Link Bait Hall of Fame

Beer That’s Good for You

“Did you know that science has now proven that -BLANK- is actually good for you?” or “…that science has now produced a –BLANK- that’s actually healthy?” These are sure-fire attention-grabbers (especially when it’s true). So are pieces on drugs and alcohol. Here we find an artful comingling of both devices. And it’s actual news no [...]

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15 Ways to Hack Your Brain

Self-improvement is a cornerstone of so many internet trends. From weight-loss to productivity to happiness, many of the most successful and enduring online ventures involve helping people to better themselves. We’re all desperate to be healthier, happier, richer, sexier, smarter, more effective and skillful and successful in our endeavors…and so on. Along those lines, here’s a [...]

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The new superfruits

WebMD in partnership with Prevention Magazine has done it again, publishing (or repurposing, really) another piece that captures the zeitgeist, in this case: our unquenchable yearning for “magic bullet” solutions. Add the word “super” in front of anything and you instantly catch the public’s attention. What is a super-car or a super-building or a super-cinema? Elevating [...]

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Ergonomic Laptop Stand Made From a Coat Hanger

Here is an example of How-To link bait done to the hilt. Notice the subject matter – making something useful out of something cheap and readily available. Those are some of the best How-To’s. Notice too the excellent use of images and pop-ups to enhance the lesson. The trick to successful How-To link bait is finding [...]

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Break out the bubbly: White wine may be good for you

In this piece, New Scientist takes a page out of WebMD’s book and reports on how something we thought was bad for us may actually be good for us. Cool! Don’t you want to go see why? I sure did. Remember all the hullaballoo when red win (in reasonable amounts) was discovered to be good for [...]

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15 Foods That Can Save Your Heart

Avoiding death is a popular subject. So natually a piece on saving yourself from heart disease or a heart attack would be an effective piece of link bait – if done right. First you need authority – which WebMD and Shape Magazine certainly both have. Then you need presentation – which writer Karen Cicero has [...]

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Science of Sleep: 5 Reasons Why You Might Want More of It

This is a well-organized and thoughtful piece that, other than a regrettable error in counting (1, 2, 3, 4…6?) gives people a digestible encapsulation (with references to boot) of why they might want to take certain specific action to improve their health and their lives – in this case, get more sleep. That’s probably why [...]

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Wacky Beauty Tips That Work

Beauty is one of those subjects always on everyone’s mind but rarely spoken about. It’s because we’re obsessed with it – obsessed with looking as beautiful as we possibly can (more really, if we’re going to be truly honest here). So, just like diet fads, people are willing to try any new and novel beauty [...]

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