TheLearner: When Scoble linked to me.

Nice chart! I love helping other people get traffic. I remember working for a guy who would tell me "never link to anyone else." Why? Cause they thought that would mean that would cause readers to leave and never come back.

See, this is the core belief behind weblogging. Link to other things and people. Even your competition.

Even people who don't like the company you work for.

What does that do? It makes you an authority. Someone people want to check out and read. Someone who has credibility.

Not to mention, you show up in their referer logs, you send them Google Juice and Technorati Power, and that usually gets their attention (not to mention that smart marketers are watching Feedster, PubSub, and Technorati for mentions of their product, their name, and their technologies).

It also does something even more crazy than that, though. It builds community. In a way that opening a Web forum or joining a newsgroup never has. Why is that? Because people love being noticed. Dave Sifry, founder of Technorati, told me once that getting a link is like receiving a gift. It's a social gesture.

It's also one that very few people and companies pick up on.

Try it, link to your favorite 10 bloggers (or the 10 bloggers you hate the most, for that matter -- I'd rather see that list, actually). Say something about them. Click on each link. And see what happens.