Link Building Tips

Links to a website is basically the measure of how search engines judges a site. Like in an election, the search engines will give their approval and trust to a site that more are linking to.

Be aware that the quantity of links is not the sole identifier of a website’s trustworthiness, but also the quality. A site that has thousands of backlinks from low-quality directories is nothing compared to a site that has a few backlinks from highly trusted websites.

Furthermore, it adds more significance to a site when backlinks use the exact keyword phrase the owner has selected for optimization. One should also take note that there must be variations in the anchor text used in creating links. Same-text links, even if it counts up to 500, will not make much of a difference for search engines.

It is true that link building is a long and tiring task. The key is to remain patient until the slow trickle of sites will turn into regular number of sites linking to your website. To help you achieve this, we have listed a number of helpful tips about link building.

Tell People about Your Website

Until the time that you will see significant results in your optimization, you can still do some other things that are within your control. Buy them dinner, offer them reciprocal links, or babysit for them – it’s your call on how you can get more links, you may get surprised on how effective this method can be.

Analyzing Your Existing Backlinks

Find out the people who are currently linking to you and offer them suggestions for making new ones that link to other relevant parts of your site.

Analyzing the Competition’s Backlinks

Find out the lineup of your competitor site’s backlinks. Try to create connections with these sites in the same manner how your competitor established links with them.

Site Submission to General Directories

Yahoo Directory

There is an annual charge of $299 for a site to pay to be listed in Yahoo’s Directory. If you think that money is worth the result to be gained, then it can be a good investment.

Dmoz Directory

This open content directory ensures that every submission is reviewed by a real person before they accept a site into their directory. It may take months, or in some cases years, before a site gets included. It’s still a good idea to try it though.

Best of the Web

It is a fee-based directory that charges an annual fee of $149.99.

Business.com

It is another fee-based service that lists a website in their directory for $299 a year fee.

Submitting to Same Industry Directories

It is best to submit your site to directories that are similar to our website’s theme. It’s easy to check which directories will be appropriate for your own site by typing in Google “surgeons directory,” if your website‘s theme is about surgeons. There is a related directory available for nearly every industry.

Submitting to Local Directories

When your target audience is local, it is also a good idea to submit your site to directories that operate locally. It’s also a great opportunity to get exposure and increase your backlinks.

Creating Fresh, Good Quality Content

Link building by creating unique content and substantive content is considered to produce the slowest results among link building strategies. However, it can be effective as people would naturally link to a site that they find interesting and offers relevant content. Writing a blog is among the easiest way in getting a headstart.

Writing or Syndicating Articles

You can also write articles and have them syndicated through websites that offer article marketing services.

Offering Freebies

Since people are lured by freebies, you can offer free items in your website such as self-help guides, tools, etc. As long as the campaign does not impact your business model, it can be a good idea since people tend to link to sites that offer things at no cost.

Using Paid Links

Websites that offer backlinks for a charge is a reality, whether we like it or not. If you’re inclined in trying it, make sure that you’re buying natural looking links without traces of link farms or spammers that search engines have difficulty identifying.

Swapping of Links

One of the oldest practices in link building is swapping of links. However, it has lost its appeal to many through the years. It is still a good idea to give this technique a try.

Giving of Testimonials

Try to look for websites that sell certain products and services and offer your testimonials about them. In many cases, these websites will link to your site together with the quoted testimonial that you gave.

Posting to Forums

Forums are not only places for interacting with peers and friends; it can also be used in creating links. A quick way to create links is to include it in your signature, making it visible each time you post in a forum. Be careful to avoid spamming the forum as it could result to negative press defeating the whole purpose of putting the link.

Commenting on Blogs

The comments alone have no bearing on your website’s ranking. The benefit will come from those who will read your comments. If they are well-thought and interesting, your comments will lead people to visit your site and possibly link to it.

Installing a Share Widget

There are widgets that allow any reader to share the content that they have read to different channels, which connect to their family, friends, and peers. Services such as Share This makes it easier to share anybody’s webpage to various social networking and bookmarking sites.

Getting into Social Networks

There are a number of social networking sites that can be helpful in building links for your own website

Facebook
Twitter
Linked In
Digg

If You’re Done Building Links for Your Website…

Then we would like to congratulate you for completing this guide on keyword research, SEO, and link building strategies.

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