QUANTIFYING OUTREACH What we learned from nearly 300,00 outreach emails

MICHAEL KING

@ipullrank

Download this deck:

http://slidesha.re/quantifying-outreach

@ipullrank

I did SEO here 2010-2011

Working for huge brands is cool, but it was time for a change.

SEO Lead until last Friday

@ipullrank

Director of Inbound Marketing

Lead Inbound Marketing Efforts for the Brand

Launch and Lead On-Page Optimization and Digital Brand Strategy Teams

Training Link Building Teams in Social Link Building

Working With Tech Team to Improve Products & Processes

QUANTIFYING OUTREACH What we learned from nearly 300,00 outreach emails

5

MICHAEL KING DIRECTOR OF INBOUND MARKETING

@ipullrank

BUILDING LINKS IS

TOO HARD.

WHY CAN’T I GET

ANY RESPONSES

TO MY LINK

REQUESTS?

SOMETIMES IT WOULD

REALLY BE NICE TO

KNOW IF I’M DOING

THIS SH*T RIGHT!

@JamesAgate from Skyrocket SEO did a cool study on the performance of

outreach emails by different features and I was inspired

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/putting-guest-post-outreach-theories-to-the-test-with-some-real-world-data (@jamesagate)

Gender

Opening Salutation

Day of the Week

Hour of the Day

Number of Mails

Message Length

First Touch on Twitter

Email Trust Signals

Combining the iAcquire iRank and Buzzstream datasets we analyzed the features

of 297,791 emails to develop definitive insights on outreach link building

Download the study: http://www.iacquire.com/resources/quantifying-outreach/

Super props to Mike

Bernardez for all his hard

work wrangling this data

for me.

Give him a shout on Twitter @mikebwinging

The Link

Building Process

@ipullrank

RANKING

RESULTS

DIRECTORIES

& LINK DB’S

VETTING PROCESS Technology Driven

VIEWING PROCESS OUTREACH PROCESS

QUALIFIED PAGES

POTENTIAL FUTURE

OPPORTUNITIES

NEW Content

& Link Partner

12,558,303 PAGES

REVIEWED

BLUELIST FILTERING

TOP 5,000 amazon.com, apple.com, wikipedia.org, etc

BLACKLIST FILTERING

“DO NOT CONTACT” LIST (internally established)

BAD NEIGHBORHOODS (link network & spam)

647,631 OPPORTUNITIES

11,487,318 PAGES

REMOVED

SEO METRICS FILTERING

Client Specific – Filtering out data based on IBL,

Moz-Rank, OBL, PR, etc.

MANUAL VIEWING

CLIENT

REQUIREMENTS

• Relevancy Guidelines

• Content Guidelines

• Legal Requirements

QUALITY CONTROL

• Full-time Highly-trained

Team

• Multi-layered Review

• Evolving Quality Guidelines

112,569 OPPORTUNITIES

535,062 UNQUALIFIED

PAGES

OUTREACH

3-4 attempts made

POTENTIAL PARTNER

“NO” NO

RESPONSE

“YES”

SO WHAT, MIKE? I

CAN’T DO THAT.

Crawl prospects

in list mode

Pull any other metrics you

care about

Sure you can. Right in Excel, no less.

Pull Open Site

Explorer metrics

Download Screaming Frog: http://www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/

Download Niels Bosma’s SEO Tools: http://nielsbosma.se/projects/seotools/

Read: https://seogadget.co.uk/links-data-excel-seomoz-api/ @seogadget

Scrape Rate and Share Rate

Read “Scrape Rate and Shareability Rate:” http://ipullrank.com/scrape-rate-and-shareability-rate/

(Original props for scrape rate belong to @pointblankseo)

Compute the Scrape and Share Rates of the sites you guest post on to

determine the propensity for the article to get scraped and generate more links

Scrape Rate is why

ipullrank.com ranked first

page for Googlebot for

several months

The Study (finally)

@ipullrank

I ASKED A LOT OF QUESTIONS

For every link building feature we will discuss I wanted to know:

The number of emails that fit the criteria

The rate of response

The rate of link placement or close

MY ASSUMPTIONS

The dataset is large enough to be statistically significant

Conclusions are made in a vacuum

Buzzstreams data represents varying link building practices,

philosophies and time zones

Correlation is not Causation

MY ASSERTION

iRank’s data represents a controlled and highly structured

data-driven link building methodology implemented by a team

working out of one office from 8AM-6PM PST Monday-Friday

LIMITATIONS

iRank™ Reporting Limitations

BuzzStream’s Privacy Policy

BuzzStream User Types

Would you give

us the data

already?

WHAT GENDER PERFORMS BEST?

WHAT GENDER PERFORMS BEST?

0

10000

20000

30000

40000

50000

60000

MALE FEMALE

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

14.91%

4.8% 16.82% 4.5%

GENDER ANALYSIS

iRank™ data shows that while women do get a higher response

rate than men (2.1% more responses for women) in outreach, the

close rate is slightly in favor of men (men close 0.31% more links).

GENDER INSIGHT

Hire outreach professionals based on their ability and the quality

of their work rather than their gender as neither has an inherent

advantage that affects the ROI of campaign significantly.

GENDER ACTION

Invest resources in equal hiring and/or training for link builders

of either sex.

WHAT OPENING SALUTATION PERFORMS BEST?

OPENING SALUTATION DATA

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

40000

45000

PERSONAL CUSTOM GENERAL

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

20.6% 6.52% 10.54%

3.12%

13.8%

4.1%

“PERSONAL”

CLOSE RATE

6.52% 2.41% Higher

SALUTATION ANALYSIS

The response and close rate was substantially higher for emails

that were addressed directly to a person. If that’s not available a

general salutation such as a “Hello” performs best. The next

section will discuss the performance of the different types of

general salutations.

SALUTATION INSIGHT

Expend the extra effort to find out the name attached to the prospect.

SALUTATION ACTION

Use a tool such as Rapportive or RapLeaf to find out more info

on the prospect. With Rapportive you get all of a given users

social information in the right pane within Gmail.

WHAT GENERIC SALUTATION PERFORMS BEST?

GENERIC SALUTATION DATA

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

40000

HELLO HI HEY GOOD AM/PM OTHERS

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

14.37%

4.14% 17.47%

5.62% 13.63%

3.82% 16.21%

5.45%

“HI” CLOSE

RATE

5.63% Higher than all

specific types

GENERIC SALUTATION ANALYSIS

Of those general salutations “Hey” yielded the best results

however due to the lack of volume “Hi” is the winning general

salutation.

GENERIC SALUTATION INSIGHT

Expend the extra effort to find out the name attached to the

prospect.

GENERIC SALUTATION ACTION

Use a tool such as Rapportive or RapLeaf to find out more info

on the prospect. With Rapportive you get all of a given users

social information in the right pane within Gmail.

WHICH DAY OF THE WEEK DOES BEST?

iRANK DAY OF THE WEEK DATA

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

16000

18000

MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY FRIDAY SATURDAY SUNDAY

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

DAY CLOSE

RATE

TUES Higher than other

days

BUZZSTREAM DAY OF THE WEEK DATA

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

16000

18000

20000

MONDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY THURSDAY FRIDAY SATURDAY SUNDAY

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

DAY CLOSE

RATE

SAT Higher than other

days

DAY OF THE WEEK ANALYSIS

For BuzzStream data close rates we were able to determine that

Saturday resulted in the highest response rate followed by

Sunday and Friday for the Buzzstream data.

We’ve found that the iRank data shows emails sent on Monday

have the highest rate of response, followed by Thursday with

Tuesday and Wednesday tied for third. Initial emails sent on

Tuesdays yielded the highest rate of activated links, followed by

a tie for Monday and Wednesday.

DAY OF THE WEEK INSIGHT

The volume of overall email lower on the weekend and therefore

it is simply easier for an email sent on the weekend to be seen.

Therefore in this case we believe that Buzzstream’s data is more

definitive.

DAY OF THE WEEK ACTION

Outreach specialists should schedule initial link building emails

during the weekend with a tool such as Boomerang for Gmail to

ensure the best chance at a response. Integrating Buzzstream

with Gmail allows you to use Boomerang for this as well.

WHICH TIME OF DAY DOES BEST?

iRANK TIME OF DAY DATA

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

16000

18000 # Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

RESPONSE RATE

9AM Higher than other

times

BUZZSTREAM TIME OF DAY DATA

0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

8000 # Emails Sent

# Responses Received

RESPONSE

RATE

2AM Higher than other

times

TIME OF DAY ANALYSIS

Buzzstream’s data shows that sending emails at 1AM, 10PM and

2AM EST result in the highest responses.

Conversely, iRank data shows that 4AM, 9AM and 6AM EST

return the highest rate of response and emails sent at 9AM, 4AM

and 5AM EST return the highest rate of link activations.

TIME OF DAY INSIGHT

It’s hard to draw a definitive conclusion here but however since

all these times fall within the 10PM and 9AM range the insight is

that the volume of email is lower throughout the night than during

the day and therefore prospects come across these emails first

thing in the morning before “email fatigue” sets in.

TIME OF DAY ACTION

Schedule emails to send within between 10PM and 9AM EST to

using a tool such as a Boomerang or hire a link building team

that operates at those times within the targets time zone.

WHAT NUMBER OF EMAILS WORKS BEST?

NUMBER OF EMAILS DATA

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

1 2 3 4 5 6+

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

MALE CLOSE

RATE

0.31% Higher than women

NUMBER OF EMAILS ANALYSIS

Outreaches that continued to 6 emails and beyond proved to do

substantially better than those that stopped at the standard 4th

email. Most importantly, we found that we achieved 60% more

responses by sending a second and third email.

NUMBER OF EMAILS INSIGHT

Be persistent until the prospect explicitly says no without abusing

someone’s inbox.

NUMBER OF EMAILS ACTION

Schedule follow-up emails with a tool such as Boomerang.

WHAT EMAIL LENGTH WORKS BEST?

EMAIL LENGTH DATA

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

40000

45000

50000

LONG EMAILS SHORT EMAILS

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

16.47% 5.41%

14.93%

4.32%

LONG EMAIL

CLOSE RATE

1.09% Higher than short

EMAIL LENGTH ANALYSIS

Short initial emails resulted in 1.54% more responses than long

emails however long emails converted at 1.09% higher rate.

EMAIL LENGTH INSIGHT

Longer emails typically resulted in more personalization and

more detail specific to the content partnership opportunity.

EMAIL LENGTH ACTION

Throw away your form letters and write more personalized

emails.

HOW DOES FIRST TOUCH VIA TWITTER PERFORM?

FIRST TOUCH VIA TWITTER DATA

TWEETED FIRST

Tweeted before emailing

Did not tweet first

TWEETED FIRST

Got a Response to Email AfterTweeting First

Did not get a response

FIRST TOUCH VIA TWITTER ANALYSIS

In 2011, 347 emails were sent from users on Buzzstream that

have a Twitter account attached. Of those users there were 16

emails sent after initial contact was made via Twitter. Of those 6

elicited responses.

FIRST TOUCH VIA TWITTER INSIGHT

While the figures are not statistically significant within the scope

of this study, the 37.5% response rate is worthy of further

investigation.

FIRST TOUCH VIA TWITTER ACTION

Build relationships using Twitter to engage prospects with

contextually relevant information that benefits them.

HOW DO TRUST SIGNALS PERFORM?

PHONE # VS. NO PHONE # DATA

0

10000

20000

30000

40000

50000

60000

70000

80000

WITH PHONE # NO PHONE

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

15.32%

4.62% 20.1% 7.1%

NO PHONE #

CLOSE RATE

2.48% Higher than with phone #

PHONE # VS. NO PHONE

ANALYSIS

Emails without phone numbers got 4.78% more responses and 2.48%

more link closes.

INSIGHT

Prospects may correlate the appearance of a phone number in an

unsolicited email with those of famous email scams.

ACTION

Remove phone numbers from initial outreach emails and only provide a

phone number should a prospect explicitly ask for it.

PHONE # VS. NO PHONE # DATA

0

10000

20000

30000

40000

50000

60000

70000

80000

WITH PHONE # NO PHONE

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

15.32%

4.62% 20.1% 7.1%

NO PHONE #

CLOSE RATE

2.48% Higher than with phone #

PHONE # VS. NO PHONE

ANALYSIS Link builders performing outreach without a linked profile in their footer closed

4.98% of the prospects they reached out to while those with linked profiles closed

4.33% of their prospects. The difference in response is similarly negligible at

0.77%.

INSIGHT The difference in effectiveness is negligible enough that it does not weigh too

heavily on performance whether a linked profile is present or absent.

ACTION Link builders should not scramble to add or delete any linked profiles when

sending outreach emails. However if a 0.65% increase in closes will make or

break a given campaign it is wise to remove them.

LOGO VS. NO LOGO DATA

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

40000

45000

50000

LINKED EMBEDDED NO LOGO

# Emails Sent

# Responses Received

# Closed

18.29% 10.58%

18.08% 6.03%

14.11%

3.72%

LINKED LOGOS

CLOSE RATE

6.86% Higher than no logo

LOGO VS. NO LOGO DATA

ANALYSIS

Linked logos have the highest rate of close at 10.58% with embedded

logos coming in strong at number two with a close rate of 6.03%. Emails

with no logos close at 3.72%.

INSIGHT

Including logos in outreach emails is a trust signal that leads to a drastic

increase in link closes.

ACTION

Link builders should put a brand behind their link building efforts and

include the logo for that brand in every outreach email.

@ipullrank

TADA! I’M AN

OUTREACH

MASTER!

The Worth of A Link (shout out to Mike Essex)

@ipullrank

LINK EQUITY NOT LINK JUICE

Formalizing the nomenclature allows clients to the idea of building links a lot more

seriously when they think of it as building value into their online home.

What “link juice” makes me think of What “link equity” makes me think of

LINK EQUITY AS THE FUNCTION OF A LINK BUY

Use what it would cost to buy the number of links to explain the value of a backlink profile. The

value of your labor is offset by the risk of being penalized.

Link Brokers charge $100/month for a PR5 link

Number of Links You Build Monthly

Price of Labor for those links monthly

THE VALUE OF LINK EQUITY YOU ARE BUILDING

LINK EQUITY AS THE FUNCTION OF CPC

At iAcquire we use what it would cost to buy the incremental projected traffic in Paid

Search. This is a rough approximation of how that could be applied to pricing.

Incremental Traffic Increase As Computed by Projected Visibility

Increase of Link Building Efforts

Cost Per Click in Paid Search

Price of Labor for those links monthly

THE VALUE OF LINK EQUITY YOU ARE BUILDING

Michael King Director of Inbound Marketing

@iPullRank

mike@iacquire.com

www.iacquire.com

THANK YOU / Q&A