Links into your website (inbound links) See “Filthy Linking Rich”, are the most important aspect of SEO behind quality content. See Content is King
Rule 1
- Get links from web pages that are read by the audience you want
Rule 2
- Buy links if visitors that come solely from the link will justify the cost
Rule 3
- Link to sites because you want your visitors to know about them
Rule #1 is important. Find the pages that people you want to reach visit.
1. Look at your competition, see what links they have through the Google Toolbar, MSN Search* or Yahoo Search** (don’t value the links they paid for – Rule #2).
2. Analyze their content, structure, meta structure and such.
3. See who Google and Yahoo associates them with***.
Rule #2 is self explanatory.
Rule #3 is another important thing to understand. The search engines do not judge you by the websites that link to you (why should they? you can’t control others). But, you can control who you link to! Reciprocal links can help you build your site, but you must remember, “When you link, so goes your reputation.” Mike Grehan (loose translation but accurate). You link to another website when you want search engines to associate your site with theirs, so if the website you are linking to is not really valuable, then don’t link to it. (see other posts about the “no follow” tag)
The best way to be:
“Build a better site and links will come!”
Let me lay it out in terms most will understand:
“If you link to a useless site, now your site is a useless site too!”
Getting Better Links:
Directories (pay for them if they are valuable)
Search Engines
Find Better Resources for Linking Strategies:
Eric Ward
Mike Grehan
A note about PageRank: is not a true “value” of a page, just an indicator! (see old posts)
* – in the search query enter link:www.yourwebsite.com
** – in the search query enter link:www.yourwebsite.com
*** – in the search query enter related:www.yourwebsite.com
Related Posts >>
- Alexa.com
- The Top 13 Posts for 2006 from Build a Better Website
- MSN vs Link Exchanges
- Linking Strategies
- pittfall on twitter
