JENN

SEM SEO PPC

Link Popularity explained

The History

In the dark ages of website development, a search friendly design was one that simply had basic meta tags with keywords, title, and description of the website. As more and more websites were be added to the internet, search engines had to find a more comprehensive approach to finding websites that would be closer to what the user was looking for. Search engines started looking at the content of the website in relation to the description, and the keywords listed. The more the leywords appeared in the content, and throughout the website the higher that website would show up in the search results.

As time went on, website developers caught on to how their website was showing up, and began tricking the search engines by randomly placing their keywords throughout the site page, and the website.

In the constant battle to be the “most comprehensive search” Google came up with their page ranking system. While perusing the internet for keywords, and content of a website, they also noted any links that were outgoing to other websites. The way they figured it was that if you linked to another website, it was because you were citing someone's work, or thought enough of the other website that you wanted your visitors to check it out. So, in a sense, Google counts these links as a vote. The more links you have coming to your website, the more votes you are getting.

However, in the constant battle to outsmart the search engines developers now began creating websites that link to the main one, or swapping links with other websites to help get a higher page rank. In a sense they are spamming the search engines with unrelated links in order to get a higher ranking.

Once again, search engines are trying to outsmart the spammers and ave narrowed the link popularity down to a “science”. When a link is found to your site, they look for the related keywords that you might have in your meta tags, and throughout your content.

So how does someone manage their links, and who links to them?

There are 4 classifications of links:

Note: In the following examples SiteA is our web site and SiteB is an outside site (i.e. a web site under a different domain name than SiteA).

1) Inbound links

Links that originate from an outside web site and link to a page on your website. SiteB points to a page on SiteA.

SiteA <----- SiteB

2) Outbound links
Links from your website pointing to a page on an outside web site. SiteA points out to a page on SiteB.

SiteA -----> SiteB

3) Reciprocal links

A link exchange, in which you link to a website that in turn links to you. SiteA links to SiteB AND SiteB links to SiteA.

SiteA -----> SiteB AND SiteA <----- SiteB

4) One-way links
Essentially the same as an inbound, or outbound link in which one site links to another. Either SiteA links to SiteB OR SiteB links to SiteA, it is one-way only.

SiteA -----> SiteB OR SiteA <----- SiteB

How to build your link popularity

The best way to build you popularity is to build up as many inbound and/or one way links to your website.

In order to drive up your link popularity it's best to have as many incoming links as possible. Those links should also include a description, if possible, and each link should include your major keywords.

There are many different ways to obtain links to your site.

Directories:

A legitimate website directory is always a quick, efficient way to obtain one-way links. You should always check the page rank of the directory before listing yourself. You can do this by installing the Google toolbar on your browser. A ranking of 4 or more is always good. Be wary of those that are lower than that. Always check back from time to time to make sure your link is still there, and that the page rank of the directory has not gone down.

Emailing website owners:

Sometime's you can request that an individual with a personal website add a link to your website. Send them a personal email stating how much you like their website, and that you would like to have your website associated with theirs. Make sure that you choose a website that pertains to yours. If you are a real estate agent in Milwaukee , be sure to choose website's of those who live in Milwaukee , and mention places that exist within the areas you serve. Then send them a link with the keywords pertaining to “Milwaukee Real Estate”, or “For New Homes in Milwaukee ”.

Link Exchanges:

Be careful of link exchanges. Quite often those who are involved in link exchanges are those that do not have a clear understanding of how link popularity works. Eventually these individuals will be picked up as spammers, and often those who are involved with them will get tagged as well. If you find that someone would like to exchange with you, make sure that they place your link on their homepage, or a page that pertains to your content, and not a links, or resources page. Pages that have more than 5-10 links on them tend to be interpreted as invalid links, or will get picked up as spam.

Valid Site Content:

If you have articles, or unique content that is relative to your industry, chances are people will want to link to your website. Perhaps you provide a service that another website would like to tell their visitors about. For example, a lawyer may have an article or two about local laws, and knowing your rights. Say someone was in a car accident, and was keeping a blog, they could then link to the article on that lawyers website. The blog pertains to the lawyers website, and the lawyers website provides information for the people visiting the blog.