SEO Link Building Skills: Build Traffic, Google Rankings, & Fame

Anyone that has a blog or website have gotten solicitation emails paying you to link to a website.  Don’t do it!  But this is why people pay money for links:

• Link building can help you rank higher in Google Searches
• Link building makes you LESS DEPENDENT on Google for traffic (funny how the less you need Google, the higher you rank in Google!)
• Link building gives you steady traffic that keeps growing (while traffic from advertising stops when your ad dollars stop!)

Links are why the internet is called “The Web.”

You can read about link building for years.  If you want to skip all of the tech details, here’s what it comes down to:

Simplest Long term strategy: Have as many reputable sources linking to you as possible.

Think of it like getting mentions from a celebrity.  Major sites like Huffington Post are celebrities.  They mention you by linking to you, then BAM! You’re on the A-list.

Link Juice, or link value, will get passed to the specific post or page on your site that was linked.  Then, some link juice will go to your overall site as well.

The post you just wrote gains value in Google when other links refer to the post.  The idea is, if your post is linked to a lot, many people thought the post was important and referred to it. The higher the status of the site linking to you, the more important your post becomes.

The more sites you get links from, the more sources you have sending you traffic, the less dependent you are on Google for traffic!

 

Have Other Sites Link To Your Post or Page.  

These external links can boost the ranking of your post in Google the most.  Why?  Because when other people link to you, it means they think your stuff is awesome…you’re not imagining your awesomeness.

So, what kind of external links would boost your post’s value the most?

High Value to Low:

1. High Profile Sites in Your Industry.  These links are worth the most.  They’ll give you a ton of street cred(ibility) with Google and other search engines.  Think of the biggest names in your industry.
   Example: If you’re a model, get links from big names like Vogue.com or Cosmopolitan.com.  If you’re a musician, links from MTV or Billboard.com would be amazing!

2. Mainstream High Profile Sites.  When you get mentioned in links from global sites like these, you content is mainstream newsworthy.
   Example: Getting your post linked by Engadget.com or CNN.com

3. Popular Sites About Your Post or Page Topic.  
   Example: Having a major studio’s blog link to your music production blog post

4. Small Sites & Blogs About Your Post or Page Topic.
   Links from new and growing blogs with only a few visitors can still add value to your ranking.  If you get a ton of small sites linking to you, it can add up!  Google likes seeing links from a variety of sources (what they call your link profile).  And you never know when a small site might become a superstar, whose links would suddenly be worth a ton.

How Do You Get Links?

Every time you make a blog post, follow this checklist.

1. Link to another site in your post.  Let them know you’ve linked to them.

2. Tell colleagues and contacts about your blog post or page.  Then ask them to link to it if they like it.

3. Write a guest blog for another site. Since you’re the author, you can link back to your post from that guest blog.

4. Participate in forums or blogs and put links to your post when appropriate. For example, you can answer someone’s question and say “I also made a tutorial about this if you want to read more…”

Then there’s also doing “Real World Businessy Stuff.”  Here’s a few examples:

1. Work with other companies and colleagues.  Link to each other.

2. Make a product that’s newsworthy, and get covered by the news.

3. Do an event that’s newsworthy, and get covered by the news or media in the industry.  Invite people to the event (they’ll likely have sites to link to you.)

4. Put on events or competitions at colleges.  The school, students, and maybe even the news will write about you and link to you.

5. Get listed in local business directories and any industry directories or listings.

 

Link to Your Own Posts and Pages

Have your other posts, written before or after, to link to this new blog post or landing page. For example, let’s say you wrote a blog post about a product last year.  That post could be lost in the archives and no one reads it.  You could write 10 mini tutorials about using that product and link to the original product post.  Now, the original product post has 10 supporting posts, increasing it’s value.

Linking within your own site does not increase a posts’ value as much as if you got a link from an outside source.  But here’s the sweet part: by linking to your own posts, you give your visitors many more chances to read one of your old posts they didn’t know about.  That old post may be just what they need and they’ll share it with everyone they know.

Now, don’t get too selfish and only link to your own posts!  You want to share the love and give credit to other bloggers and colleagues whenever you can.  Building that relationship is magical.  When you’re generous with your links to other sites, they’ll start linking back, sending you their audience in return!

 

Do Not Purposely Link with Specific Keywords!  

Trying to trick Google with keyword linking is dangerous and your site ranking can DROP.  You can’t trick Google like days gone by.  Link naturally:

• Don’t tell other sites to use specific keywords when linking to you.  Let them do it however they want.
• Don’t link to your own content with specific keywords.  Write your post naturally without thinking about the link, then add the link wherever it fits best.

 

Bottom Line

Take time to first build a quality post, then do the groundwork to build up the value of that post.  Don’t rush to pump out posts and forget to do the work to build value.  Otherwise, you will end up with 1000’s of posts and make no money.  Obviously you can’t do all these steps for everything you produce, but it is something to strive for.  Many other successful websites that you’ve never heard of were built on these concepts.

 

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