Archive for October 29th, 2007

Link Building Is A Science

Link building is turning into a science. Link Building is still the most important item on an SEO’s check list because it plays a huge role in gaining organic traffic. It takes great effort and hours of experimentation to get the link building process right.
Search engines weigh each site that links to you. For [...]

Link building is turning into a science. Link Building is still the most important item on an SEO’s check list because it plays a huge role in gaining organic traffic. It takes great effort and hours of experimentation to get the link building process right.

Search engines weigh each site that links to you. For example, if CNN linked to you, that would weigh much heavier than RANDOM-WEBSITE-THAT-NO-ONE-KNOWS.com linking to you. You can go to www.google.com and type in link:www.yourwebsite.com to find out which sites are linking to you. I suggest looking at this every information every three to four months because it usually takes Google a few months to index links.

I always have members ask why Google only lists five-ten link backs when in reality they have hundreds. Google is clamping down on bad links and for this reason, they will only show links that are extremely related and worthy of being shown. You need to find the right mix of link partners. Create content on your site that will make websites want to link to you.

Google is very picky when it decides which links are important. For this reason, you will need to carefully examine the sites that you link with. I would go over a check list every time you receive a link request. Preparation and careful planning will lead to better search engine rankings in the long run. Keep in mind, it is not about the number of links you have, but about the quality. Here is a sample checklist I use when requesting /receiving links:

• Does the site have good quality content? Do they have well written articles with beneficial information?
• Do they have a niche links directory? For example, if they own a site about dogs, do they have a links directory that has niche directories such as Dog Food, Dog Clothing etc, or do they have a links directory with directories such as Clothing, Computers etc.
• Is the website a link farm? Are they linking to every site in the world? Stay away fro these!
• Is their content relevant to yours?
• Will this link benefit your end users? Will they actually visit the website or are you posting a link to the site for the sake of SEO.

Link building is becoming a science because it’s no longer a numbers game, its purely a quality game and finding the right mix. You will need to experiment and find out what works for you. Stay niche and stay related.

October 25th - Google PR Update

Pagerank has been affected for many sites. Some have been positively affected but many have been negatively affected. We are having many reports from both ends of the spectrum.
Again, we have always advised our clients to not use Pagerank as the measure for exchanging links. Use high quality content as a measure instead. Looks for [...]

Pagerank has been affected for many sites. Some have been positively affected but many have been negatively affected. We are having many reports from both ends of the spectrum.

Again, we have always advised our clients to not use Pagerank as the measure for exchanging links. Use high quality content as a measure instead. Looks for long term results!