Search Engine Optimization

Link development isn’t what it used to be. Back in the early 2000’s, link development consisted mostly of sending out link requests, doing link exchanges, and submitting your website to dozens of directories. The bar has been raised, however, because search engine algorithms have become more complex and search engine users have come more demanding. If you want to keep up with your competitors and ensure that your site continues to rank well in this day and age, keep the following “do’s and don’ts” of link development at the forefront of your mind.

Don’t:
Send out generic link requests to hundreds of webmasters at once. Your emails will simply be marked as spam.
Do:
Find sites about your topic and then determine what information is missing from those sites. Write a personal email to the webmaster, telling him how the information on your site fills that void and how linking to your site would benefit his readers.

Don’t:
Ask webmasters for links using specific keyword anchor text.
Do:
Encourage people to link to your site using whatever anchor text they want to use because it looks more natural and won’t get your site flagged by the search engines.

Don’t:
Submit your site’s URL to hundreds of directories just so you can get backlinks.
Do:
Take the time to find reputable directories to submit to that get significant traffic and page views.

Don’t:
Write short, mediocre articles and submit them to dozens of article directories.
Do:
Find popular sites in your niche that accept guest articles and write useful, lengthy articles for them that include a link back to your site. It will take more time and effort for you to write quality content and find sites that will accept it, but doing so will bring you more traffic and brand recognition in the long run.

Don’t:
Write and submit boring, pointless press releases for the sole purpose of getting backlinks to your site.
Do:
Submit press releases when you truly have something newsworthy to report. If your press release is truly newsworthy and you have it distributed to major news engines, you may be able to get media attention, which will bring you a huge return on investment. At the very least, you’ll be able to generate tons of targeted traffic to your site via news engines.

Don’t:
Leave comments on dozens of forums just for the backlinks in the forum signatures.
Do:
Become an active member on a handful of forums so you can build your reputation and encourage people to actually click on the link in your forum signature.

Don’t:
Buy software or outsource to generate thousands of cheap links on social bookmarking sites, forums, blogs, etc.
Do:
Hire skilled programmers to develop useful tools for your site and hire writers to create quality content so you can attract more links and traffic in the long run.

Don’t:
Create a blog for your site that only contains posts about how great your company is and constantly links to your site.
Do:
Create a blog that features valuable, useful content that attracts link, traffic, and social media attention. Only lead visitors to the commercial area of your site when it’s relevant. Remember: if your blog reads like one big sales pitch, it won’t give you the results you seek.

Internal links don’t carry as much weight as links from other websites, but they are still important in SEO because they affect indexation, search engine crawling, and PageRank distribution. Other aspects of your website that are affected by internal linking structure include user-friendliness and conversion rates. Internal links also help you drive more traffic to internal pages of your site. Improve your website’s internal linking structure by following the 7 tips below.

1. Use keyword anchor text

When linking to other pages of your site, use relevant keyword anchor text. For example, if you’re linking to a page about black shoes, do keyword research to find out what keyword phrases people use when they search for black shoes and then use them as anchor text. Anchor text tells the search engine bots what a page’s content is about and improves a page’s ranking for that particular phrase.

2. Use text navigation links

Search engine bots still have difficulty crawling navigation menus that require Flash or Javascript, so be sure to use text navigation links.

3. Fix broken links

Use Google Webmaster Tools to identify broken links throughout your blog. Remove the broken links or fix them by redirecting them to valid pages in order to reduce indexation time and improve the rankings of your site’s internal pages.

4. Create a sitemap

A well-defined sitemap informs both the search engines and site visitors exactly what pages are on your site and what they’re about. Sitemaps ensure that search engines can crawl and therefore rank every page of your site.

5. Don’t overdo it

Placing internal links in your content improves your site’s usability. Internal links give visitors access to internal pages of your site and share more relevant content with them. There shouldn’t be any more than 100 links per page, however, and the number of external links should be lower than the number of outgoing links a page has. If there are lots of external links on your website, most of your PageRank juice will be driven to external websites and your internal pages will get less link juice as a result.

6. Use footer links

Rather than making your site visitors scroll all the way back to the top of the page or click all the way back to the home page to reach your site’s navigation menu, why not use footer links? All of the important links from your site’s navigation bar can be linked to in the footer. Other pages you can link to in the footer of your site include your social media profiles, your company blog, and important pages that you don’t want crowding your high level navigation bar, such as your Privacy Policy.

7. Place important links at the top of the page

Search engines evaluate a variety of factors when measuring the value of internal links and their position on a page is one of them. Links in the footer have less value than links at the top of a page, so make sure you place the most important links at the top of each page.

Want to build more valuable backlinks and boost traffic to your site? Participation in Q&A sites is a great way to generate targeted traffic and build quality links. Q&A sites, which include Yahoo! Answers, Quora, and how-to sites like Wikihow, have significantly grown in popularity over recent years. Since major search engines like Google aim to provide users with diverse search results, they typically include a few different types of sites on the first page, including commercial sites, Q&A sites, Wikipedia, video sites, news sites, etc. Q&A sites tend to take up at least a couple of slots on the first page of search results.

Why Search Engines Love Q&A Sites

Q&A sites rank well because they are updated frequently by people who ask and answer questions. And it’s no secret that the search engines prefer active, frequently-updated sites over static sites. Q&A sites are also SEO-friendly since their content is keyword-rich and they contain lots of internal links owing to the generation of relevant questions/answers or articles on each page. In addition, Q&A sites get linked to often because they are informative and easy to find.

Another factor that makes participation in Q&A sites worthwhile is the fact that an increasing number of people type questions when they conduct searches on Google and other major search engines. Q&A sites are popular with users who type questions into the search engines since they provide direct answers to their questions.

How to Use Q&A Sites to Your Advantage

The easiest way to get started with Q&A sites is by answering questions related to your industry and placing relevant links to your site within your answers. You can find questions to answer by searching Google for target keywords in your industry and picking Q&A sites that rank on the first page. You will surely get decent traffic through the answers you leave on those sites since they are already ranking well in the search engines.

Search Engines Value a Diversity of Links

If you want your link portfolio to look natural, you need to seek links from a variety of different websites. Adding links from Q&A sites is a great way to diversify your link portfolio. If you only get links from one type of site, such as blogs or directories, your site is more likely to get flagged by the search engines.

Get More Targeted Traffic

Another benefit of participating in Q&A websites is that you can generate more targeted traffic to your website. For example, say you sell tours to Turkey and answer questions related to Turkey travel on Q&A sites. If somebody searches for “things to do in Turkey,” they might find your answers on Q&A sites in the results. If they like your answers and click on your links, they may decide to sign up for a tour in Turkey on your website.

Even if you are an affiliate, you can use this tactic to your advantage because there’s a chance that someone who clicks on your link on a Q&A site will click on your affiliate banner and purchase a product. Traffic that sites receive via Q&A sites tends to convert well since it is highly targeted.

Are you launching a new online business or website? If so, one of the first things you have to do is decide on a domain name. A great domain name will help you rank better in the search engines and attract more traffic to your site. Factors to consider when you choose a domain name include its brand image, SEO-friendliness, and linkability. Here are a few steps to take when deciding on an appropriate domain name.

Brainstorm Keywords

When it comes to SEO-friendliness, your domain name should contain your target keywords because a keyword-rich domain name will help you rank better in the search engines. Brainstorm keywords until you come up with the five best terms or phrases, but only use one of those terms or phrase in your domain. The last thing you want is a domain that looks like this:

www.babysitting-service-in-new-york.com

An overly hyphenated domain name that’s stuffed with keywords looks spammy, doesn’t have any branding value, lacks credibility, and is hard to remember. It’s difficult to get a domain like this to be taken seriously, much less linked to.

Get a .com domain

Although it’s fine to use a .net or .org domain name, you should own the .com extension as well and use a 301 redirect because many people who aren’t tech-savvy still assume that only the .com extension exists. Plus, more people will type “.com” when they guess your site’s domain.

Make It Memorable

Make your domain name as catchy and memorable as possible. It should be concise, easy to spell, and easy to recall. If your domain name isn’t easy to remember, people are far less likely to share it with their friends and colleagues!

You should also make sure that your domain name is unique. If your domain name is too similar to that of a website that’s already in existence, it will constantly be confused with the other website and fail in terms of branding.

Make It Easy for People to Guess What Is on Your Site

Create a domain name that makes it easy for people to guess what kind of content is on your site. For example, a site like Travelocity.com does this far more effectively than Amazon.com.

Use a Generic Term plus a Target Keyword

A great approach for domain name creation is to combine a generic term with one of your target keywords. For example, sites like Travelzoo.com and Coffeegeek.com do a good job of this. This method will allow you to create a brand-worthy domain that’s still generic enough to rank well for the target keyword.

Having a domain name that contains the exact target keyword will give your website a boost in the search engines. Matt Cutts of Google recently announced, however, that Google would be making some changes to their algorithm so that keywords in the domain aren’t given so much weight.

To prevent your keyword-rich domain from getting buried in the results after this algorithm change, make sure that your website looks like a legitimate business with a strong brand image. Some ways you can do this are by building a strong presence on social media sites and varying the anchor text of incoming links, so it isn’t obvious that you’re trying to push certain keywords. If all of your incoming links have the same anchor text and match your domain name exactly, your site will look less like a “brand” in Google’s eyes and ultimately, your rankings will suffer.