Friday, March 18, 2005

Make the LINK! Your SEO strategy depends on it!

If you are just getting to grips with website building, maybe you have been following the intermittent Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tips that have been appearing over the last week or so on this ‘blog.

Assuming you have tweaked your site to take account of the variety of ‘keyword based’ optimising you can do, then it is time to think about ‘other things’ for a few moments…although it’s liable to take a damn sight longer to do than it is to say!

You may well have heard about the importance of LINKS for a site to grow its ‘credibility’ with some of the major search engines.

True the spiders may have ‘logged’ your existence, and if you have a site that is deemed to be ‘legit’ so far…

[That is - it features keywords in the right place, at the right time, and appearing with the right ‘density’ (see previous posts)…]

And if your site is assessed as being ‘substantial’ enough to be a ‘serious’ contender for inclusion in ‘search results’…

[That is - it has perhaps 20 decent pages that convey some worthwhile content, around its ‘core theme’ (identified in its domain name!), with ‘keyword’ based topics that relate to that theme…so it’s all beginning to ‘hang together’ nicely in the relatively simplistic ‘assessment’ of most ‘techno-arachnid’s’ eyes!]

Now the thing that will give more credibility to your website will be if ‘other sites’ link to it…Evidently…in furtherance of a simple ‘site assessment regime’ (otherwise known as an ‘algorithm’…if your site is good enough to be linked to…then maybe it is good enough to be ‘cited’ sooner in those ‘1,200,000 other’ search results than a ‘similar’ site with few or no links…
The catch-22 to which you will soon tumble…if not done so already…is that if you are just starting out is…how does a new site establish itself with other credible sources so that they will ‘rate it’ enough to link to it!

This is even more aggravating that at first glance… It is generally well known that ‘arguably’ the (for now) big-momma of SE’s (Google) bases an element of its ‘page ranking (PR) score’ based on the number of incoming links a site has…

Most people who are similarly trying to establish a website are also aware that they should try and get incoming links from other sites/pages that ‘at least’ have some ‘PR’ score…being linked to by other ‘PR=0’ web pages, just doesn’t fill the sceptical old ‘spiders’ with much confidence…

So, you not only want links in, you want quality links in!…And don’t be running away with the idea that the answer is simply to sign up to those ‘link trading’ sites…true SOME of them might have something to offer (?)…BUT many have a load of irrelevant/rubbish/weak/ or even downright potentially ‘HARMFUL’ links mostly on offer…because…

Not only are you looking for ‘quality’ links from pages with at least some PR…and from ‘quality’ sites (more about which below)…but the sites which refer to you SHOULD SOMEWOW AT LEAST RELATE to your own site topic…Non related sites may actually be ‘harmful’ to you ‘ SE reputation’..and you should neither encourage, nor welcome them, if you want SE credibility! It’s as ‘simple’ as that.

But how do you judge quality? Well you need to ‘know’ the site and its content and make a judgement…Let’s be fair, you don’t need to spend long visiting a site to ‘KNOW’ when something is ‘crap’!

Also you may use the additional ‘determinant’ of ‘quality’ that the site should have at least a decent ‘Alexa’ ranking…a ‘decent’ Alexa ranking ‘implies’ that the site is at least receiving traffic…

[hence, the nearer to '1' the rank is, the better..because the site is getting more traffic…so #1=Yahoo, #2=MSN, #3=Google...etc., etc….This is a bit deceptive…so do beware, many sites have a fairly good ranking but are frankly NOT the type site you want to be linked to anyway – unless you are also peddling “glamour” shots, too!!! If you know what I mean!]

(So, what’s a decent ‘ranking’ you ask? Well Alexa has about 10-12 million ‘tool bar’ users supposedly…so ‘top 3%’ of those COULD be said to be a ‘decent’ rank - depends on your personal view I guess – if you accept ‘top 3%’ as a guide…then let’s say a ‘Alexa’ rank less than 300,000!..You’ll probably see a wide variety of opinions…but this is at least some guid to the fact that the site must have a certain amount of ‘traffic’…and being linked by a site with Alexa rank 3,000,000 probably ‘ain’t gonna’ see a lot of traffic finding your link!)

So you have to somehow make contact with site that have a fair Alexa ranking, that are at least relevant to your tiopic (but not directly competitive, of course!), with at least ‘some’ PR for the page that links to you!!! And all you have to do is....

Well it would be nice if it was just a matter of ‘being added to a links list’…but frankly…how much real use do you think being added to the end of a huge (maybe pages) of indiscriminate, non-alpabetized, random links really is?…NO…neither does a ‘simple techno spider’ either…

The truth is that as the SE’s try to improve their ‘assessment’ methods and keep one-step-ahead of ‘black hat’ SEO’ers…and really actually achieve that ‘simple’ task :-D of producing ‘quality relevant efficiently ranked’ results for its ‘ info searchers’…the value of being added to long, random links list is minimal if not actually NEGATIVE! Ideally you want to be featured on a well ranked page, on a quality site, on a page that features no more than say 10-15 links at most…AND (this is the ‘clincher’…because they are stkll like HEN’S TEETH) ideally your link wants to be ‘cosseted’ in a nice piece of relevant text…and …we-e-e-e-e-l-l-l-l-l-l-l-l

I’ve really waffled on…(OH you’d noticed :-)…so I’ll save the last bit for next 'blog…

BUT...IF you are still with me…and IF you are STILL looking for the ‘best way’ to build a website…then I include some of the links I posted last time…because FOR SURE…I wouldn’t want you to walk away from the 'MOTHERLODE'…

Honestly, this is not ‘fool’s gold’...take a look at one or two of these links...there’s mountains of useful free info behind them anyway…and if you still feel sceptical…then PLEASE send us your ‘concern’ wrapped in a ‘pithy question’ or better still send it to the man himself, Dr.Ken Evoy (see the ‘send your question’ link below)…look, you may or may not take my word for it…but you can believe you own eyes when you see our current ‘project’ here…

www.visiting-the-dominican-republic.com

If you already have ‘Alexa’ tool bar installed, you will SEE that we are currently riding at about 79,000 and some odd…ranked out of Alexa’s 10+ million users.

This progress made in just 5/6 months using SBI’s amazing ‘package of total support’…It’s not ‘luck’, it’s not by ‘black hatting’…take a look at the site…it is by following Dr.Evoy’s ADMIRABLE ADVICE…so why not follow ‘Doctors orders’, and get yourself a ‘healthy website’, too? ;-)



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    AS 16/03/05




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