Link building can be time consuming, frustrating and often
confusing. However, link building is a huge part of SEO and
necessary for your site to reach top ranks in the search engine
results pages. Aren't familiar with link building? No problem.
Read on to learn why link building is important and how you can
build links to your site, improve your link popularity and
raise your search engine page rank.
Why is increasing links important? When other sites link to your
site it directs visitors to it and also shows Google and other
search engines that you are a legitimate site that's worthy of
some attention. However, the sites that link to you must be
relevant to your site. The other site's topic must be related to
yours otherwise Google will see it as dishonest, black hat SEO
or spam.
When you have a significant number of relevant links that lead
back to your site, you build your online reputation which in
turn, will improve your page rank on the search results pages.
Increasing your page rank will allow potential customers to see
you, rather than your competition, when they search for certain
keywords that are relevant to your business. This will help grow
your business and boost your profit. However, the question
remains, how do you get relevant sites to link to you? Here are
a few things you can do to urge others to link to you.
Create and Maintain a Blog
A blog is a way to write about industry news, engage readers
about your business and speak to your customers and potential
customers in a conversational tone. When you write a blog, link
keywords back to your business's Web site. The more blog posts
you write, the more relevant links are going back to your site.
Also when you post great content on your blog, others will come
across it and want to link back to what you wrote. Link to other
relevant blogs and comment on them to urge those blog owners to
view your blog. This increases the chance that they will link
back to you.
Submit Your Site to Link Directories
A big part of link building in the SEO world is submitting to
link directories. Many link directories are free to submit to
and as long as you submit to a relevant category the link
directory will accept your request and link to your site. You
can also use Craigslist to place a classified ad. Another link
building tool is a topical Squidoo page, where you can link to
expert documents and other useful tools in your field and also
create a link back to your site. You can also submit a story to
social bookmarking sites like Digg or Delicious that links to
an article on your site. Another easy link you can get is from a
forum. Many forums allow members to leave signature links or
personal profile links. If you make good contributions to a
forum, some people might follow your links, read your site,
link to your site or buy products from your site.
Create Lists on Your Site
People love lists and they're easy to link to. If you build a
list like "10 easy tips to help you __," people will read and
link to it. Just make sure the list is relevant to your industry
or business. Create a resource list on your site. If it's good
people may link to your resource list, or your resources might
put you on their resource list
Use PPC as a Link Building Tool
You can buy relevant traffic using PPC, which will get you
visitors to your site and more brand exposure. When people come
to your site, regardless of how they found it, there is still a
possibility that they will find something they like and link to
you.
Make Your Web Copy Easy to Understand
This will make people want to spread the word. People won't link
to information they don't quite understand themselves, which is
why this is very important. Put extra effort into making sure
your content doesn't have spelling or grammatical errors. This
will make you look like a more professional and reliable source.
Have an "About Us" section on your site so people can see who the
information is coming from. This will make it look more
trustworthy so they are more likely to link to it.
Submit Articles and Press Releases
If you submit articles to an industry news site the article will
have a link back to your Web site. Making the article relevant
with quality information will entice readers to visit your site
and possibly use your service and recommend it to others, or
link back to your site on their blog or site. Send out a press
release to journalists and bloggers that you think will
appreciate it. They are likely to link to your site on their
blog or news site.
Gain Easy Local and Business Links
Join the Better Business Bureau and get a link from your local
chamber of commerce. Submit your link to a relevant city or
state governmental resource and list your site on your local
library's resource page. Use LinkedIn or other social media
networks to develop relationships with other non-competing
businesses in your industry. You can recommend each other
through linking to each other's sites.
Use Link Bait for Link Building
Link bait is anything on a site that makes people want to link
to it. It could be interesting content, funny videos, shocking
photos, etc. It should have some association with keywords you
are optimizing for. Then once you have your link bait ready to
go, promote it on social media networks, through blogging and
with article writing.
Link building takes a lot of time and effort, but in the end
it's worth it. Gaining links is the key to getting noticed by
the search engines and increasing your rank. You should never
stop link building. It's an on-going process that takes
commitment and drive. However, when your site begins moving up
in the rankings until you're above all your biggest competitors,
you'll see your efforts paying off.
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link building