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BackLinks
It is out of question that quality backlinks are crucial to
SEO success. More, the question is how to get them. While
with on-page content optimization it seems easier because
everything is up to you to do and decide, with backlinks it
looks like you have to rely on others to work for your
success. Well, this is partially true because while
backlinks are links that start on another site and point to
yours, you can discuss with the Web master of the other site
details like the anchor text, for example. Yes, it is not
the same as administering your own sites – i.e. you do not
have total control over backlinks – but still there are many
aspects that can be negotiated.
Getting Backlinks the Natural Way
The idea behind including backlinks as part of the page rank
algorithm is that if a page is good, people will start
linking to it. And the more backlinks a page has, the
better. But in practice it is not exactly like this. Or at
least you cannot always rely on the fact that your contents
is good and people will link to you. Yes, if your content is
good and relevant you can get a lot of quality backlinks,
including from sites with similar topic as yours (and these
are the most valuable kind of backlinks, especially if the
anchor text contains your keywords) but what you get without
efforts could be less than what you need to successfully
promote your site. So, you will have to resort to other ways
of acquiring quality backlinks as described next.
Ways to Build Backlinks
Even if plenty of backlinks come to your site the natural
way, additional quality backlinks are always welcome and the
time you spend building them is not wasted. Among the
acceptable ways of building quality backlinks are getting
listed in directories, posting in forums, blogs and article
directories. The unacceptable ways include inter-linking
(linking from one site to another site, which is owned by
the same owner or exists mainly for the purpose to be a link
farm), linking to spam sites or sites that host any kind of
illegal content, purchasing links in bulk, linking to link
farms, etc.
The first step in building backlinks is to find the places
from which you can get quality backlinks. A valuable
assistant in this process is the Backlink Builder tool. When
you enter the keywords of your choice, the Backlink Builder
tool gives you a list of sites where you can post an
article, message, posting, or simply a backlink to your
site. After you have the list of potential backlink
partners, it is up to you to visit each of the sites and
post your content with the backlink to your site in it.
You might wonder why sites as those, listed by the Backlink
Builder tool provide such a precious asset as backlinks for
free. The answer is simple – they need content for their
site. When you post an article, or submit a link to your
site, you do not get paid for this. You provide them for
free with something they need – content – and in return they
also provide you for free with something you need – quality
backlinks. It is a free trade, as long as the sites you post
your content or links are respected and you don't post fake
links or content.
Getting Listed in Directories
If you are serious about your Web presence, getting listed
in directories like DMOZ and Yahoo is a must – not only
because this is a way to get some quality backlinks for
free, but also because this way you are easily noticed by
both search engines and potential visitors. Generally
inclusion in search directories is free but the drawback is
that sometimes you have to wait a couple of months before
you get listed in the categories of your choice.
Forums and Article Directories
Generally search engines index forums so posting in forums
and blogs is also a way to get quality backlinks with the
anchor text you want. If the forum or blog is a respected
one, a backlink is valuable. However, in some cases the
forum or blog administrator can edit your post, or even
delete it if it does not fit into the forum or blog policy.
Also, sometimes administrators do not allow links in posts,
unless they are relevant ones. In some rare cases (which are
more an exception than a rule) the owner of a forum or a
blog would have banned search engines from indexing it and
in this case posting backlinks there is pointless.
While forum postings can be short and do not require much
effort, submitting articles to directories can be more
time-consuming because generally articles are longer than
posts and need careful thinking while writing them. But it
is also worth and it is not so difficult to do.
Content Exchange and Affiliate Programs
Content exchange and affiliate programs are similar to the
previous method of getting quality backlinks. For instance,
you can offer to interested sites RSS feeds for free. When
the other site publishes your RSS feed, you will get a
backlink to your site and potentially a lot of visitors, who
will come to your site for more details about the headline
and the abstract they read on the other site.
Affiliate programs are also good for getting more visitors
(and buyers) and for building quality backlinks but they
tend to be an expensive way because generally the affiliate
commission is in the range of 10 to 30 %. But if you have an
affiliate program anyway, why not use it to get some more
quality backlinks?
News Announcements and Press Releases
Although this is hardly an everyday way to build backlinks,
it is an approach that gives good results, if handled
properly. There are many sites (for instance, here is a list
of some of them) that publish for free or for a fee news
announcements and press releases. A professionally written
press release about an important event can bring you many,
many visitors and the backlink from a respected site to
yours is a good boost to your SEO efforts. The tricky part
is that you cannot release press releases if there is
nothing newsworthy. That is why we say that news
announcements and press releases are not a commodity way to
build backlinks.
Backlink Building Practices to Avoid
One of the practices that is to be avoided is link exchange.
There are many programs, which offer to barter links. The
principle is simple – you put a link to a site, they put a
backlink to your site. There are a couple of important
things to consider with link exchange programs. First, take
care about the ratio between outbound and inbound links. If
your outbound links are times your inbound, this is bad.
Second (and more important) is the risk that your link
exchange partners are link farms. If this is the case, you
could even be banned from search engines, so it is too risky
to indulge in link exchange programs.
Linking to suspicious places is something else that you must
avoid. While it is true that search engines do not punish
you if you have backlinks from such places because it is
supposed that you have no control over what bad guys link
to, if you enter a link exchange program with the so called
bad neighbors and you link to them, this can be disastrous
to your SEO efforts. For more details about bad neighbors,
check the Bad Neighborhood article. Also, beware of getting
tons of links in a short period of time because this still
looks artificial and suspicious.
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