by Steve Prylon

It’s now common knowledge that inbound links are ridiculously important to the success of your site. Receiving a link is a ‘vote’ in a search engine’s eyes, and now energy seems to be (necessarily) focused on how to obtain as many links as possible. But there is more to it than that, and the right amount of links, the right kind of links, is just as important and overlooked by eager newbies wanting a quick boost in rankings. It will take time and know-how to develop links more naturally and in such a way that you get the most bang for your buck.

Of course, it goes without saying that your site should actually be worthy of the Top 10. So step one is to truly focus on your site from a visitor’s point of view, not a search engine’s exclusively. Only gaming the system will get you nowhere. It may get you temporary results, or it may get you banned from Google’s index, but it will not work long term.

That said, you still have to do a ton of work that you would not normally do for visitors only, if you want to rank for your words. It is just not possible to build a site just for visitors and expect to rank. MAYBE if you have 4 years, MAYBE if the nature of your business coincidentally is one that demands new content naturally for visitors, MAYBE if you are such a huge authority in your field, if your field happens to be something worth linking to, MAYBE then you can just randomly and naturally build up enough inbound links to rank high enough to turn a profit. But what if you sell socks? I mean, how much content can you possibly ‘naturally’ put on your site about socks? Is it really helping your visitor? And how many websites in the world are just dying to link to your fabulously well written valuable articles (1-2 new ones a month, right?) about socks, choosing a color, knee socks vs. crew, etc. It is all just fluff, and this is what the search engines want (expect) us to do.

So accepting that you will have to manipulate your marketing plan for the search engines as well as visitors, you will embrace this intimidating link building campaign. You must get links. Gotta do it. No getting around it. And link baiting, enticing people to link to you by offering rich valuable content, or free widgets, or press releases, is a big part of it. But baiting is just not enough for most sites, you will have to do active building the hard way: one at a time or buying them. You will want lots of smaller links, and a few big boys. Some links in content from a high PR will work magic on most sites, especially mixed in with the average links. A few authority links such as EDU links or GOV links will complement your smaller links and give you a big boost.

The basics for a good link campaign: Well rounded, and well timed. A variety of links from numerous sources, some from authority sites and some from new sites and blogs. Watch not to build too many too fast, a spike will be detected. Keep anchor text relevant but varied. Use internal pages as well, especially high content pages. Links embedded in relevant content are hands down the most valuable, strive for as many as possible.

Sounds like a lot of work? The best link building is just plain time consuming, there is no way around it, and more and more companies are hiring it out in some fashion.

About the Author:
Edutextlink is a valuable link building source for obtaining edu links without effort. Buy links in relevant content on edu sites as part of your effective linking campaign. Permanent links, no monthly fees.

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