SEO Link
Building
Link building is one of the most important
factors of Search Engine Optimization (SEO), as Search Engine
algorithms take into account when determining the relevancy and,
indirectly, page rank of a site on Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).
How it Works:
Because there are too many websites for critics
to visit and individually rank, Google has developed an algorithm
that ranks sites based on a number of factors deemed representative
of a ‘consumer friendly’ site. One such factor is the number of
backlinks (links from other sites) that a site has received. It is
Google’s belief that user-beneficial sites will be linked to more
often than sites that are not beneficial and do not add value to the
‘web’. Initially, the algorithms only took into account the number
of backlinks; however, due to abuse of this system, Google and other
Search Engines were forced to develop more effective algorithms that
now determine not only the number of backlinks, but the number of
quality, relevant backlinks.
What is a Relevant Backlink?
A relevant backlink is a link that connects to
your site from a credible and relevant source. The most credible
sources are those with .edu and .gov domain names, next is .org, and
finally are .com and .net. Therefore, a link from a .edu rank of 3
may well be more valuable than a link from a .com of 4.
You may be thinking of writing a mass email and
sending it to every webmaster on the internet and requesting a back
link to your site. This would be a wonderfully useless addition to
already abundant email spam, as you would receive few links and even
fewer links that would actually help the rank of your page. Relevant
links come from sites with relevant material. If you sell cars and
get 100 links from boat dealerships, you’ve wasted 100 links.
However, if you sell cars and receive 10 links from 10 different
car brands, you’ve received 10 credible links. In order to build
relevant links, you’ll need to develop a linking campaign.
Your Linking Campaign
Step 1) Create an email template
You’ll be sending out plenty of emails to
webmasters who run relevant websites, so it’s good to have a
template from which to customize each individual email.
A template should look something like this:
Hello (name if available),
I was browsing the web and came upon your
website,
http://www.website.com.
My website,
http://www.yourwebsite.com, provides services (or product) that
your customers may be interested in purchasing.
(a sentence about yourself and what you do) I
was wondering if you would be interested in posting a link to my
website.
Please feel free to copy and paste the
following information to your website. This link would be an
excellent addition to the links section of your website:
<P> <FONT FACE="ARIAL" SIZE=2><A HREF="http://www.yourwebsite.com"><B>My
Website – Providing services and products relevant to your web
site!</B></A></FONT> <BR>
Thank you,
Your name
Your company
Remember, each email must be custom tailored
for each website…webmasters are much more responsive to emails from
individuals who have clearly spent the time to learn about their
site.
Step 2) Finding Sites
There are numerous ways to find sites:
Run a Search Engine Search for relevant sites.
If you run a car dealership, try typing ‘car dealerships’ in
Google. However, I recommend first typing ‘car dealerships
site:.edu’ into Google, as the results will list only .edu pages.
Contact any relevant webmasters (perhaps those who list student
friendly car dealerships) then repeat the search for other keyword
phrases, with the site:.edu at the end of the phrase. Repeat this
process for .gov and .org sites.
Check out who is linking to your top
competitors. Determine who your top competitors are and type in
their URL here:
http://www.webmaster-toolkit.com/link-popularity-checker.shtml
Click on the resulting numbers for a list of sites that link to your
competitors. Send emails to relevant webmasters.
Go to http://www.DMOZ.org and click on
reference, then click on directories. You will be provided with a
list of directories. Find relevant directories and submit your
site.
Remember, you are mostly interested in quality
sites with Page ranks of 3+. Only link to lower ranking sites if
you think they’ll increase in page rank.
Step 3) Follow Up
Keep track of the webmasters you contact and
occasionally type your site into the link popularity checker (link
above). After 2-3 months, contact webmasters that have not yet
listed your site.
**Please click the following links if you are
interested our editing /
writing services or to hire a
freelance proofreader.
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