Choosing Link Partners

Last Updated: August 1, 2005

internet marketingBy Chris Boggs

Almost everyone that owns a website has received emails that say something along the lines of: “Hi, I went to your site yesterday and found it to be the GREATEST site ever written…your material would be of interest to the people that visit our site…we have placed a link to your website on our page at…please add the following information to your site….” Are these worth the time to research? The answer is a resounding YES. This is a process that can be remarkably quick and painless.  There are three determining traits of the other website that you should consider: relevancy, relevancy, and, of course: relevancy. Is the site’s content relevant to yours? Even more importantly: are the rest of the links on the page relevant?

 

Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo! and MSN do place importance on inbound (backlinks) and outbound links. If the link leads to another industry-relevant site, it offers what the search engines are seeking for their users: more relevant content. If you provide such links on your site, you are in fact increasing the relevance of your site. Many top search engine results positions are dominated by “Reviews” and “Directories,” because of exactly this reason.   Also important is the idea that there are sites considered “hubs” or “authority” sites, meaning that they link out to many industry-relevant sites and also have many relevant links pointing to them.

 

Any effective effort to get you ranked for popular search phases in your industry will more than likely encompass some sort of linking initiative. Although one-way links from directories such as the Yahoo! Directory and DMOZ (just to name two) are the most desirable, reciprocated links between like-industry sites can still carry weight.  Nowadays there are many respected human edited directories out there that provide categorized links to many industries.  The following will offer suggestions as to how to go about choosing which sites should link to yours, and which reciprocal offers to accept.

 

Directory Listings

“One-way” links in the form of listings in directories are very valuable in establishing a strong link reputation. Sites that are listed for their categories within the Yahoo! and DMOZ Directories consistently outrank sites that are not, even in Google! Yes, that’s right, Google places importance on Yahoo! Directory listings. The reason for this is because many directories are human-edited. If a reviewer has judged your site to be relevant to a particular directory category, you will receive more traffic from not only the listings themselves, but also in the form of increased rankings within “regular” search engine results.

 

Other than the “big three” directories, Yahoo!, DMOZ, and Business.com (very valuable especially for B2B organizations), you can find directories that are particular to your industry. The easiest way to find them is to, surprise, do a search. Search for “(your industry) directory” or “(your keyword) directory” at your favorite search engine, and you should find a list of the desirable ones. Some will be free, and some will charge a nominal fee. I have often said that the $299/year cost for inclusion in the Yahoo! Directory is one of the best investments you can make in your website. Many directories only charge $50 or even less per year.

Remember that the key is to get listed in directories that have a category that closely matches your industry.  Do not get listings in “FFA” (free-for-all) directories that mix up Viagra, home loans, and your industry all on one page, for example.  There are services out there that sell links purely based on the PageRank of a website.  This idea is generally sound, but beware that Google seems to be decreasing the value of PageRank in its algorithm, since it is flawed and has shown to be easy to manipulate by SEO’s.  Just because a site has a good PageRank doesn’t mean it is right for you.

 

Reciprocal Links

 

So how do you choose whether a site that solicits you for a reciprocal link is worth it?  There has been much recent discussion about the value of reciprocal links in various forums, blogs, and other sources of up-to-date information. There is a consensus that links from non-relevant sites will not help you, while links from relevant sites will. Some believe that links from non-relevant sites can hurt. My opinion is that only links TO non-relevant sites can hurt. So stick to linking out to a site that has something to do with your product.

When choosing reciprocal linking partners for Instant Position, we like to follow a few basic rules. Step 1: Is the site relevant to your industry? If so, move along to step 2. Step 2: is the page that wants to link to you solely comprised of other industry related links? If so, move to step 3. If there are links, for example, to mortgage companies on a web design directory: stop and don’t waste any more time. Step 3: Are there a legitimate amount of links on the page? Any page with more than about 20 outbound links “waters down” the value of any single link on that page. Consider whether this link will help you or not. This should be enough to get you going, but one more step follows.  Step 4: Does the page have a Google PageRank? Many people will consider this step 1 or 2, and others discount the value of Google’s PageRank as I mentioned above in the directory section. Personally, I like to use it as an indicator of page popularity. No matter how much you may argue the fact, web pages that have links from other pages with PageRank (including those on your own site) build their PageRank. PageRank is indisputably part of the Google Ranking algorithm. 

 

Other Thoughts

Some people may feel uncomfortable with linking to a competitor’s site. This is an objective topic that has many right and wrong answers.  I feel that it cannot hurt you unless you are really overcharging for your product or service. If that is the case, today’s increasingly savvy searchers will probably find your competitor anyway.

 

Many SEO’s and “Linking Experts” nowadays are trying to establish three or more-way linking schemes. An example would be you link to site A and site B will link to you in exchange. The jury is still out as of the writing of this article as to the damage this may cause if such a scheme is discovered, but I would caution any SEO’s or other web marketers not to be too public about such efforts. As long as all three sites are topic-related, it should be OK, but don’t bet your house on it.

 

The following style is recommended for writing your Titles and Descriptions. The Title should also be the link to your site, in most cases. Use popular keywords associated with your industry or page-specific product, in order to take advantage of anchor text popularity.  However, you should also use your site URL in some inbounds, especially if the URL matches the company name or the DBA, in order to ensure that your URL appears highly in applicable searches.  The description should be short and to the point, and include popular search terms as well as synonyms.  Mix up your inbound link Titles and Descriptions, in order to avoid seemingly link-spamming.   Look at the other links on the page your link will be and try to avoid duplication.  Lastly…it is highly recommended that you do not use site-wide links, especially on sites that are not officially related to you in a business sense (part of the same parent company, for example).

 

Backlinks are very important to search engines because they strive to provide as much relevant content to its users as possible.   If a site has many backlinks from relevant other sites or especially “hubs” or “authorities,” it will help your rankings.  Some say that “Content is King.” I agree, but feel that linking is certainly a very powerful Queen at the King’s side.

 

Comment on this article at my blog.

Read more information about linking in our website promotion tutorial regarding reciprocal linking.

Chris Boggs,
SEM Specialist and Contributing Writer
Instant Position