unknown university (i.e., not from IITs/BITS/IIITs/good RECs), I have to look a little deeper. And I ask a question, what do you have that others do not. It is not possible to compare GPAs across different institutions but I may take notice if you in the top 10% in a mediocre institution (and usually decline if you are bottom 50 to 75% depending on various factors). If you have done good, competitive internships and the outcome of your internship project is exciting (e.g., you did something meaningful software development utilizing a state of the art technology), and a reference letter from your mentor shows excitement about your work, you would deserve my interest. As Arjit says, demonstrated hackathon experience, winning a coding competition, or a GitHub account with a decent submission, can indeed impress. I seldom find an Indian applicant with a noteworthy conference or journal publication (be sure to put a copy on your homepage; I would like to quickly scan - journals and conferences that accept every submission do not count), but if that is the case, I will be impressed and might even set it aside for funding (usually I find such cases only from a few countries such as China and Iran - their resumes are on average much stronger). I also look for good programming skills (students who cannot program well have to take prerequisite courses and often do poorly compared to those who have a good data structure and programming knowledge -- here good job experience can be a basis for you to demonstrate you know decent programming.And yes, I do read the SOP, just to check if there is something special or if I have missed out on anything. I try to assess if it was written entirely by the candidate himself (having looked at so many of those, it is easy to find out if it was not written by the applicant). If I think it is, then it will give me important cue about communication skills (even if CS is a technical field, communication skill is very important both for graduate studies and for future career success; and good MS students do a thesis, for which they need good English language skills). I basically look for two things: has the candidate customized the SOP to our department or is it a generic SOP (in which case, I am not interested). To write a well thought out SOP, you have to study the Web site of the department, from there on you have to get a sense of which areas of CS this department is good at (this requires looking at the web pages of its labs/centers that may be well funded with lots of funded Ph.D. and MS students as well as the home pages of either highly successful or relevant professors, and more importantly find a match between your interest, background, and future plans with what unique things the department has to offer (special courses, labs, faculty, alumni success). Such background reading and putting it in the context of your desire to join the department will take a lot of time- but if you are not willing to spend that time, why should I (department) be willing to choose you over others you can express better why they want to join us? Something interesting about why you want to pursue your graduate studies at our department would serve you well. Routine reference letters (often drafted by applicant himself or herself) from a lecturer do not get looked at, but if you won a programming contest, a reference letter from your mentor might make an impact. There must be something unique about a reference letter, written by the person signing the letter, for that letter to be taken seriously (talking about which class you took, what grade you got, that you were an obedient student, etc. are utterly useless and waste of time).I generally advise against using agents and consultants who advise you on where to apply and help you write your application including SOP. Most of them do not look after your interest-- they get paid by both by you and the universities they refer (some give them give the commission to send students to them!). SOP written by them would do you more disservice than help.For most students who believe they are hard working (have solid work ethics), have good preparations (e.g., in programming), and have investigated which areas of CS they want to learn more about, instead of simply going by university or department ranks, it may be better to look for hidden gems: departments with research strengths in the CS areas that interest you (this is usually demonstrated by research funding- and even if you may not get funded to start with, you can learn more when there are good research groups in the areas of your interest) or special educational emphasis (e.g., our department has Cybersecurity program and "Big and Smart Data Science" certification-- the latter is, for example, good for preparing for a career in the hot data science or big data areas). If you believe you are very good but are afraid you cannot get into a top university, read [1].While I am at it, let me also write a bit about financial assistantships.Usually financial aid decision is made in a separate round (to maximize your chances, make sure your application is complete in all respects by early to mid February):some universities (including most private universities) count on tuition from international students, so do not expect any funding from them (e.g., USC);among those who do fund GTAs (large state universities have more GTA positions because grad students participate in teaching labs and grading undergraduate classes), local/US students get priority as usually they also have good communications skills (plus in most cases, undergrad education in CS is a lot more solid even at mid-tier US universities than most highly regarded south Asian universities (for more about it, see pointers at [2]),few places have departmental GRAs for top international students (this is usually cyclical-- e.g., our Engg college got $1million special fund, so for Fall 2015, 8 MS applicants got GRAs (they are required to find a faculty advisor who will guide them to do an MS thesis), andif you are very good and smart about starting to work with well-funded research labs, you may get professor funded GRA (usually this is available after first two semesters when you would complete the majority of the course work- while you are focusing on coursework, you may not have time to do research, hence no GRA, but you may still take a course with the professor you want to work with and start working in his/her research group- this will improve your chances of getting funding; again see [2]).For more on how I select my students: What do professors actually care about in selecting research students?[1] How do I get over the idea that only top graduate schools are worth attending? I'm an undergraduate in a STEM major at a respectable university. I’d like to pursue graduate school, but it’s not likely that I will be accepted to a top school.[2] Prospective tab at http://aiisc.ai/amit/students/

Consider starting with the traditional CS learning exercise. Typically this begins with a basic address book, and builds out to something more complex like a grade tracker for a teacher. The beauty of this is that it builds on itself, and does so in a way that you can gradually expand your knowledge and capability.Exercise 1 - Scalar Variables - Create a script with the following contentsa = 2 b = 3 c = a + b  if c == 5:  print "C is 5" Exercise - Modify your program to print a different message when c is greater than 5 and a third message if c < 5. Run your program modifying the operator to use -, /, *, %, //, and **.4. Built-in TypesExercise 2 - Lists4. Built-in Types - ListsStart with the following code.colors = ['red','orange','yellow','green','blue','purple'] Print the number of colors in the list.Sort the listUse a list comprehension to create a new list with the values of the length of each color name.Use a for loop to print each color name on a new lineUse a nested for loop to print each letter of each color name on a new line, separating the words with a blank line.Exercise 3 - Dict4. Built-in Types - DictsUsing the initial list above, create a dictionary that contains the color name as the key and the length as the value.Iterate through the dictionary and remove all color entries with a length < 5Iterate over the initial list of colors, printing true or false if the color is found in the dictionary.Exercise 4 - Strings4. Built-in Types - Stringstext = "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy log." Print the number of characters are in the stringPrint the position of “jumped” within the stringPrint the position of “box” within the stringCreate a list of the words in the stringCreate a new string with the words separated by the | character using the list of wordsUse a for loop to count the number of “e” characters in the string.Exercise 5 - Basic I/OBuild a small program which asks you a question on the console, listens for your answer, and compares it to the correct answer.This will help you get through the first bit of how to construct a basic python program, how to do basic I/O, and how to interact with your code.Exercise 6 - Read the questions from a text file where the questions are stored one per line. Prompt the user for a name. Store the responses to the questions in a text file, with the user name at the beginning of the line followed by a tab, followed by the answer.Learning how to read and write files is fundamental to programming.Exercise 7 - Create a second program that will allow you to search for the answers from a specific user. Use a list to store the previous answers for searchThis adds a bit more complexity to the first two exercises requiring you to be able to sort through data and find the data you are looking for.Exercise 8 - Modify the code from the last exercise, to use a dictionary of lists to store the answers from each user.Using dictionaries to store/access keyed data. Containers of containers, complex data structures.Exercise 9 - Create a program to generate a sample file matching the answer output, that allows you to create a set of data with an arbitrary number users answers using the range operator. The number of answers should be a command line argument. Generate an answer file with 100,000 answers.This exercise will help you to understand the process of building mock data for testing. It should introduce you to the range operator and command line arguments.Exercise 9b - Compare the time required to search using programs from Exercise 3 and 4, using your data file from 5, try different answer file sizes 10,000 10,000,000.Increased understanding of container types and uses.Exercise 10 - Create a class, Question. Read the original Question file, and create a Question object for each Question. Place the Questions in a list and store the list using a Pickle.Begin using Classes to represent coding constructs. Introduction to storing data in a binary format using pickle.12.1. pickle - Python object serialization - Python 3.6.1rc1 documentationExercise 11 - Repeat Exercise 6, but this time use the pickled Question file. Create an Answer object to encapsulate the Answer data. The code to prompt the user for an answer should become a method on Question, and should return an answer object. The Answer objects should be placed in a dict by user and stored as a pickle.Reading in binary data, using methods, returning objects.Exercise 12 - Modify the code to read the previous answer file, append new answers provided, and store the file.Reading, Modifying and storing data.Exercise 13 - Create a Person object, include Id, First, Last Name, Birthdate. Create a Student object that inherits from Person object and adds fields for Id, Person Id and Major. Using what you learned above write a program that will allow you to create a Student object with all data populated. (Do not worry about storing yet).Introduction to inheritance. Constructing objects.Exercise 13b - Implement the comparison operator (==/_eq_) to compare two Person objects. Overload that method in Student to compare two Students. The overloaded method should call the parent method then implement additional logic.10.3. operator - Standard operators as functions - Python 3.4.5 documentationOverloading methods, implementing operators on objects.Exercise 13c - Implement the _repr_ method to provide a JSON string of the Person and Student objects. Implement the _str_ method to provide a pretty print version of the objects.Overloading methods, implementing operators on objects.Exercise 13d - Create a class method that returns a Student object given a JSON string version of the object.Class methods, Factory methodsExercise 13e - Create a property “name” that is the concatenation of first and last names. Create a setter that splits a “full name” into first and last name.Decorators, Properties and property settersExercise 13f - Implement __lt__ and use the total_ordering class decorator to enable sorting of Student objects. Read the student objects, Sort and store them in the new sorted order.10.2. functools - Higher-order functions and operations on callable objects - Python 3.6.1rc1 documentationClass Decorators, sorting.Exercise 14 - Use SQL lite to create a Person and Student tables mimicking your objects from Exercise 9. Modify Exercise 9 to create and store records.Introduction to SQL databases.Exercise 15 - Create a Course object containing Course Id, Name and Description. Create a StudentCourse object containing Student Id, Course Id, and Grade. Create corresponding tables in SQL lite. Modify your program to allow creation and storage of course objects.Building on SQL experience, and more complex objects.Exercise 16 - Add a list of Courses to your Student class. Modify your program to allow adding a Course to a Student. Read Course list from the database. Store the courses added to the Student as StudentCoursesRelationships, increasing complexity.Exercise 17 - Modify your program to allow updating the grade for any Student in any Course. Search using Select for Students in your database. Select from the sources for that Student to find the course you want to update the grade for, store the upgraded grade.Searching the database, updating records in the database.Exercise 18 - Add functionality to produce a report of all grades for all students in a selected course.Reporting from a SQL source.Exercise 19a - Install Django.To this point your code has all been console driven. This is an antiquated way of accessing an application. We don’t want to learn to much at one time, but now it is time to move to the web. Depending on your other experience this can be a very daunting task, or a few minutes work. However, it is important for developers to have an understanding of how the underlying systems the work on work together.Quick install guideExercise 19b - Create a Django project.Writing your first Django app, part 1At the end of this you should be able to start the development server and make a simple request.Exercise 19c - Setup uWSGIHow to use Django with uWSGIUsing uWSGI is critical to any production Django setup.Exercise 19d - Connect uWSGI to nginxNGINX as an Application Gateway with uWSGI and DjangoNginx exposes uWSGI Django to the web.At the end of this you should have a production setup of Django, on which to continue your Python learning experience.Exercise 20 - Connect a database to Django.Writing your first Django app, part 2At this point you could skip this step and continue using SQL lite, but really should start using a real SQL database server.Exercise 21 - Either continue with the Django online tutorials, or repeat Exercises 5–18 using the Django MVC framework.This is really many steps, but it is basically transitioning to the Web HTTP IO model that is the foundation for all web applications. This time instead of just making objects, you will make models to represent your entities, controllers to route requests and prepare models for display, and views to display them and allow user interaction.Exercise 22 - Modify some portion, or portions of your Django app to use an AJAX request instead of a full page reload.The modern web is moving towards Single Page Applications (SPA). While Python cannot be used to implement the SPA part of the application, nearly every SPA application has a server side component for persisting data. Python and the Django frame work are quite capable of providing this server side complement to a SPA. Further many traditional apps can be given an enhanced UI using SPA/AJAX techniques to make the application more responsive to user interaction.Exercise 23 - Write a procedural function to return the n-th element of the Fibonacci sequenceThe Fibonacci sequence is the sequence where the next number is the sum of the previous two numbers, beginning with 0 and 1.[0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, …] Exercise 24 - Write a recursive function to return the n-th element of the Fibonacci sequenceThe Fibonacci sequence can also be defined as the sequence of numbers where f(n) = f(n-1) + f(n-2), where f(0) = 0 and f(1) = 1.Exercise 25 - Write a generator to iterate over the Fibonacci sequenceLearn to use a generator.Exercise 26 - Write a function that returns a function f(n) = x^n, where n is defined by the caller.Introduction to the true nature of python functions.I.E. Such that the following would workdef f(...):  .... square = f(2) cube = f(3) area_of_30cm_square = square(30) volume_of_30cm_box = cube(30) Exercise 27 - Write a function that Curries another function.Currying in PythonI.E. Such that the following wouldExercise 28 - Write a function that takes a function as an argument and executes that functionImplementing call back functions.Exercise 29 - Write a coroutine that returns the largest value it has been sent.Python Tips 0.1 documentation - coroutinesEffective Python › Item 40: Consider Coroutines to Run Many Functions ConcurrentlyIntroduction to coroutines.Exercise 30 - Write a program that determines if a word is contained in the works of Shakespeare. Given a word check each document in the works and report which documents contain the word.This will teach directory traversal, more involved file io, and lays the groundwork for additional Exercises.Download the complete works of Shakespeare from this page in gzipped format:The Collected Works of Shakespearehttp://www.cs.usyd.edu.au/~matty/Shakespeare/shakespeare.tar.gzExercise 31 - Modify Exercise 24a to use a Thread and two queues, to process the documents for a given word.17.1. threading - Thread-based parallelism - Python 3.6.1rc1 documentation17.7. queue - A synchronized queue class - Python 3.6.1rc1 documentationExercise 32 - Modify Exercise 24b to use a thread pool. Create 10 threads each listening as before. Make sure to send 10 Nones to the Queue, and use Queue.join() to wait for completion. Also, join all 10 threads when done.Welcome to multithreading.Exercise 33 - Remove the sending None, and replace it with a Mutex/Event object. All threads should exit when the queue is empty and event is_set.Using EventExercise 34 - Modify your program to use Processes instead of threads.17.2. multiprocessing - Process-based parallelism - Python 3.6.1rc1 documentationOvercoming the GIL. Compare the time required for this version and the previous 2 versions.Exercise 35 - Write a program that takes a URL as an argument, uses the request library to request a web page and stores the contents of the page in a file.Web requestsExercise 36 - Write a program that makes a search request to the Wikipedia API and returns a list of pages matching a given search string.API:Search - MediaWikiWikipedia Endpoint: https://www.mediawiki.org/api/rest_v1/?specUsing Rest APIsExercise 37 - Build a web page that has a form to submit a URL, and uses an AJAX request to your Django application to retrieve a shortened URL from the Google URL shortener API, and displays the shortened URL on the page.Get Started | URL ShortenerUsing OAuth, Submitting and retreiving data using REST apis, Writing AJAX request handlers in djangoSummaryPerhaps you know some or all of this, you didn’t really indicate your experience level. If this is not helpful to you, perhaps it will be helpful to someone else who finds it and is looking to grow their Python knowledge.

Question: Which would you rather have -- more organic traffic or better rankings?It’s a trick question for most of us -- we’d actually rather have both. That’s because we know that both search engine metrics can make a huge difference in our businesses.As you probably already know, Google tends to rank pages higher in search results based on the authority of that page. In modern SEO, links build up the page’s authority and improve its SEO value. In the same arena, duplicate content gets penalized.The right key word search term can mean the difference in traffic and rankings.Recent data estimates that the link popularity of a specific page accounts for 22.33% of the components of Google’s ranking algorithm.What if you could access the most updated resources that would help you build the right links? You'd feel like the ultimate demon of search engine power, right? What difference would that make in your investment, considering that about 37% of business owners spend between $10,000 and $50,000 per month on link building?There is actually a submission SEO tool called Ultimate Demon to help build links to increase traffic. Do make sure you understand how a tool works because they often are a baseline that you need to tweak to get the results you really want: juice from search engines.Over the years, I’ve come to understand that a link building campaign with useful content and quality anchor text phrases is easier than most people think.If you can develop and document your strategy, you’ll ultimately generate more authority links for your pages. Both content marketing and link building are like those interconnected steel rings magicians use -- the ones that can’t be separated.In this in-depth post, I’ll show you 9 link building software resources that you can tap into any time that you want to.These resources provide scalable link-earning techniques, tips and best practices that are proven to work. When you implement them, your search engine rankings and site traffic will both improve.1. Broken Link Building Bible (source)All links are created equal, right? Actually, no.Link building used to be easy. You could set up a few PBN (private blog network) sites and get a bunch of links that’d push your organic rankings to the top. But does it still work?The honest guys says you shouldn’t do it. Ditch the idea of a PBN. Sooner or later, Google will catch up with you and push your rankings to page 107 or de-index your pages altogether regardless of how popular your search term is.Instead, to get links that’ll actually improve your search listings, increase your search term traffic and get you a higher click-through rate (CTR), you need to study the Broken Link Building Bible.Broken link building is a white-hat and scalable tactic for getting the right kind of links.At its core, it’s a content-focused strategy for any link building campaign. You simply find dead (or broken) links, analyze the page for relevance and create more valuable content to replace the broken content. This helps site owners, editors and webmasters improve their site user experience by replacing broken links with a link to your page based on a search term.With the right approach, you can create an link building campaign and automate broken link building, which will continually build momentum for your site with this simple link building software.As you go through the Broken Link Building Bible, you’ll discover why broken link building is perhaps the most effective white-hat link building strategy to come along in years.However, understand this: Your success at getting the right links will entirely depend on how willing you are to research and analyze or audit different websites.Broken link building is all about making an impact. It’s about helping webmasters and making the web a better place.Webmasters are always happy to fix broken links - if they find them. They know there’s a relationship between Google rankings and links but, on big sites, finding broken links isn’t easy.You'll also want to make sure you aren't linking duplicate content.A dead link -- that is, a link that no longer works -- doesn’t do the user or the site any good. In fact, too many broken links can have a negative effect on a site. Webmasters hate doing all the keyword search term work and link building to have this happen.Having too many broken links on a page is a sign of a neglected or abandoned site. The Google Search Quality Raters General Guidelines view broken links as one of the ways to measure a homepage’s quality. It's one SEO tool.According to Moz, broken link building is a strategy that constructively addresses many of the competing interests in our industry: content vs. links, link earning vs. link building and inbound vs. outbound.2. Advanced Guide to Link Building (source)I’ve had my fair share of SEO struggles. I struggled to get other sites to link to my posts. I struggled to keep up with Google updates. I struggled to reach the expected quantity and quality of links necessary to rank highly in Google.Those struggles taught me that achieving success online takes time. You have to be patient and you’ve also got to create content that’ll help people get closer to achieving their goals.One of the best steps I’ve taken since I started blogging is the creation of The Advanced Guide to Link Building, which I shared with the digital marketing world for free. This isn't link building software but helps you understand the steps necessary for success regardless of what building software you choose..If you’ve struggled to build the kind of links that Google loves, the way I did in the beginning, you should study this guide. It’ll show you:How to go about finding and getting those “perfect links”The right way to create epic search term content that’ll help you build relationships with the leaders in your industryHow to identify and approach the authority sites you can get links from in just a few minutesThe hidden secrets to getting hard-to-come-by .edu and .gov backlinksThe step-by-step method of link-building outreach that walks you through the process of initiating and building a relationship with influencers and pro bloggers3. Using Educational Linkbait to Get Valuable .Edu Links (source)This resource was written way back in 2011, but it’s been consistently updated to match modern SEO best practices. It’s not your typical long-form post -- it’s pretty short, actually -- but it’ll show you:Why educational links matterHow to create content that attracts .edu linksHow to build relationships that help you get these linksLink building has evolved significantly since 2011. Lots of tactics that used to work have since fizzled out -- e.g., article directories, duplicate or barely-rewritten content, etc.But educational sites have remained a viable source of high-quality links for any site.Incoming links from educational websites are often perceived as the most powerful links you can get and getting a bunch of these links can skyrocket your search rankings.It’s true that .edu links aren’t the only kind of powerful incoming links. There’s no proof that Google rates them universally higher than all other kinds of links. John Mu, a webmaster trends analyst at Google Zürich, clarified the issue:However, educational backlinks are powerful -- just like links from any other high-authority domain would be.Educational backlinks are hard to get. Your link building software can only help if you have high quality, respected content. According to Felix Tarcomnicu,The harder it is to get a backlink, the more value it will have.Sites with .edu domains typically have high authority as they’ve been around for a long time and have many trusted quality sites linking to them.That’s why many of these sites are viewed as authoritative by Google. Therefore, getting links from these authority top-level domains improves search performance.Wordstream’s guide on using editorial linkbait to get .edu links is a must-read. It uses anecdotes to explain the relevance of educational links and to show how you can create .edu link bait.Link bait is simply content on your site that other sites link to willingly because the content solves a problem. This is the type of content people will tag with a social bookmark.When people link to your content page on their own initiative, it means you’ve created a linkable asset. The intersection between link bait and linkable asset is your sweet spot for converting your prospects into customers.It can be a blog post, a viral podcast, an infographic or a helpful ebook. Ultimately, you want people to view your site with the same authority and want to tag it with a social bookmark as well.How to get educational backlinks: High quality links make the difference. After Google launched Panda, Penguin and Hummingbird algorithm updates, quality became the defining factor of a link, as opposed to quantity.It’s no longer a question of how many links you need to rank. The challenge that most SEOs and site owners face is actually getting these quality links (e.g., .edu links). This is where high quality, easy to use, link building software makes life just a bit easier.The vast majority of educational sites from top universities and colleges don’t accept guest posts. The ones that do accept guest articles are stricter than you can imagine. You can’t just write any post you want and get them to publish it.Also keep in mind that guest blogger or contributor content may be available through various domain names as it could by syndicated. Check links to make sure it isn't duplicate content you are using and making a social bookmark with.So, guest blogging is perhaps not the best or most effective way to get .edu links. But there are other ways that are proven to work.You can use advanced search modifiers to find education sites in Google. Your goal is to narrow your results down to educational results pages. Some of the search strings you can use are:a). site:.edu - shows you search results containing educational result sites onlyb). site:.edu “blog” - returns search results for educational blogs onlyc). site:.edu “forums” - if you want to participate in an educational discussion boardd). site:.edu “comments” - for educational blogs with comments sectionse). site:.edu “log in / create account” - returns .edu blog extensions that allow you to sign up as a user for the purpose of commenting or other kinds of participationf). site:.edu inurl:blog “seo” - for educational blogs that understand SEO and would be interested in learning more about search enginesLet’s try one of the search strings:As you can see, the search result contains only educational sites. But, it’d be difficult to get links from those sites. It’s much easier to get a link from a blog than a static web page. This is the nature of almost any link building campaign.So let’s drill down our search to focus on blogs:These results are more specific to educational blogs related to marketing. If your site is related to sales or marketing, those educational blogs are your targets.Broken link building is the easiest way to get your links from educational portals. All you've got to do is find dead links on these blogs and suggest better content -- your own -- to replace it.Broken link building works. For example, Michael Chibuzor, founder of contentmarketingup.com, generated 27 links from .edu domains in 90 days.Brian Dean has taught broken link building and his students are seeing great results. Recently, one of his students, Emil Shour, set out to rank for his most profitable search engine keyword.He leveraged the skyscraper technique and created an in-depth, long-form article in the employee wellness niche, entitled “121 Employee Wellness Program Ideas for Your Office.”Richard researched industry blogs that are relevant to employee management, found broken links and sent outreach emails to all of them.By doing this, Richard was able to push his post into a number #1 ranking and generated $100,000 in revenue. Richard also boosted his organic traffic by 348% in just 7 days.So how do you find dead links on educational blogs that you can capitalize on to get incoming links?It’s easier said than done, but it isn’t impossible. Here are the step-by-step instructions:i). First step: Go to Google and search for educational resource pages. These pages contain lists of links to external sites and contents.This time, let’s find educational resources for small businesses.The search string I used is “site:edu “resources” + blogs + small businessAnd here’s the results screenshot:You can see that the search results are relevant to small businesses only. This makes them viable.ii). Second step: Choose one of the resources and click on it. Here’s the page, with all of the resources:Some of the outgoing links on this page may be dead, but you can’t tell just by looking and clicking on all of them one-by-one will take lots of time.Instead, use a tool designed for checking dead links ...iii). Third step: Go to deadlinkchecker.com. Copy the resource page address as it appears on the browser.Then paste the site address into the search bar and click the “check” button:Out of the 142 out-going links analyzed by the dead link checker tool, 8 of them are dead. Those are the links that return any of these error messages: 404 not found, 400 bad request, -1 not found, etc.Next, prepare your content. Remember that since you’re concerned about small business, your content needs to be relevant to that topic. Otherwise, it might be difficult to convince the blog editor or administrator to swap out the dead link for your page. Search term research helps here to ensure it is relevant in today's search engine realm.iv). Step four: Send a personalized outreach email. I’ve received several outreach emails that are obviously form letters. Sometimes, the exact same email I receive went out to 10 or more other bloggers.Don’t do that. Instead, personalize your email subject lines when reaching out to educational blogs. This is key to better email open rates.Often, these people are academics and any slight error or hint of deception will result in your email being deleted without being read.To “personalize” means that you give it a personal touch. If you know the name of the person you’re writing to, address them by their first name.Not everyone understands how to write persuasive emails to site owners and bloggers. If that’s you, don’t worry. Just use the email templates below and add the person’s name, if you know it.When using any email template, keep these things in mind:Write lowercase subject lines – I do this all the time because I want the email to seem casual as if it’s from a friend, not a robot.Be creative – emails that are boring and lack emotional appeal won’t get opened or responded to.Personalize – you have to include the person’s name and the website name in the email so it doesn’t come off as spammy.Here’s a broken link email template you can model:If you didn’t find any dead links on your targeted educational resource page, don’t give up. Instead of sending a broken link email, you can simply send a basic link request email.If broken link building seems like a lot of work, or too difficult to tackle, there are other tactics that I’ve personally used to get .edu authority links:Blog commentsCreate a case study that’s relevant to the subject matterBlogger recognitionLeveraging alumni newsLocal resource pagesUniversity discountsImprove a section of a siteAs you can see, link building software may help but isn't necessary.You can learn how to apply all these link earning tactics in Chapter 5 of the Advanced Guide To Link Building.4. Linking Out Instead of Link Building to Rank in Google (source)This helpful resource shows you why linking out is a strategy, not a tactic -- because when you build quality anchor text phrases to outsiie sites, you also get these benefits:Enhanced awareness for your site and brandOpportunities for other sites to link back to your pageSearch engine awareness that you have a timely and useful resourceMore helpful information for your readersAnd so on...Developing a link building strategy isn’t a cakewalk. Heck, even SEO experts sometimes fail at a link building campaign.Link building software and tools help, but you still need to split test everything.Outbound links or links that point to external web pages from your own site can actually impact your blog authority. Make sure the pages your links point to are relevant, useful and have good standing with Google.At the heart of effective an link building campaign is the concept of giving.In other words, you link to other sites, pages and case studies willingly.“Linking out instead of link building to rank in Google” is a helpful resource that doesn’t follow traditional advice. Rather, it capitalizes on the principle of reciprocity.According to Wikipedia, “reciprocity is a social rule that says we should repay, in kind, what another person has provided us. That is, people give back the kind of treatment they have received from you.”For example, if you’re writing a guide to SEO, you should link out to authority sites that have addressed the topic before. As much as you can, link out to pages with high page authority - it’ll have a dramatic impact on your search performance and online visibility. Use simple search term phrases for anchor text when possible.Reciprocity is one of the most vital of Cialdini’s 6 principles of persuasion. We humans are basically hard-wired to pay back our debts, help those who offered us a helping hand and generally treat others as they’ve treated us.I’ve applied the principle of reciprocity to grow QuickSprout to over 700,000 monthly visitors and generated tens of thousands of quality backlinks. I give away tremendous value in my content.When I write a post, I link out to anywhere from 5 to 20 external web pages that contain helpful and relevant content.I don’t claim to know it all - that’s why I include the views of other expert’s in my posts. It’s also helped me earn more links and increase revenue since 2007.Here’s one of my recent posts on Helping You Succeed Through Online Marketing!. I linked out to more than 20 external web pages that offer additional information to my readers.Linking out to relevant pages not only earns you editorial links, but it also improves your search rankings. A survey of major newspapers on the web found that those who link out tend to outperform others who don’t on several performance metrics.Check popular sites like Digg, Reddit, Twitter & Tumblr - they all link out excessively, and yet they still have millions of visitors coming back again and again.If you’re worried that linking out will harm your rankings, do you have any proof of that?I’ll keep looking, but so far I haven’t seen any proof that linking out to relevant and informative sites/pages that users will benefit from actually hurts my long-term rankings and revenue.5. Low Hanging Fruit: Linkbuilding with Screaming Frog (source)To a large extent, valuable content makes it a lot easier to convince webmasters to link to you. According to MarketingSherpa, “53% of businesses view content creation as the single most effective SEO technique.”There are lots of opportunities to grow your site, if you just study your Google Webmasters Tools data and pinpoint the links coming in to your site.Go to Traffic > Links to Your Site:Next, go to “More”:Finally, download latest links (limit is 100,000):Getting the right links may seem difficult, especially when you’re not producing enough content.But if you consider the impact those links will have on your search rankings, you’ll invest in content creation and promotion.The old way of creating content and expecting customers to just show up is no longer feasible. You need to spend about 70% of your time and resources on promotion - that’s the new and better way.“Low Hanging Fruit: Link Building with Screaming Frog” is an in-depth post that reveals opportunities for getting the right links using Screaming Frog, a premium SEO tool for link reclamation and link analysis.Screaming Frog is invaluable as link building software for architecture research. You can also use it to initiate relationships with bloggers and reporters, among other things.The tool can analyze your links and show you ways to pass more SEO search term value to your web pages.Knowing when to increase your link building efforts or slow down with that mission is critical. This is the whole essence of link velocity, which measures the rate at which other sites link to you.There’s no single rule on how fast you should get links to your site. SEOs have differing opinions, but Google hasn’t commented one way or the other.The best approach is to create more content and increase your site authority. Content growth can solve your link velocity problems.For example, it doesn’t matter how many links SEO Software, Tools and Resources for Better Marketing or HubSpot | Inbound Marketing & Sales Software generate this week; Google won’t view those links as manipulative, because both sites have good authority and thousands of pages already.6. Your Link Reclamation Sucks Like Irene’s Dyson (source)Link reclamation is the easiest way to earn editorial links to your pages from referring sites that mentioned your brand but didn’t link to you.Whether you’re a B2B or B2C marketer, there are three sources of links you need to reclaim:i). Brand mentions: This means aspects of your brand such as your site, events, courses, etc. Other sites could be mentioning your site, without linking to it. Brand mentions are the future of link building. Through link reclamation, you can request actual links be added to mentions that already exist.ii). Product mentions: Several sites, media portals and discussion boards could be mentioning your product without linking to your sales page or homepage.If you’ve got a great product, I can almost guarantee that you can reclaim 10 or more unclaimed links today. You don't need link building software for this. You can use the Rank Tank’s brand unlinked mentions finder tool to find these product mentions across the web.iii). Personnel mentions: What about your team, your name, your nickname or your professional title?All of these provide another opportunity to reclaim unlinked personal mentions and boost your search rankings based on your company or you being the search term. You want people to view your site with the authority to use you as the social bookmark.If you want to dominate social media and claim brand mentions easily by building relationships with social media power users, site owners and bloggers, this guide -- “Your Link Reclamation Sucks Like Irene’s Dyson” -- will help you.In an earlier Whiteboard Friday video, Ross Hudgens showed that that you can reclaim links from brand misspellings, brand monitoring and moving links to primary domain, etc.7. Ultimate Guide to Link Building (source)Without a doubt, links connect the web together. Links exist because there are websites, pages and portals that need to share information with users, rank pertinent content, push the drivel aside and prevent plagiarism or duplicate content where possible. That is the job of search engines and every SEO tool must play in their realm.Who links to your site and how they link to it are more important to Google than virtually any other Google ranking factor. Data from Searchmetrics suggests that the number of backlinks is the third most important factor in the UK Google ranking factors.In this book, Ultimate Guide To Link Building, Eric Ward shows you:How to build linksHow to gain authority and credibility for your websiteHow to increase your site traffic and rankingsWard teaches with a deep understanding of link profiles, what makes them good and how to maximize the quality of links that point to your site. Understanding this means you won't need expensive link building software but you may still take advantage of tools to make you more efficient.Ward uses illustrated case studies, expert interviews and helpful resources in this book to drive his message home. You’ll find that getting backlinks can actually be fun, once you master the art of networking with bloggers.Using some of the outlined whitehat backlink techniques, Dom Wells, founder of Human Proof Designs, built 59 quality links to his new site in 10 weeks.And Inflow used email outreach (a tactic for connecting with site owners and getting them to reference and link to your page) to gain 96 links from 43 domains.8. Link Building for Startups – Find Unlinked Brand Mentions at Scale (source)Most startups waste time trying to get the right links when there’s a far more accessible opportunity right under their noses.More links will improve your search performance, increase leads to your business and increase your revenue. If you don’t get links to your site, your search rankings, traffic and leads will suffer. Your startup will fail.If you’re a startup entrepreneur, you’ll agree with me that you need to contend with a lot of competition.According to Club Z, about 80% of startups fail to see projected return on investment, frequently due to a lack of planning and experience.Before you can drive targeted visitors from Google and benefit from your site, you need to build quality links to your pages.Guest blogging is a viable and free way to do just that. As you contribute to industry blogs, you can speed up your rate of getting links by simultaneously reclaiming your brand mentions.For example, I could cite your domain name (e.g., iPad Cases & Covers for iPad Air, Mini & more | DODOcase) without linking to it. Before someone can visit that site, they’d have to copy and paste it into their browser or look for it via a search engine.But if the domain name was hyperlinked, when someone clicks on it, they’ll visit the startup site.If you’ve been consistently creating fresh and useful content and promoting your site through social media, there’s no doubt that other sites are mentioning your brand name. Don’t let these mentions be a waste; reclaim them and be your own best search term.And that’s exactly what you can learn from “Link Building for Startups – Find Unlinked Brand Mentions at Scale.”9. How to Get Links on Resources Pages (source)One of the most effective methods I use for getting links is through resources pages. With this tactic, Startup Company Lawyer got a link on the resources page of Johnson Cornell University.Although contextual links are desirable and powerful, you still need to diversify anchor text, If all your links appear within the content, this may not seem natural.I am a firm believer that there’s no single one-size-fits-all approach to link diversity ratios.Depending on the domain authority and page authority of referring pages and their IP diversities, Google can use these factors to gauge and pass value to your links.Different niches require different approaches to getting links. For example, building links to a niche site (e.g., a site focused on a specific topic or product) is a delicate process, because you've got to be mindful of the linking site - making sure they’re relevant even if they’re not too popular.But for an authority site, it doesn’t matter where you get your links from. It could be from an entirely unrelated web page, but provided your site has some authority Google will likely not view this as spammy.“How to Get Links on Resources Pages” is a helpful guide that gives you vital information on how to get the right links by capitalizing on resource pages - pages with plenty of linked-to resources (e.g., blogs, books, papers, resource works, images).Matthew Barby used the resource linking tactic to find link building opportunities for the travel blog he created with a group of friends, Melted Stories Travel Blog: Stories, Advice & Reviews for Backpackers.He got 15 new links from the sites he contacted, generated a decent amount of traffic and grew his blog.ConclusionAt the heart of every link building campaign is email outreach. Whether you’re involved in guest blogging, broken link building, social media networking or blog sponsorship, you need to connect with people.However, you can’t simply blast scripted emails to hundreds of people and wonder why only a handful of them read it and replied to you. You also need to learn how to write high-converting emails.Get personal. Your target audience wants to connect with you on a personal level. They should want to make you a social bookmark.That’s the quickest way you can build a loyal audience, get referral traffic, improve your search traffic, increase your email subscribers and grow your sales.