Are back links key to getting higher in google?
- Thread starter djridings
- Start date
It's an element of it but not the key as such,
Just randomly back linking to your website is not an advisable thing to do, it can cause you to be ranked even lower by Google due to your website being linked from poor websites.
I would concentrate on your content, this is a slower process but it's more sustainable and less likely to be affected by Google's ongoing change of their ranking criteria,
Just randomly back linking to your website is not an advisable thing to do, it can cause you to be ranked even lower by Google due to your website being linked from poor websites.
I would concentrate on your content, this is a slower process but it's more sustainable and less likely to be affected by Google's ongoing change of their ranking criteria,
Upvote
0
Yes they are in some cases but like the other poster said if you don't know what you are doing you can do more harm than good and you are also subject to changes made by google that can render all work useless after a few months/years or even hurt you.
Take Davids advice and concentrate on content and marketing yourself out there based on your target markets behavior rather than spending hours link building as it can be a very boring, very soal destroying process.
Take Davids advice and concentrate on content and marketing yourself out there based on your target markets behavior rather than spending hours link building as it can be a very boring, very soal destroying process.
Last edited:
Upvote
0
W
WolfStores
I would say that back links are important and would help Google rankings provided that they are 'legitimate' links from other sites with good reputation. Avoid simply adding your URL to any random website directory and also avoid hiring anybody who promises to provide thousands of back links to your site for a small fee 
Upvote
0
N
Ninja Commerce
Hi David.
Firstly, yes, Google is pretty confusing at times. I would say links are still pretty important, but that statement is a massive oversimplification which has lead to many people think that all they need to do is get links.
Try to think about it in terms of whether your pages 'Deserve' to rank. If you want to rank for a given term then you need to build a page that is better (for users Googling that term) than anything that currently exists.
If you have a site which doesn't get a lot of traffic, then building links the right way is a great way to get some traffic and kick start the SEO ball rolling. In theory, if your content is up to scratch then you will start getting some natural links too...
Of course, it's not an ideal world, the system can be gamed although it is getting harder to do.
In general, if you approach SEO with a pure-heart (ie, be genuine and try not to upset Google) then you *should* do well. But there's no guarantee that you won't ever be outranked by someone else using slightly questionable SEO tactics.
...Sorry, I think I got off on a bit of a tangent there... Hopefully that helps clear things up for you, but I doubt it!
Firstly, yes, Google is pretty confusing at times. I would say links are still pretty important, but that statement is a massive oversimplification which has lead to many people think that all they need to do is get links.
Try to think about it in terms of whether your pages 'Deserve' to rank. If you want to rank for a given term then you need to build a page that is better (for users Googling that term) than anything that currently exists.
If you have a site which doesn't get a lot of traffic, then building links the right way is a great way to get some traffic and kick start the SEO ball rolling. In theory, if your content is up to scratch then you will start getting some natural links too...
Of course, it's not an ideal world, the system can be gamed although it is getting harder to do.
In general, if you approach SEO with a pure-heart (ie, be genuine and try not to upset Google) then you *should* do well. But there's no guarantee that you won't ever be outranked by someone else using slightly questionable SEO tactics.
...Sorry, I think I got off on a bit of a tangent there... Hopefully that helps clear things up for you, but I doubt it!
Upvote
0
Yes, links from other websites are important but it is just part of the deal. First you need to have a good website which is build in a way that it is easy and clear for Google to pick it up. Then you need to keep the content fresh so it's important to spend a lot of time on it. You can also think about adding facebook, google plus and twitter on your website so that people can like and share your page. Don't forget to advertise your company in different directories too.
Good luck!
Tom
Good luck!
Tom
Upvote
0
Hi David,
Yes, link building is an important element of SEO. Google are particularly not keen on people 'buying' links, even though this goes on quite a lot. You can get away with buying links so long as you do it ethically (i.e. they are good links), here are some key points to identifying 'good links':
* Links come from websites relevant to what you do (so the people on the website it is linking from will be interested in your products or services)
* Links coming from popular websites work best and looking at the Google PageRank of the page they come from (or the homepage of the website they come from) will give you an idea of just how beneficial this might be. Higher Google PageRank score is obviously better.
* Sometimes you can get others to unwittingly do your backlinking for you! For instance, if you have some informative or useful content, people start sharing on forums, blogs or even social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook (these all count as backlinks too)
Most importantly - avoid bad links as too many of these can have a negative impact. Good examples of bad links would links from spammy websites (or websites in a foreign language with no relevance to what you do) or poor quality ones from websites with no Google PageRank.
Content is definitely important too (probably slightly more so than backlinks, although I would recommend any good SEO activity needs to look at both of these - along with other activities like social media and so on
Yes, link building is an important element of SEO. Google are particularly not keen on people 'buying' links, even though this goes on quite a lot. You can get away with buying links so long as you do it ethically (i.e. they are good links), here are some key points to identifying 'good links':
* Links come from websites relevant to what you do (so the people on the website it is linking from will be interested in your products or services)
* Links coming from popular websites work best and looking at the Google PageRank of the page they come from (or the homepage of the website they come from) will give you an idea of just how beneficial this might be. Higher Google PageRank score is obviously better.
* Sometimes you can get others to unwittingly do your backlinking for you! For instance, if you have some informative or useful content, people start sharing on forums, blogs or even social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook (these all count as backlinks too)
Most importantly - avoid bad links as too many of these can have a negative impact. Good examples of bad links would links from spammy websites (or websites in a foreign language with no relevance to what you do) or poor quality ones from websites with no Google PageRank.
Content is definitely important too (probably slightly more so than backlinks, although I would recommend any good SEO activity needs to look at both of these - along with other activities like social media and so on
Last edited:
Upvote
0
B
businessbrain
In my opinion, don't focus on backlinks but focus on creating the types of thing that people want to read about. Focus your ideas and content on the reader, not yourself. Then, people will start to share your content etc and your backlinks will grow stronger and more importantly, they will be organic. Keep this in mind.
1 Strong content backlink is worth 20 bought backlinks on spammy websites.
1 Strong content backlink is worth 20 bought backlinks on spammy websites.
Upvote
0
Are backlinks the key to getting higher in Google?
Well, that's a question with many answers. The simple one is yes, but likewise, the same answer applies to: Are backlinks the key to getting a search penalty that keeps your site in the 50+ regions.
The key to ranking in Google, now and for the foreseeable future is to have a worthy site for the terms you want to rank for - and, you can't do that overnight and you can't just fire some money at a link building company to make that happen for you.
Sure, there are some easy wins and simple links you can and should pick up to get started from quality directories, maybe even a few articles, a couple of guest posts and highly visited sites etc and they are no brainers, you should do that, but where this gets risky is when you are paying someone X a month to build Y amount of links for you and having no part in that process.
To some extent, I like the struggle with a new site, the lack of traffic to begin with is an opportunity to really hone your site into a mean, lean, lead generation tool. Only getting 10 visits a day? Well, try and convert one of them to a lead, social media or some other goal.
Businessbrain mentioned it below but content really is the key here. It may not instantly generate you a ream of backlinks, but long tail content focusing on very specific terms allows you to get content in front of people. The ratios are generic but approximately 10% of search queries are transactional, 10% are navigational but the rest, the other 80% or so is informational so if with content, you can target that bigger slice of the action whilst your competitors flail around going after the tough as old boots 10% of directly obvious and commercial terms.
I am helping some smaller folks in some big money areas where the results for the money terms are still totally saturated by the players with the biggest cheque books but we are still finding ways to bring people in via the back door with long tail content articles whilst the big players are all fighting a big linking battle for results.
Ultimately, if you are spending money on the marketing of your business, and are just paying a company to build links or some such, it might work for a while (if they are good) but you are not investing in your own website and subsequently you are not improving the value of your own site so you are not likely to build a sustainable form of traffic from search.
Build great content, invest in your site, if people like your site, Google will like your site and guess what, if you focus on the helpful, informational content, over time, the ranks for that tricky 10% will start to climb as well and that is without following risky link building strategies.
There is another way to look at this that I find useful and that is to consider what happens if you go and build a series of placed links. In essence, this is a very simple approach and therefore is something your competitors can easily copy. Hey, lets pull up that sites links in one of the link indexes and copy them - not sustainable and someone will always have deeper pockets (not even considering the link penalties etc).
You want links that can't be easily copied and Google have rattled it off enough so we should all know that you want honest, editorial links and to do that you have to make news and make friends. Write good stuff but then add some hustle so folks know about it and over time, you will build something sustainable and something your competitors can't just replicate.
Just some thoughts & I am not avoiding doing the nasty job I have been putting off all morning, honest, guv.
Cheers
Marcus
Well, that's a question with many answers. The simple one is yes, but likewise, the same answer applies to: Are backlinks the key to getting a search penalty that keeps your site in the 50+ regions.
The key to ranking in Google, now and for the foreseeable future is to have a worthy site for the terms you want to rank for - and, you can't do that overnight and you can't just fire some money at a link building company to make that happen for you.
Sure, there are some easy wins and simple links you can and should pick up to get started from quality directories, maybe even a few articles, a couple of guest posts and highly visited sites etc and they are no brainers, you should do that, but where this gets risky is when you are paying someone X a month to build Y amount of links for you and having no part in that process.
To some extent, I like the struggle with a new site, the lack of traffic to begin with is an opportunity to really hone your site into a mean, lean, lead generation tool. Only getting 10 visits a day? Well, try and convert one of them to a lead, social media or some other goal.
Businessbrain mentioned it below but content really is the key here. It may not instantly generate you a ream of backlinks, but long tail content focusing on very specific terms allows you to get content in front of people. The ratios are generic but approximately 10% of search queries are transactional, 10% are navigational but the rest, the other 80% or so is informational so if with content, you can target that bigger slice of the action whilst your competitors flail around going after the tough as old boots 10% of directly obvious and commercial terms.
I am helping some smaller folks in some big money areas where the results for the money terms are still totally saturated by the players with the biggest cheque books but we are still finding ways to bring people in via the back door with long tail content articles whilst the big players are all fighting a big linking battle for results.
Ultimately, if you are spending money on the marketing of your business, and are just paying a company to build links or some such, it might work for a while (if they are good) but you are not investing in your own website and subsequently you are not improving the value of your own site so you are not likely to build a sustainable form of traffic from search.
Build great content, invest in your site, if people like your site, Google will like your site and guess what, if you focus on the helpful, informational content, over time, the ranks for that tricky 10% will start to climb as well and that is without following risky link building strategies.
There is another way to look at this that I find useful and that is to consider what happens if you go and build a series of placed links. In essence, this is a very simple approach and therefore is something your competitors can easily copy. Hey, lets pull up that sites links in one of the link indexes and copy them - not sustainable and someone will always have deeper pockets (not even considering the link penalties etc).
You want links that can't be easily copied and Google have rattled it off enough so we should all know that you want honest, editorial links and to do that you have to make news and make friends. Write good stuff but then add some hustle so folks know about it and over time, you will build something sustainable and something your competitors can't just replicate.
Just some thoughts & I am not avoiding doing the nasty job I have been putting off all morning, honest, guv.
Cheers
Marcus
Upvote
0
Upvote
0
I would not say that backlinks is the only key to improving a sites search engine rankings; however having a solid backlink profile is a very and very important part of any SEO strategy.
One has to keep in mind that the quantitative approach to links is outdated, and if you just manage to get many links in a short period of time, this definitely wont be of any contribution to search engine rankings and may only result in sending a site to Googles sandbox.
On the contrary, a powerful link building strategy came to be about earning reputation in a niche and delivering informative content that people naturally refer to. Hence, only relevant and organic backlinks will definitely improve search engine rankings.
This is also a rule of a thumb to have a combination of do-follow and no-follow links for a diverse and 'looking natural' linking profile. Although one should aim at getting links from pages with high PR in the first place, because they are beneficial in terms of added PR, it still sounds reasonable to me to get some links from niche-related pages with low PR for the sake of diversity.
As Google especially trusts backlinks from .edu and .gov domains, this will be rewarding if you manage to get a few links from them. However, backlinks from these domains are rather difficult to obtain for free, and that's why to me this is the only exception from do not buy links rule.
And of course one should make use of of credible SEO techniques, such as guest blogging, article submission, press releases etc. because apart from providing quality backlink opportunities, they contribute to building online presence and increasing site's search engine visibility.
One has to keep in mind that the quantitative approach to links is outdated, and if you just manage to get many links in a short period of time, this definitely wont be of any contribution to search engine rankings and may only result in sending a site to Googles sandbox.
On the contrary, a powerful link building strategy came to be about earning reputation in a niche and delivering informative content that people naturally refer to. Hence, only relevant and organic backlinks will definitely improve search engine rankings.
This is also a rule of a thumb to have a combination of do-follow and no-follow links for a diverse and 'looking natural' linking profile. Although one should aim at getting links from pages with high PR in the first place, because they are beneficial in terms of added PR, it still sounds reasonable to me to get some links from niche-related pages with low PR for the sake of diversity.
As Google especially trusts backlinks from .edu and .gov domains, this will be rewarding if you manage to get a few links from them. However, backlinks from these domains are rather difficult to obtain for free, and that's why to me this is the only exception from do not buy links rule.
And of course one should make use of of credible SEO techniques, such as guest blogging, article submission, press releases etc. because apart from providing quality backlink opportunities, they contribute to building online presence and increasing site's search engine visibility.
Upvote
0
SEO is an activity used to get the traffic on the website. Backlinks helps a lot i increasing the traffic on Google Page. SEO includes some the following activities by which one gets the traffic on Google page like :
Blog Posting
Forum Posting
Bookmarking
Directory submission
PDF
Images sharing and so on.
Blog Posting
Forum Posting
Bookmarking
Directory submission
Images sharing and so on.
Upvote
0
Probably Yes,
Google values links from valuable sites, but you can not guarantee any link value for your keywords, this is all about probability.... Now, nothing is sure at all...
Google is also hiring social media walls for knowing the latest updates and trends... but it is also not sure that it will bring higher rank, because Zebra update is another problem for social sharings.
One thing is always okay,,, Blogging on website, sharing information, link building at informative sites.
Google values links from valuable sites, but you can not guarantee any link value for your keywords, this is all about probability.... Now, nothing is sure at all...
Google is also hiring social media walls for knowing the latest updates and trends... but it is also not sure that it will bring higher rank, because Zebra update is another problem for social sharings.
One thing is always okay,,, Blogging on website, sharing information, link building at informative sites.
Upvote
0
Latest Articles
-
What Carphone Warehouse, Microsoft and Uber Have in Common: They Started in a DownturnThere's a comforting myth that you need a booming economy to start...- Ozzy
- Updated:
-
What Makes a Small Business Actually Sellable?There's a question that a lot of small business owners never think to...
- Ozzy
- Updated:
-
Why Your Team Keeps Asking the Same Questions (And What to Actually Do About It)Every small business owner knows the moment. You're halfway through...
- Ozzy
- Updated:
-
At What Point Do Courier Losses Just Become a Cost of Doing Business?If you sell physical products online, you already know the feeling. You...
- Ozzy
- Updated:
-
What I Wish I'd Known Before Using AI in My BusinessSomewhere between the headlines promising AI will transform everything...
- Ozzy
- Updated:
