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Link Popularity |
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Link building is the process of establishing links from other sites to yours. It is the number of external links that links to your site. Search engines value links from other relevant websites to yours; they effectively see them as a referral or recommendation. If you have more quality links to your site than your competitors have to theirs you will generally rank higher than they do.
Link building can be a very time-consuming and difficult task, though its importance is difficult to overstate. It requires hard work and consistent efforts. It is one of the most typical and time consuming process, but plays a major and important role to boost your Search Engine Rankings. |
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Benefits of Link Building |
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A properly executed link building campaign will help boost your ranking with many search engines, but this is only part of the benefit. The quality sites that have agreed to link to you will also send you highly relevant traffic. Also, your brand and name will become better known within your industry as a result of the link requests that you make. Finally, your additions to Yahoo and the Open Directory will send you a great deal of additional quality traffic. Link building is a laborious process, but if done properly it is most definitely worth the effort. Maximizing the number of web sites that link to your web site is one of the most important factors to successful online marketing. An effective linking strategy establishes your site in the online marketplace that already exists for your industry.
The key benefits of link building are:- |
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Increasing Link Popularity - most search engines place huge emphasis on 'Link Popularity' when determining a sites ranking. Your sites Link Popularity is determined by the number of incoming links to your site - so the more incoming links, the greater priority your site will be given in the search engine rankings. This logic is based on the principle that if your website is of a high quality, more and more websites would want to link to you. |
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Driving Relevant Traffic - simply having incoming links will drive relevant traffic to your web site. |
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| Brand Building - increasing the number of incoming links from quality web sites will build brand awareness and trust in your company or brand. |
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Types of Links |
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There can be three ways of Building links to your site: |
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Reciprocal/Two way linking: This is the most commonly used link building techniques. Here two websites of similar theme comes to a mutual understanding of exchanging links. This is one of the easier practices to boost your Search Engine rankings and is also known as ‘link swapping’ or ‘link exchanges’.
Getting quality link is very important in case of Reciprocal Link Building . In other words we can say that this is a kind of Barter System, where you offer something in return. While you are offering something to webmaster, you can expect a better quality links in return.
If we define the quality of Reciprocal Links, this should contain the following parameters: |
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Theme Relevance : Sites you are approaching for Reciprocal/Two way Linking must be similar to the theme of your site. You will not get any benefit of asking link from ‘software’ site and in return offering back a link from ‘shopping’ site. Moreover this will increase the chances of getting your site banned by Google or other Search. |
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Decent Page Rank : Getting links from the site with better Page Rank gives you more benefit than having link exchange with the site with low page Rank. Most of the sites asking for links are either new or have low Page Rank. Than how this is possible? There is no thumb rule behind. In Link building Luck also plays a very important role.
If your site is having a good content or search engine friendly, than there are higher chances of getting desired link back to your site even if you have a low page rank. |
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One way linking |
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One way links are a backward links to your site from the sites those have not received any link back from your side. Isn’t it strange that you are asking for something in this commercial minded world and in return you are not offering them any thing?
So far this has been considered as a toughest job in link building. But fortunately or unfortunately, one way linking is the best way to boost your search engine rankings. Since other websites are recommending your site without any personal greed, Search Engines believe that your site will add maximum value to customers.
Long term output is another advantage that one way linking offer! Since one way linked sites offer tremendous value it is more likely to be stay there for a longer period of time unlike reciprocal links. Website owners add these links because they think that it is a value add to the user experience. Reciprocal links could be dropped when it no longer suits to the website’s linking strategy.
One-way link building means hard work and long term determination to achieve good link popularity. By improving the quality of your website, you improve the chance to obtain good quality natural links. Spend a set amount of time each week to seek out quality one-way links to achieve your goal. By using this long-term game plan you will be able to safely build links for optimum link popularity success. |
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Triangular/Three way Link Building |
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We have always heard of this thing that every problem has a solution. As mentioned above that one way link building is the most typical link building exercise. Some smart webmasters have introduced the technique of Triangular Link Building . Proven t be a great technique, this exercise can easily manipulate reciprocal linking into one way linking.
In Triangular Link Building , we request the webmaster to place our link at his website and in return we will not place his link at the site whose link has been added by him, instead we will add his link to some other related site or directory. This will solves the purpose of one way links for both the parties. Both of them will get one way link in a kind. |
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Steps to Proceed with Link Building : |
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Before entering Link Building there is a basic groundwork to do.
Site Analysis: As any other campaign site analysis is very important. You must spend at least 15-20 minutes in understanding the theme of the site. What site is all about? Who all are the competitors of the site?
Database Creation: Once you are through with the competition analysis, start thinking and maintaining the database of the sites you feel will add maximum value to your site if the link exchange is matured. Having a good database is very important to proceed with the link exchange campaign and that can be created, first, by analyzing the back links of the competitor sites and secondly by giving some commands in Search engines Google/Yahoo/MSN etc.
Always be sure to use exact phrases or keywords while searching prospective link partners. You can also take help of overture or other keyword search software to find some more relevant matches to that keyword.
Letter Format: Now here comes a most important part of link building. While creating a link request letter make sure that you are related at least to some degree with the site you are asking, and tell them how and where it is of benefit to their viewers.
Some webmasters have more than one site. Writing a general letter without mentioning the exact URL of the site you wish to exchange link might confuse them and they will not give you any responses on your efforts. Always mention what site you want to link with by name and URL, that way there is no question in the mind of site holder.
If you plan on putting their link up but have not yet, say so, tell them how long it will be and where it will be, and if its already up, send them the URL to the page its on. If you have posted a link to a site, write a nice letter asking the site holder if they would mind reciprocating, if your site is one they like, is related, and you’re polite about it, most site holders will. |
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What Your Link Request Should Contain and Why? |
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A link request sent via email should include several elements. Collectively, all of them serve two key purposes: They let the receiver know you took the time to look at his or her site, and they make it as easy as possible for the receiver to make a decision whether or not to link.
Here are the 12 things that your link request should contain: |
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- Your Request letter must contain the relevant subject like ‘Website Link Request’ or ‘Link Submission’
- The site owner's name. It seems simple, but takes the time to look through the site where you want the link, and find the site owner's name. Address this person immediately in your email, so he or she knows you're not a spammer.
- Your name. Again, it's just common courtesy. The person requesting a link is a human being and so are you. A first line like "Hello, Mr. Ward. My name is John Smith" tells me that at least this person has taken the time to find out who was running my web site and is nice enough to tell me who he or she is.
- The home page URL for the site. "I have been spending some time looking at your site at http://[insert their URL]."
- Your site's name and home page URL. "I am contacting you about my site, called 'Site Name,' which is located at http://www.SiteName.com."
- The exact URL on their site where you think the link is a fit. "With regard to your links section at. [Insert exact URL of their links area/section]."
- A paragraph that describes your site and why you feel its link worthy. "I would like to submit for your consideration my site, which I feel is a nice match for your collection of links. My site is..."
- The exact URL from your site you want them to link to. "Since I have a splash page that has some large images, you may prefer to use this URL for linking: http://www.SiteName.com/home2.html."
- A valid email address and response to any requests made to that address. "If you would like to contact me about this, please feel free to reach me at my personal email address below." (Put your email address.)
- Your phone number. "Or, if you prefer, you can also call me at this phone number: [put your phone number]."
And, if you are seeking a link on a site where a reciprocal link is required, also include:
- Confirmation that you have added a link to their site. "I have already placed a link to your site."
- The URL on your site where they can see the link to their site "that you can see at http://www.SiteName.com/links.html.
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Below is a sample of what a full link-request email would look like.
Bob,
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My name is Eric Ward, and I am contacting you regarding your Birding site at http://www.millcomm.com/ekblad/Index.htm.
I'm working with eNature.com to announce and link a new section on their site called "The Bird Audio Database." nature is located at http://www.enature.com, and the new bird audio section is located at http://www.enature.com/audio/audio_home.asp.
Per the link request instructions on your site, I would like to request a link to our bird audio section in your Links to Birding Web Sites section at http://www.millcomm.com/ekblad/Link-Gen.htm.
Please let me know if the above provides you with the information you need to review and consider our new section for linking. I can be reached via email at ericward@urlwire.com, or, if you'd like to talk about this by phone, my direct number is (865) 637-2438.
I have also subscribed to your e-newsletter and look forward to receiving it.
Best wishes,
Eric Ward, for eNature.com
mailto:ericward@urlwire.com |
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Have Multiple Sites? |
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The most common practice that executive follows to save their time and efforts is sending multiple links of same theme in one request letter. Believe me this no more than a suicidal. It looks like a spam mail and will bring your success rate down.
Link Building is a game of trust. Webmasters can trust you only once they have experienced your loyalty towards them. One on one, ask them for one link exchange in the beginning. Once they have added your link and in return you have added their link as well based on your commitments, then ask them for other link exchanges and send them 2-3 site details in one letter. This way you will come to know them personally and the chances of getting another site’s links confirmed will be much higher and your success rate will be high. |
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Affects of Jagger Update on Link Building |
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Some of the SEO companies have opted unethical practices like spamming to boost their client’s search engine rankings. To prevent these practices Google frequently change the algorithm for ranking the sites. |
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The latest algorithm update from Google is ‘Jagger’. Jagger was come into the act in September 2005 and still nobody knows what all changes Google has made in the algorithm. However after continuous testing and research SEOs got some insights about the changed algorithm. |
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Here we are talking about its impact on Link Building Strategies. Reciprocal linking was very popular way and still SEOs are using it to build link popularity. But it is not sufficient to prove the relevancy of the page. Reciprocal liking is simply looked as link trading or link exchange. This means you are buying a link or exchanging it with some other link. Google noticed that reciprocal linking technique is being highly misused and just by treading the links, pages are gaining high rankings. |
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Google solved this problem in ‘Jagger’ updates. Now since ‘Jagger’ is introduced, the reciprocal linking is almost vanished on the charts of Google. Google is not considering any reciprocal link for ranking the page. Now post Jagger, quality is more important than quantity. The kind of content you are linking to is more important according to Google. So the reciprocal linking strategy will only be successful if the content you are linking to is high-quality and relevant. |
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Ways Jagger Might Help You |
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| Very relevant links— IBL and outbound link (OBL) relevancy is more important after Jagger. This means that if you point to related sites or you get links from other sites that are related to your site, you may rank better after Jagger, with all other things being equal. |
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| Links from trusted sites help— Trust Rank (or a similar concept) is more important than ever after Jagger. Trust Rank is a concept that says if you get a link pointing to your site that is highly trusted by Google (trusted either programmatically or by human editors), then you will rank better all other things being equal. |
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| Variety of links— Links from .edu and .org sites are good for increasing your rankings and are more important than ever. It's vital to get links form a wide variety of Web sites. Just like your investing, you need to diversify your IBLs. |
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| Aged links— the older the link that points to your site, the more weight it's given now. |
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| Embedded links— Links that are embedded in sentences and paragraphs instead of stand-alone links are weighted more heavily now. |
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