A lot is being said about link building. It’s the most recent search engine pie-in-the-sky solution for all your search engine woes… Like meta-tags were just a few short years ago — you couldn’t walk through cyberspace for even a moment without being hit up by folks that would write optimized meta tags that would rocket you to the top of Alta Vista, Yahoo, Excite and Looksmart… Google who?

Google is nearly single-handedly responsible for this most recent phenomenon, and for the record, it probably is here to stay, unlike meta tags whose use is for the most part optional in today’s landscape. Google decided that who links to you and what that link “says” about you is nearly as important as what your page says itself. It’s usually called Link Reputation. Just like your personal reputation, it may know you better than you know yourself.

At the most basic level, incoming links should include your top keywords in the linking text and point to similarly relevant pages on your site. Hundreds, even thousands, of incoming links may make the difference in top Google rankings for the most competitive keywords. There is evidence that links that are traded (reciprocal links) aren’t valued as highly by the engines as “natural” one-way links. The best links are usually links that others included on their site just because your content is so darn good. The most valuable forms of link building include article/content production, press releases, producing an RSS feed, and content content content.

At the recent WebmasterWorld Search Conference in New Orleans, link building was the topic of many discussions. And usually it all came back to building great content. The conference was a little weak, however, on ways to build content - but we’ll save that for another day. Marketers in the travel space usually have some content at their disposal and, if not, there is enough to say about your products and destinations to fill pages and pages.

Here are some tips, though, that I did pick up at the conference on the art of link building.

  • Don’t rely on reciprocal linking. As mentioned above, reciprocal links may be de-valued by the engines. You can use them, but don’t let them outweigh your efforts on building one-way links.
  • Run about 70% of your incoming links to your homepage and the other 30% to your interior pages.
  • When researching a potential linking partner, check their inbound links for relevancy and quantity, view their source code to make sure they’re not redirecting through a counter or ad server or including a “NoFollow” tag, and look for a robots.txt file that may be keeping the engines from indexing or following links on the page.
  • Leverage your own network first. Do you have other sites, associates or friends that you can trade links with?
  • Don’t be afraid to buy links. This shouldn’t be your entire strategy, but it does have its place. For instance, buying link in the Yahoo! Directory should be first on your list.
  • Obtain directory links. A lot of directories out there are sub-par, but some can not only drive link reputation but TRAFFIC! You should shoot for at least 25-50 links from quality directories.
  • Start a blog. If your content is fresh and good, folks will want to link to it from their own blogs with their own comments.
  • Don’t focus on Google Page Rank. You know, the little green bar on your Google toolbar. Ignore it. Or better yet, make it go away in the toolbar settings. It’s not updated regularly and there seems to be no evidence that it will help you with anything, except maybe your ego.
  • 90% of your incoming links should be from different IP C Blocks. In other words, if you manage 100 sites and they are all hosted with the same company and you interlink them all, it probably won’t help much.
  • The text around your incoming link may be considered as well. Make sure your link is in context.
  • Use different variations of your keywords in your links. If you suddenly have hundreds of incoming links that all say the exact same thing, Google may assume that it’s not “natural.” So, mix it up. In fact, throw in some banner ads to really make it look natural.
  • Include a “link to us” link on your site. Then give users instructions on how to add a link to your site from their own site. You may be surprised on how many of your visitors will take you up on it.
  • Internal links are important too. Meaning, the links from one page to the next within your own site. Use keyword rich anchor text and consider using breadcrumb navigation.
  • Pay attention to the neighborhood your links are coming from. If you’re selling travel, make sure a good portion of your links are from other travel related sites, and make sure they’re not “spammy” sites or link farms
  • You may want to consider outsourcing link building if you have the budget. It’s really not easy (or fun!). There are companies and consultants who do nothing but link building. Contact me if you would like any names.
  • Build great content and others will want to link to you without even being asked. “If you build it they will come.”

Tagged as: Search Engines, SEO, Link Building