Special Link Love + I Want to Link to You Too!

I thought I'd do a special post to thank and share link love back with the bloggers who have so kindly helped promote my entry to Marketing Pilgrim's 3rd Annual SEM Scholarship Contest. But there's still 3 weeks before the contest closes, so there's still time for YOU to link to 8 Stupid Things Webmasters Do To Mess Up Their Analytics. I promise to add you to this list in return, just fire me an email at linda.bustos AT elasticpath.com.

Don't have a blog? You can join the 65 people who have bookmarked the post in del.icio.us.

On with the THANK YOUs...

• The first to share the link with readers was Jure Cuhalev, a hacker-slash-linux-lover-slash-usability-expert. Jure's currently the User experience and Community manager at Web 2.0 startup Zemanta. (Sounds a bit like "semantic?") Zemanta is a blogging add-on that picks related posts to link to your posts, and it determined Jure's Building Websites with Findability in Mind was related to 8 Stupid Things Webmasters Do To Mess Up Their Analytics (8STWDTMUTA for short). Thanks, Zemanta!

• Next up was Kyle James who kindly included 8STWDTMUTA in his weekly link roundup on Friday, May 30. He also submitted it to Sphinn and it went hot! So big thanks to you, Kyle. As the .eduGuru, Kyle applies his Internet marketing know-how to his role as Webmaster at Wofford College, his alma mater.

• Another link roundup included 8STWDTMUTA on May 30, this time from Ken Jones of the SEOpsCenter Blog. Ken is experienced in SEO for online retail, and blogs about what he learns as he learns it - you may just want to subscribe and join Ken for the ride.

• Short but sweet, Usability Engineer with Maas Global Solutions Ann Krause linked to the post from her World of Usability blog. She also linked to Nipping FUDDs in the Bud from What's a FUDD?. So double thank yous, Ann!

• Active Get Elastic commenter and Google Analytics user, John Joubert linked to S8 from
  Google Analytics Tweaks: Must Read for Any Site Owner. John is a 3rd year business management student at the University of Pretoria, in South Africa. He also runs his own e-store, Metatech. From what I gather, he's also available for consulting projects.

• I was honored to get 2 links from Matt McGee's May '08 Best Search/Marketing Posts for S8 and PPC Copywriting: The Evolution of a PPC Split Test. Matt's a search marketing expert for hire, specializing in small business (hence his blog Small Business SEM.) He's also a regular fixture of Search Engine Strategies and Search Marketing Expo conferences (and a speaker so he knows his stuff), and I look forward to meeting Matt at SES San Jose should I win the SEM Scholarship Grand Prize.

• Next is great example of the value of links. Andrew Careaga, an education blogger, discovered the link through Kyle James' blog and also linked to it from his blog Higher Ed Marketing. One of Andrew's readers, Eddie Merille, then forwarded it to his "web guys."Andrew is the the director of communications for Missouri University of Science and Technology. He's also an ambidextruous guitar player who at one time drove a 1964 Dodge Dart - metallic sky blue.

So thank you once more to all of you who have voted with your mouse and headed over to Marketing Pilgrim to read the full article, emailed the link to friends, bookmarked it, blogged it, Stumbled it, Twittered it or however you share content with friends and colleagues. I pledge that should I win this contest, the knowledge I gain from the entire prize package will be shared with you through Get Elastic, no doubt.