How
and why to Build a Linking Strategy for your Web Site
Why would you want a linking strategy for your site?
The most important reason is to drive traffic to your site, which in turn would
increase visitors that would either purchase from you, make your web site more
popular, or reach a larger audience to inform for your cause. The second
reason to develop a linking strategy for your site is to help increase your
rankings in the search engine. With Google this is very important for
achieving high web rankings, and I expect the other search engines to follow
suit relatively soon.
There are many ways to develop a linking strategy where
the links to your site will multiply without any effort from you. This is
the most effective way to generate links to point to your site. In this
article we will discuss how to do this, debunk myths, and how to do this without
unintentionally harming your site's status.
Debunking myths:
Linking software
I personally don't approve of linking software that does
the work for you. Why? Because the software does not do a good
enough job where it can tell if the site it has the same theme or relative
content that matches your site. Many errors slip through the process when
this is done, that can cause damage to the reputation and rankings in the search
engine. Also each site that you would like to link to you should have a
decent PR ranking from Google to help your site's rankings. (PR ranking is
a method that Google uses to put a value on the web site) If you have too
many web sites pointing to you with a poor PR ranking it could actually make
your site drop in the rankings. And in addition sites with excellent PR
rankings would help your rankings a great deal.
Linking farms and automated link exchanges
Linking farms and automated link exchanges are not
recommended for the same reasons as the linking software. Poor quality
links and potentially harmful to your site. In addition these two methods
carry another danger. If the site that links to has been put onto a black
list for spam, and your site points to that site your web site will
automatically get black listed and your rankings will go down as well.
That is why I prefer one way links to your site instead of reciprocal links.
It may sound hard to do, but it isn't and I will show you a way to do it below.
The more sites pointing to your site the better. Right?
Wrong! In the past search engines would rank you
higher in the search engines by judging the value of your site to the number of
links pointing to it. But because people have abused and try to cheat this
system, the rules have changed. Now they actually penalize you for too
many sites pointing to yours if they are deemed suspicious. For instance
many other sites pointing to you with the same IP address (caused by you putting
up mirror sites to build links), links that point to that do not have the same
content as you ("once I saw a web design site having a reciprocal link with a
lingerie site"), and links that have low PR rankings pointing to your site
(in this case the more the merrier does not work).
"I've seen a site with only 10 links pointing to it (links from government
sites) do better with searches than a site that had over 10,000 links pointing
to it."
Another thing to consider: Google has just bought
rights to register domain names. So, here is a theory of mine that may
show up later. Google may update their algorithm to check links to see if
the domain name those links are registered under contain the same registration
information. This way it could penalize sites that register a bunch of
domain names to point to their site and try to cheat the system.
"The only time you would like a lot of links pointing to your site is if
they are from respectable sites, have a high PR ranking, and have relative
content."
Who links to your site now?
An easy way to find this out is to type in
link:www.yoursite.com into a search engine and you will receive a list of web
sites currently pointing to you.
Are they quality links?
You can use Google toolbar located at their site to read
the PR ranking, an add-on extension for Firefox, or visit a web site that will
tell you the PR rankings of sites that you type in. If you type in page
ranking tool in the search engines you'll find plenty of resources for this.
Who links to your competitors that are high in the search engines?
Examine and study the links to and from your competitors
web site to learn more. And request links from the same people for your
site.
How do I build links pointing to my site?
These are a list of ways to build links to your site that are one way links
instead of reciprocal links. I highly recommend these ways to build a
solid link foundation:
1) Content and more content. Content will increase your rankings in the
search engine and people are more likely to link to you if you have valuable
content. One time I had a large college link to one of the articles at my
site for a research paper. The college had a high PR ranking and the link
is in their archives. (This is a way to have your links multiply without
the effort)
2) Add a link to us page to your web site. Where you can give the
visitors to your site to apply a text link or banner. I recommend a text
link to your site that contains keywords for your site. For example,
web development contractor
would point to my site via hyperlink. (This is a way to have your links multiply
without the effort)
3) Start a blog on your site that people can go to and bookmark for the
latest information in a category that relates to your site. (This is a way to
have your links multiply without the effort)
4) Offer a free helpful 'how to' e-book to give away that has links inside of
it that point to your site. (This is a way to have your links multiply without
the effort)
5) Submit to online directories. Online directories usually have high
PR rankings and get picked up by other directories and web sites to include on
their sites.
6) Write a testimonial for a site you like that has the same relative content
as yours. Chances are that if you praise their site and sign it with a
link (to your site) of who praised them they will post it on their site giving
you a free one way link.
7) Create a free article directory asking people to submit articles to your
site, and in exchange for posting their articles on your site have them post a
link on their web site stating where their article can be found. (your
site) I've seen people put a list of where there article can be found to
impress the visitors on how popular they are. (This is a way to have your links
multiply without the effort)
8) Lastly, and most importantly write articles yourself! When I wrote
my first article I submitted it to 25 places. (places with higher traffic
views) and the next day over 180 sites were pointing to my web site, because I
had a nice keyword enriched link pointing to my site in the article. The
next day the total was over 300. How do you find out if they are pointing
to your site? Type in your article title in quotes into the search engines
and then you'll find out how many sites are posting your article on their site.
(This is a way to have your links multiply without the effort)