In Monday’s blog I talked about the importance of SEO link building. Inbound links to your site raises the search engine authority of your website. It takes a long time to build this authority because for the links to be effective they should be linked to content on your site. One of the ways to do this is to publish blogs with helpful information that others will want to link to. As you start to think about building inbound links you’ll start to get messages from other sites that want to link to you.
A few weeks ago one of my clients was asked by a website to exchange links. We had just days before set up her website and were a bit surprised by the request so we took a closer look. It turns out that what looked like a cancer support group page was really a page for an attorney looking for cancer victims who wanted to start a law suit. Nowhere was this obviously stated. I have nothing against lawyers and helping cancer victims start lawsuits but this seemed a little underhanded and not very honest. Besides that they wanted us to put their link on our home page while the link back to us was buried deep in their site. We decided not to exchange links. The point is building link authority takes time and usually responding to link exchange e-mail is not the way to do it. Exchange links but only with sites that you really support and that support you. Besides waiting for others to act, what can you do to start building links to your site? Well one thing you can do is to watch this webinar on link building strategies.
Here are a few other things you can do.
- Social Media Links: Use Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other sites to link back to your website. The client I mentioned above got her first site visit from someone who followed the link we posted to her Yelp profile.
- Use Your Social Profile: Always put a link to your blog in your online social profiles. It seems that every service or group I belong to has a place for me to put up a profile. Beside my photo I always put in a link to my web site. Don’t use the default “My Website” tag. Most profiles, including LinkedIn, let you change the tag. Most LinkedIn profiles say “My Website” while mine says “Partner Views Blog.”
- Link in Discussion Forums: Many discussion forums let you add a link to your web page or to information related to your answer. Always take advantage of this.
- Put Links in Press Releases: If you post a press release on your site, send them out through a news service or post them to a site such as ExpertClick put in links back to your site. This makes it easier for others to find you and it builds link authority. Others are more likely to use the same links in blogs or news stories they write from the press release. Use PressRelease Grader to evaluate the press releases effectiveness.
- Directories and Local Listings: Submit your blog to blog directories or website directories. Some are free and others cost money and many will vet submissions before you are listed but reputable directories can be very helpful. In addition there are many directories dedicated to local business or trades. Do a little research and submit your site and blogs to these sites.
Link building is a slow process and it will take time but the payoff with increased SEO ranking and increased traffic will be worth it. Do you have any suggestions on how to build links to your website? Send us your suggestions below.
If you would like to find out how your website is doing with inbound links contact us for a free website and social media evaluation.
Photo Credit: Casiuno, morgueFile Free Photo
