Link Building is Dead
In my last post I talked a little about SEO companies in Regina, or the lack thereof, and Marshal Finch left a comment.
Marshal lists some good, basic backlink building strategies. I left a couple of comments with my point being that building backlinks now is no longer just about getting links wherever you can get them, but it is about building relationships with others to help build links. Directory listings are nice to get, especially if you can get into Yahoo, DMOZ or even the Best of the Web directories, but how much traffic will you get from them? Very little. I have some websites that are listed in each of those directories and the amount of traffic I see from any directory is less than ten since January. That is right, less than TEN referrals from any one directory.
Want to know what websites send the best and most traffic? Referrals from blogs and forums. Places that I have taken the time to build some relationships with, leave comments, and take part in the communities of those websites. Places where it was not just about me getting a backlink. I routinely get requests for link exchanges in my inbox, want to know what happens to them? Can you guess? They go straight into the trash.
Interestingly enough a few days after I read Marshal’s post there was a great post on SEOBook about this exact topic. Link Building: The Future Of Relationships. Building links back to your website is not just about getting that link, it is about building a relationship. About giving back. Being a webmaster or blogger is not just about pushing your own website. You need to be social of different social communities to help promote your website or blog.
Want a really good example of how to do that? I already gave you one at the start of this post, did you see it? Here is your chance to put it into practice. Leave a comment, subscribe to my RSS feed, build a relationship and backlinks and visitors will follow.
Comments
Daniel, The Hosting Blog
I agree that for the most part, link building on sites that dont send traffic is pointless - IE link building for + PR. I think that the best links are the ones that you spend time cultivating like on social sites and forums. Basically what I noticed is that the harder it is to get a link, the more traffic it will send you.
LGR
Blogs, social sites, forums, links from those places tend to do better from what I have seen than any directories out there, even Yahoo. Sure the big directories have some pagerank weight, but considering how Google has cracked down on directories in the last year those links are pretty much useless. Besides it is just fun and a boost to ones ego to see other people linking to you.
onewayseo
Although blogs etc are important, they still have a lower value than a relevant site. Who knows how long this will be the case though with talk of Google changing their algorithm.
LGR
So you are telling me that comments on a blog that might be on the exact same or similar topic as mine would not be relevant? Or that a link in a blog post that is talking about my blog is not relevant? I would tend to think that a link in a blog post would be more relevant than a link on a PHP page with a bunch of other links that is generated from a service. After visiting your website and the services your company offers I would be very concerned about using it. It sounds to me like you are trying to manipulate PageRank. While I might dislike the way Google has changed the rules about link buying, their webmaster guidelines state that purchasing of links is a no no. <a href="http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=66356" rel="nofollow">Read about it here at Google.</a>
linking service
I will agree that link building is getting harder these days, but there are a lot more link building techniques than just submitting to directories. From a white hat POV link baiting is probably the most effective. @Daniel while direct referrals from directories or wherever you happen to place links is nice, remember you can get much more traffic by using link building for PR building due to the increased keyword rankings that anchor text and PR afford you.
Eric Ward
Link building is not dead. Stupid link building is dead. It was never alive really.
LGR
Hard to argue with you. That was exactly my point, stupid link building is dead. A lot of people spend all this time and energy sending out emails asking for links to sites that offer nothing if interest. Maybe I am just tired of getting them. Perhaps the term "link building" is the problem. That is why I liked the article over at SEOBook. The term "Relationship Link Building" is perhaps better. A link from a blogger is more of a testimonial and a referral than just a link. There is a reason you have a quote from Matt Cutts on your website. It is not a link, but it might as well be. That is the power of a relationship.
smithsan
Sometimes a different approach requires us to change our nomenclature. No matter how much we redefine the activities that occur with "Link Building", it still always makes people think of link exchange or reciprocating links. Lately, we've simply been using "Off-Site Optimisation" to describe the set of activities that we perform to enhance a client's popularity and reputation for their web site. It seems to help. ------- smithsan <a href="http://www.widecircles.com" rel="nofollow">Link Building</a>
johnson
Building links back to your website is not just about getting that link, it is about building a relationship. its just like a google but not providing such kind of facilities.
Jason
I would agree with your comments on relationships link building. Placing comments and links back from discussion groups, blogs etc do seem to work. However so many of these groups have no follow tags associated along with the fact that the time involved with creating the high volume of links required to compete on high competitive keywords is stagggggggggering. Do you know of any "REAL" company or service or outsourcing "relationship link building" groups which offer manual link building? How about someone who really knows how to communicate in todays social media world?
LGR
Who cares about nofollow? Posting comments on blogs and forums is about getting real people to visit your website. Building links with nofollow for some magical link juice is something different. As for outsourcing relationship link building, I am sure there are some companies out there that do it, but what is the point. If I want to create a relationship with an owner of a website do I want to get to know some flunky from some outsourcing company that really knows nothing about the website. Relationship link building is hard to do, that is what separates real people from spammers. Spammers are to lazy and stupid to actually take the time to build something of quality and want to be anonymous.
Andreas - Linknami
A lot of people focus solely on dofollow blogs. However many high quality and high traffic blogs are nofollowed and you may get valuable leads from posting comments there that do not necessarily translate into search engine luv.
Carrie Bevill
Hi, Thank you for sharing this with me. I am very much into web design and seo. I originally did not come here looking for this, but when I found it, I was glad I did. I believe these tip can enhance search results link building. I just started my SEO company, and I want to build it right from the begining. Do these software tools get spotted by search engine and penalize a website? I am passionate about giving clients the best service possible and would like to know what is the quickest and most effective way to build a high page rank. I also heard someone say that page rank doesn't have that much credibility anymore. Thanks for the valuable information. I really appreciate it. Anyways, great web design and information. Have a great day. Thanks alot Carrie .-= Carrie Bevill´s last blog ..<a href="http://carriebevill.com/seodesign/?p=443" rel="nofollow">What are the best ways to find freelance work for website design?</a> =-.
Jon
I recently outsourced some link building and so far it seems like it was a waste of money. 3 weeks of full time link building from a company in Bangalore has resulted in a handful of free and useless directory links. Waste of time. Most likely not all link building companies are equal. .-= Jon´s last blog ..<a href="http://shareholdersportal.co.uk/market-news/uk-retail-market-slows-in-september" rel="nofollow">UK Retail Market Slows In September</a> =-.
Corey
I completely agree with you. I have clients asking for 2,000 links because they think that is the end all be all of SEO. Quite simply it is not. SEo has now become more about creating engaging content that creates links rather than just link building.