A Guide to Better Link
Popularity - by
John
Buchanan
Over the past year or two,
one thing has become extremely clear...the need for link
popularity. Every major engine weighs the link popularity of
sites heavily when ranking sites. At least one major engine
even claims they won't index sites that don't have at least
one link pointing to them from another site.
Unfortunately, building link popularity can be one of the
most challenging aspects of search engine promotion. It's
tedious, boring, extremely time consuming, and ABSOLUTELY
essential.
That being said, let's go over some things you should and
shouldn't do when beginning your link popularity campaign.
We'll start first with the "shouldn't" list so we can get
those out of the way and focus on what will actually work.
*Don't bother with FFA pages. They worked at one time but
now most engines have learned to filter out FFA pages, and
even if they don't your link will most probably rotate off
the results page in a matter of minutes, but you can
guarantee that your email address will remain in their
database for YEARS.
*Don't join link farms. These were a good idea once as well,
but have come under heavy fire by the engines over the past
year.
*Don't use hidden links with the goal of building your link
popularity. I'm of the opinion that one or two throughout a
site is no big deal, but don't go overboard with them.
*Don't use free classifieds to get your URL out there. You
are just asking to receive mass amounts of junk mail.
Ok...now that we know some of the things NOT to do, let's
get down to some things that you can do to build your link
popularity.
*The first thing you should do is to get your site listed in
the "Big 3" directories. Those are Yahoo, LookSmart, and the
ODP. Yes, Yahoo and LookSmart are expensive (even more so
since their recent price increases), but one link from each
of them can go a long way in boosting your link popularity.
*Next you should concentrate on finding sites that are of a
similar nature to yours and approach them about linking to
you. Stay away from off-topic sites. Links from sites of the
same theme as yours help to reinforce your theme and further
help in boosting your search engine rankings. Be creative in
your thinking. Attempt to develop a list of all the
different types of sites that relate to yours. Once you have
this list you can then begin to search for those specific
types of sites.
*Create a link page listing all of the sites that you wish
to link to you. By linking to the sites you are going to be
contacting first, they will be more likely to link back to
you when you contact them.
*Search for smaller vertical directories to submit your site
to. There are thousands of these directories out there. A
good place to start is at:
*One often overlooked trick is to find similar sites that
use guestbooks and forums. If you can find these you will
often be able to post a message and include your URL. Be
careful with this. Some forums don't allow the posting of
URL's so check out their rules of etiquette first.
*Testimonials of products can also be a good way to get your
URL out. Consider writing a testimonial of a product you've
used. Include your name and URL at the bottom. Email the
testimonial to the site owner. Site owner's are ALWAYS
looking for testimonials as it increases buyer confidence
and most likely they will be happy to post your testimonial.
*Writing articles on your topic can also be a great way to
get your URL out. Write an article and include your URL in
the bio at the end of the article. Once written submit it to
related areas around the web such as E-zines etc. Most of
these publications also keep web-based archive of articles
that the search engines will eventually spider.
*One product I have personally used is a program called
Zeus. This program can dramatically reduce the time involved
in finding sites similar to yours. There is a bit of a
learning curve to it, but once you understand it and have it
up and running, it is a definite time saver. The program is
designed to automate the entire task of finding sites,
contacting them, and building a link system for those sites,
but many people use it just to help them locate the sites so
they can personally contact them.
*If you don't think you have the time to devote to this
consider hiring a professional to do the work for you. I
have personally worked with a company called LinkageXpress
and had great results. They have different price plans
depending on the number of links you want. For more
information on them visit the following URL:
*Finally, don't forget to link from your site to other
related and important sites. This is also taken into account
by the engines.
Yes, it can be a bit of a task, but it is an absolute
necessity in todayıs search engine era. Stick to the above
guideline and with a little work, effort, and time, you
should be sitting pretty.
Good Luck and Happy Linking!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Buchanan is the author of the book "The Insider's
Guide to Dominating The Search Engines", and publisher of
"The Search Engine Bulletin", a FREE monthly newsletter.
Visit him at
http://www.se-secrets.com for more information or to
sign up for the newsletter.
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