Link Love Mad Libs for the Writing Community

photo credit: germeister

Let’s talk about links and why it’s beneficial to spread link love throughout the writing community.

For some reason, Google thinks links are the cat’s meow. When someone links to your blog, Google says “Hey, people like that blog over there!” And then whoosh — your Google Page Rank goes up while you purr and drool all over your keyboard.

Google is so smart it actually ups your rank even more if the links to your blog come from a website with a lot of clout. And by clout, I mean a site that already has high standing in Googledom. So a link from someone like Dooce is going to make you purr a lot louder than say, a link from me. For now anyway.

Hopefully I don’t have to explain why you want to be on Google’s good side. What I would like to point out is that everybody wants to be on Google’s good side (not just you). You can probably guess where this is going.

Making Dreams Come True

That’s right, everybody wants inbound links. So if you have a blog, then you have the power to fulfill wishes and make dreams come true.

One way to do this is to write a review of something another blogger wrote or mention blogs that have inspired your own posts. Another way is to create link lists. The point is, you find a way to link to the ones you love and it’s just like you’re blowing pretty little Google kisses their way.

So link lists are good but guess what’s better?

Use Your Writing Skills to Spread Link Love

Actual sentences and paragraphs are far more appealing than mere lists. This is where your writing skills come into play.

Yes, Google recognizes the difference between links in a list (they get a nod and perhaps a curt handshake) and links that are embedded in the body of a written post (these get a welcome-to-the-family hug). So, when you construct links in this manner, you’re not blowing kisses, you’re French kissing.

What I mean is, links in sentences and paragraphs are WAY better than links in lists.

Links, Trends, and Creative Writing

Recently, I’ve noticed a trend around some of the blogs I frequent, which involves the blogger writing a little story and plugging links (the French kiss kind) into the posts. This is a perfect writing exercise for people like us (that would be you and me) because we are writers and bloggers. It’s a lot like doing mad libs because you write a story and then fill in the blanks with blogs you want to make out with.

Here’s how it works:

photo credit: germeister

Living in the Writing Community

My writing journey had been what you might call a sweet unrest until last September when I launched my freelance writing business because I was struck by one of life’s little inspirations. That would be to make a living doing what I love on my own terms.

Within about six weeks, I had launched my career and was happily writing the cyber highway. My blog helped me find great people within the writing community. And while freelancing paid the bills, it was not my life’s greatest ambition. For I had big dreams of writing a novel and having it published, but I harbored fears of the rejecter and publishers who would find flaws in my fiction.

I decided that in addition to peddling my writing as a service, I would embark on a mission to become a better fiction writer. How? Well I started by escaping reality. Later this year, I’ll participate in NaNoWriMo and write a novel in 30 days. Hopefully I’ll finish on time because as you know, punctuality rules.

Now my dreams are starting to manifest in the form of words and pictures. I pray that I succeed so that one day I might be able to buy a cottage of my own. I just hope I don’t end up on any of the Deep Friar’s rant lists.

photo credit: germeister

You’re All Good Kissers

Now that I’ve made out with all you fine people, try writing a link love mad lib of your own.

It’s a great way to show your affection for other bloggers and a wonderful way to connect with the writing community.

In case you want to get all crazy with the Google juice, here are a few final tips for spreading the link love:

• Don’t limit yourself to using anchor text that matches the blog’s title. Use whatever makes sense. [Anchor text is the text that contains the link. Usually it's underlined. Often, it's blue.]
• Likewise, you can link to posts on other blogs, not just to the main page.
• Sadly, you probably won’t fit every blog you love into your link love mad lib. I didn’t. (Sorry guys.)
• You have to choose whether to let the links you want to include drive your post or whether you want it to be story driven. I’m a writer before I’m a blogger so I went with the story.
• Be creative and have fun. Be a good writer-blogger and link lots to others in the writing community.

Now, let’s play spin the bottle! But don’t forget to keep on writing!

Inside the Writing Community

Writers are notorious for being loners. We spend hours in solitude, bent over our keyboards, laboring over prose and poetry. And when we’re not absorbed by our own writing, we’ve got our noses wedged deeply into someone else’s, because if there’s one thing we love as much as writing, it’s reading.

When we finally pry ourselves away from pages of text, we’re usually greeted by our non-writing or non-reading friends and family members. They don’t care about alliteration, character development, or dangling prepositions. They want to know where you’re going for dinner.

Writers have access to books and websites full of writing tips that provide useful ideas, inspiration, and guidelines to help us be better at our craft. What’s often missing from those writing tips is this: embrace the writing community.

The Heart of a Community

At the heart of every community lies a common, shared experience, and it’s no different for writers. Only other writers can understand our unique struggles. Whether we’re tangled up in a messy plot that’s going nowhere, trying to form a poem into a publishable work of art, or working through a stressful revision on an article or essay, the challenges we encounter as writers are particular to our craft.

When we surround ourselves with other writers, then it becomes easy to find a friendly comrade – someone who can sympathize or lend a bit of writerly advice. Someone once told me that getting married means your life has twice the joy and half the sorrow, and the same is true of being involved in the writing community.

Other writers will relate to small accomplishments and celebrate them with you. When I finished the first draft of my novel, the non-writers in my life wanted to know if I’d already sent it out to get published. My writer friends said, “Good for you! When are you going to start revising?” This stark difference punctuated why the writing community is so important to me as a writer, and made my heart sing with appreciation for my writer friends.

The Writing Community

One of the things that makes me proud to call myself a writer is the community itself. Throughout our lives, we usually find ourselves involved in various communities and I’ve found that writers tend to be warm, supportive, and generous people. Whether I’m sitting in a live workshop, or interacting with writers online, listening to interviews, or reading books full of writing tips, I always sense kindness from other writers.

Plus, writers come in all shapes and sizes. There are fiction writers, poets, novelists, and of course a slew of nonfiction writers. Some are heavy on the grammar. Others, not so much. Some consider their writing an art. Others view it as a livelihood. Some writers are solitary, shy, and withdrawn. Others are highly social, outgoing, and extroverted.

Exploring the writing community is fun and it can be exciting, especially when you meet other writers that you really connect with. And like all passionate people, writers generally love to talk about their passion and are glad to engage in conversations about grammar or swap writing tips.

Getting Involved

With the Internet, connecting with the writing community has become a snap. It may take awhile to find exactly the type of community you’re looking for, but rest assured, they’re out there. You can find writers blogging, hanging out in forums, and participating in community projects like NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month).

Looking for an offline writing community? Check with your community center to see if there are any local writing groups you can join. Book clubs are a great place to find other writers. One of the best places to meet and mix with writers is in a workshop or class, so see if any creative writing classes are offered at a nearby community college.

Whether you join a small writing community or start your own, you will reap incredible benefits and pleasures from mingling with other writers, and by simply being a writer, you are already part of the larger writing community, so why not get a little more involved?

You can always start by leaving a comment and sharing your own writing community experiences. Have you found a great online forum or are you looking for one? Did you ever participate in a workshop that changed the way you viewed your work? Do tell!

And keep on writing.