Link Building Basics

Jeff Ashby — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 03:44:52 +0000

Wow, it has been about 3 months since I last wrote on my blog. A lot of things have been going on, and I haven’t really found much time to write, especially during the holidays.

I thought I would write today also after realizing that this website was ranked on the first page of Google for the keyword “SEO Tactics” which is the main keyword I am going for right now. It gave me some incentive to buckle down and write this while I watch some American Idol. Anyways, here we go…

I want to talk a little about link building. Actually, not a little – a lot. Link building is a huge portion of SEO. Actually, it is the biggest, along with content writing. Basically, if you want to see success, make sure you are targeting the right keywords, and point enough quality links to your site in the right spots and you should be fine. However, what are the main link building methods? I am going to discuss each method here a little, and then hopefully do a “Link Building Post Series.” I think it is such an important topic that we really need to spend some time on it.

Here is a list of the main ways to build links in which I personally use (well, most of them).

Directory Submissions
Do Follow Blog Commenting
Forum Linking
Article Submissions
Link Bait
Strategic Partnerships
Link Buying
Grey/Black Hat Methods

Directory Submissions – These are online directories in which you can post a link to your website. These work with some success, however a lot of directories need to be submitted to, and the success rate of actually getting in the directories aren’t great. However, they are good to keep your links diversified.

Do Follow Blog Commenting – Some blogs will allow you to comment on their site and actually receive link juice for your URL. WordPress is defaulted to have no-follow blog comment links, so blogs need a special plugin to do it. A lot of blogs will start out with doFollow, and then quickly take it off after receiving so much comment spam.

Forum Linking – Forums are great places to get links. If there are any forums you submit to regularly, you usually will be able to put a link in your signature. Every time you comment, you build another link. Forums are usually spidered often and bring in good link juice.

Article Submissions – This is one of the best ways to build links. Article submission websites allow you to post an article about a particular topic, then post a few links as well. That way, you get great links that come from content related to your site. The downside is, in order to be successful, you need to write on a regular basis. The quality of links though are great.

Link Bait – Link Bait is content, or tools, or something that is going to give someone a reason to put a link to your site. Popular link bait includes quizzes, and website tools. After taking an online quiz, you might have something like “Here is code to post on your website to show results.” A tool might be a website counter or a mortgage calculator or something like that. These post a link back to your site. Link Bait can bring in tons of links if the content is unique and useful.

Strategic Partnerships – If you are building a website that can help another company, try to set up a strategic partnership in which they add links to their site.

Link Buying – Buying links is definitely not recommended since Google doesn’t like it, and you can get your site penalized if you do. However, buying links can be a good way to get lots of links quickly, or getting links with high pagerank. Link prices can range for a few dollars, to several hundred, all depending on quality. If you choose to buy links, make sure you know what you are getting into, and how much you should pay.

Grey/Black Hat Methods – I will discuss these at a later time, but there are many methods of link building that allows a lot of quality links to be built in a short amount of time with little effort. I have seen success with these methods, so I will share a few of them.

Again, I will get further into these methods going forward, including specifics. Also I would love to see comments for what anyone else uses to build links.

What Kind Of SEO Are You?

Jeff Ashby — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:00:21 +0000

I just took a quiz over at DarkGreySEO.com, in which they determine, based on you are willing to do as an SEO, if you are a Black Hat, White Hat, or Grey Hat. And the results?

Dark Grey SEO

Pushing the boundaries to the maximum minus one fraction, your SEO campaign is as hard as it gets without getting in trouble with the law but you’ve probably been in trouble before with Google. You rarely back down when faced with conflict or a challenge.

You don’t like SPAM or SPAMMING however a comment blog SPAM or four is okay. However, you don’t over-do it and rarely use a personally identifiable URL when you get risky.

You’re probably banned from AdSense due to mistakes you make in your early years. You’re hopping on a friends AdSense account because you’re screwed.

However, you’re not banned from AdWords and that’s all you need. With your knowledge of consumer habits combined with your ability to tolerate SEO risk, you’re on your way to a powerful future.

You know that you have to diversify your SEO resources to account for ‘collapse.’ If a campaign goes south, you don’t care because you have 2 more backing it up that have an entirely different strategy.

You are Google’s worst nightmare x 2. The real McCoy. The Genuine Article. The Mr. Smarty Pants of SEO.You have probably received one or more warnings or C&D’s from Google or other companies. You had to break a few eggs to make your omelet. This is how it’s done.Your campaigns are highly refined, targeted, and optimized however you’re not 100% sure from one day to the next if your money-makers are going to get POOFED from Google and then your revenue goes bye-bye. You’ll need to start all over.This is both your gift and your curse for the Dark Hatted SEO.

This is about right for me. I will talk more about how I feel about Black Hat SEO in the future, however I do not feel an ethical dilemma when it comes to SEO tactics. If you can use a strategy that doesn’t get caught, in which helps you rank, why not do it? I will not divulge all of my black hat secrets, however I will get into some strategies that are somewhat less reputable as we go along in our journey. Anyone can take the quiz and post their results here in the comments. I am interested to see where everyone stands.