Lately, I've been re-reading the masterpieces about creating link-worthy content. It is sometimes useful to recall what you know to be more efficient. Thus, you may as well either remember what you've heard about linkbait or learn new things from the links below.

What is link-bait?

Nowadays, link-bait is some kind of content, created with the intent of getting links. Most effective link-baits are build on delivering great content, tools and such.

But back in the days linkbait was just another word for 'link-worthy content'. And in my opinion, that's what a good website should have: something amazingly useful for the audience, links or no links.

How to get links with content?

Thus, when you read the articles below (and you may be familiar with some of them), you should first remember about your audience, visitors, potential customers and whoever you may be running the site for. You need to know your audience and create something they desperately need and can use, with your help. That'll get some attention.

The posts below list various ways that you can go to create great content for your people.

Notes on Link Baiting

"The Art of Link-bait" (one of the first and best posts on link-baiting) by Chris Garret
"How to turn link-posts into link-bait" (because no-one links to the linkers-only)
""Can't we all get a widget?"
"20 Link-baiting Techniques" from Darren Rowse
The secret of search engine ranking
Creating Content that Appeals to a Link-Savvy Audience
Making a Site Link Friendly
Every Site is Link-bait & Linkerati Worthy
"Identifying the linkerati" by SEOmoz
Link Bait Hooks from Todd Malicoat
"SEO advice: link bait and linkbaiting" from Matt Cutts
Andy Hagan's Guide to Link Baiting
10 Sure-Fire Formulas that Work from CopyBlogger
"Can you compete with industrial strength link-baiting?"
"Enormous link bait list" (a nice link-bait in itself)
"Write with emotions to create great linkbait" by Lyndon Antcliff
"The Tao of the link-baiting method" by Lyndon Antcliff
66 ways to build links
How to Make Viral Link-baits Work: Four Characteristics of Success
How to Get Strong Referral Traffic from Social Websites: A Simple Linkbait Tactic

Spreading the value

Some link-bait attempts are simply aimed at gathering links, either by running a contest of sorts, spreading a badge or simply asking people to link to you (mostly works on blogs).

A good example of this could be this very post of Jim Boykin, who's running a contest to anyone, who links to that very post. The winner will get We Build Pages prizes and $720 worth of ads.

While some people think that linkbait is focused on links, yours should really be focused on creating value on your website for your visitors. Needless to say, spreading the news about the content is quite an important step of benefiting from it.

Usually, it involves:

your friends, contacts, etc
on-topic forums
various social sites
popular industry bloggers
industry journals

Ideally, the content should spread itself. But it doesn't happen. You need to share your great value with others - only with this attitude you can succeed.

Once your site gets popular on one of the social sites, it may get popular on another, because many people have accounts there, too.

While I am not savvy enough to talk about my experience of spreading link-worthy content (I should be doing more of this, really), some of the articles have sufficient information for you to get your toes wet.

Examples of great content

Sometimes, it is better to see, than to hear a story 100 times. Here are some examples of well-written content and successful promotion:

"10 Brilliant Examples of Link-bait"
"Anatomy of a Super Digg" from a SEOmoz contributor
"Talking about link-bait" from SEOmoz
Creative ads and explanation (the post itself has some analysis too)

As you might notice from the examples, the posts/tools are so great, that they were naturally accepted by the audience. Perhaps, some authors only wanted links. But the rules of the game are that only valuable information/tools get popular, because the people want to read/use them. In the end, only the quality matters - and how you distribute it, too.

Conclusion

No matter what other webmasters say about 'links, more links and linkbaiting', you'd rather still be focused on creating something valuable for your audience. Only in this case you'll find unique ways of delivering value that others haven't thought about. Links come after value, not visa versa.