to link or not to link?

[RobinBHM]

I have just had my website completely re-designed and it has been live for a week.

I would now like to have a go at some off-site SEO and see if I can improve the sites rankings myself.

I have been researching my competitor sites that rank in the top few places and although some of them don't necessarily have great content, they do have loads of backlinks (from about 300 to the 1000's), the majority of which seem to be from .com sites of low quality.

So is it worth doing the same as my competitors and working my way through loads of these sites adding links? -it seems to be working for them.

 

[aidan1980]

quality over quantity everytime

 

[Websitehandyman]

Don't be tempted to use poor quality sites or none related blog posting to get free backlinks. You should search for natural backlinks and although it's difficult to get people to link to your site the are other natural backlinks like social bookmarketing, some decent directories and shopping sites.

 

[webgeek]

Find the top 20 keywords that represent real income opportunities for you.

Now, make a list of the top 20 competitors for each, removing all duplicates.

Run them through Ahrefs, or similar, and only keep something with a rating of X (maybe 10, maybe 2, depending on your niche).

Now you've got a shortlist of targets worth pursuing.... if you're convinced they're ranking because of those links.

You might want to consider splitting 1/2 your time and seriously re-checking your site content. Easy way to know if you're bringing your A-game is to set up an Adwords campaign, 1 adgroup per keyword for each of those 20 keywords. Put together a crackin ad for it, pointed to your home-run page on the website. NOW, check the quality score, landing page rating, etc. Google will give you a lot of information on how well you've prepped for that term - so just apply that intel back to your organic thinking, tweak the content, get the score up, and then look at backlinks.

 

[Colin Smith CBP]

The easiest way of thinking about link building strategy is in terms of offline networking. It may be somewhat impressive to have numerous contacts but the degree of power and influence of the contacts that you have is obviously much more important than sheer quantity. Google certainly looks on it that way. Ideally, of course, you would have both quality and quantity.

There are many types of campaigns that can be chosen, and making those decisions can often be difficult to do. Obviously you will want and need to get the highest possible return on your investment in link building as well as achieving a competitive advantage in the SERPs.

There are five major components to a link building campaign,listed here in order of priority. These are:

1. Getting links from authoritative domains
2. Getting links from a volume of domains
3. Obtaining links to pages other than the home page, known as "deep links"
4. Local links for local rankings
5. Getting the anchor text needed to drive rankings.

From what you have said about the link building strategies of your competitors, they seem to be focusing on volume, with the quality of links being pretty low. In many industries, that kind of strategy would get you nowhere fast. However, any strategy is better than no strategy so your competitors are doing well in the SERPs by default because so few of them are implementing a link building strategy at all. The strategy of your competitors has the virtue of being cheap and easy to implement. However, by taking the easy route, they are leaving themselves open to attack from the competition. Should you choose to do it properly, you would wipe the floor with them, at least until they responded in kind.

Implementing such a strategy isn't beyond the capacity of any reasonably intelligent business owner, but it can be time consuming. You would need to weigh up whether doing it yourself was the best use of your time. Certainly, there are many freelancers out there who could do the donkey work for you at a reasonable cost.

 

[RobinBHM]

Many thanks for the comments –lots of stuff for me work on.
-I have been submitting to local directories for local links
-I am researching any industry relevant sites IE conservatory, double glazing and linking where possible

Whilst researching backlinks to competitors I can see that a lot of the sites are American, although quite a few do have reasonably good page rank –but how do I know what is a good site and what is a bad one? It is frustrating to look at a competitors site which has poor content has loads of backlinks but has high rankings -perhaps there something I'm not seeing. The main keywords I am trying to rank for are based around the word 'orangeries'


If it is true that ‘getting links from a volume of domains’ is a key part then I need to understand what is a safe link that won’t get penalised.

I can understand the need to get links from authoritative domains, however I can see this goes hand in hand with building excellent content on my site.
Would I be correct in saying that any article writing I do should be put on my own site at the moment to build authority rather than submit to other article sites?

How often should I update the onsite blog? -would 3 to 4 articles per month be enough? –I would prefer to research and write quality content rather than generic stuff in quantity. I would also like to add 1 or 2 pages to the site each month (its a CMS site)

I will try press release through PRWeb –sounds promising I will do this

I am thinking of writing a design guide download and an excel template as a budget planner with guide prices for potential customers who can use it work out a budget for their complete project including for example landscaping, patio, decorating, floor tiling –all the extras which customers often have done but usually not as a package through us. I could then try and create backlinks offering a free useful download -is this worthwhile?

I am still learning about adwords –so that for another day!

 

[webgeek]

If you use opensiteexplorer or ahrefs you can see their quality ratings for competitor backlinks.

You do NOT need volumes of links. A handful of high authority, highly relevant links could potentially outperform droves of those unrelated links on 0 PR sites.

There's no reason to only publish content on your own site. Sure, it helps you create a high mass of keyword relevant content which eventually forms a gravity of it's own, attracting links and rankings, but it's not an overnight process.

Publishing on external sites that are highly controlled, high authority, dofollow, will help. There are still several top article sites that carry great weight. The same is true with some web 2.0 properties. Or, you could always create a micro-niche site as a spoke, pointing back to your main site hub.

 

[RobinBHM]

Hi Webgeek and others,

Thank you for your input, I will have a play with opensiteexplorer and ahrefs to check quality backlinks.

I feel time spent researching and writing quality articles will be very worth while even it takes quite a long time to write them and find high authority sites to take them.

Can anybody recommend any top article sites I should try? -Do they need to be industry specific, IE in my case, construction, conservatory, double glazing or even perhaps planning or building regulations.

 

[fisicx]

Before you launch into a load of link building, you need to sort out the on-site SEO. There is shed loads of things you can do to the current content and navigation to boost your ranking.

Site reviews are only allowed in the website review forum do cant offer advice here.

 

[webgeek]

As fisicx points out, the on-site is totally within your control and can be done without much expense (just your time). 30%+ of the ranking algorithm is attributable to the on-site.

Here's a recent list of top article directories, though they are general in nature.

Other options would be the document sharing sites. I've seen some top competition in several sectors making good use of SlideShare to get some decent ranked backlinks.

I'd also suggest you check out myblogguest, a place where you can find some of the higher authority/reputation sites looking for guest posted content.

 

[RobinBHM]

I will post on the website review forum as I would be happy to receive any advice about improving current content and navigation for on-site SEO. (and probably have my website slaughtered at the same time -I've read quite a few of the posts on that forum)

I will check out myblogguest to find some of the higher authority sites looking for guest posted backlinks.

Interestingly since posting on here I've had a call this morning from rank-1. I suppose if your website details are made public some sales calls are to be expected....

 

[w.fei]

what's the score you used to rank whether your competitor outperform you or not? number of people linked to the website? this figure might mislead you cause even if users are linked to the website, users will leave immediately anyways, and perhaps left bad impressions over the website. It's better that you also take into consideration the amount of time each user stays on your website.

Last but not least, I would say quality is everything!

 

[jeffreydominic]

Poor quality links may work soon but do not last for long time. Getting 100's of poor quality links is equal to getting one top quality backlink. So try to go in that way

 

[Robert C]

Just try to maintain the quality links. Because those who are sitting at top position in google right now with loads of bad links they will be surely go down due to google panda update. So don't worry.

 

[The Osiris Group]

Qaulity links relevent to your business wins every time.

 

[The Osiris Group]

Jump on the social networking band wagon as this is a real winning way to promote your business.

Sites with high ranks in google. Find them and post your backlinks

 

[FreelanceScribbler]

Don't forget that there are thousands of bloggers out there who can be befriended, bought and bribed to blog and link to your website and recommend your services.

However, with all of these links, the best ones you need to work for and inventivise.
Anyone can just go and buy a link.

 

[RichB0101]

Agree with most the comments already made. I would add that it is important not to put all your eggs in one basket re. links so spread them out between directories, reciprocals, press releases, blogs, article writing, forums and social networking links.
I notice you have a blog and obviously you can trade article writing, but why not have a 'testimonials' and a 'resources' page which are a slightly short-hand way of trading a few links so long as you don't go over-board with too many?

 

[RobinBHM]

My initial temptation to play the numbers game for backlinks has waned somewhat............I thought it was the same as facebook likes, the more the merrier!

Following the excellent advise on here, I have been looking at sites such as Now public, PRWeb etc -these are fantastic quality sites and it'll be worth the time researching and writing articles to the quality these sites require.

This forum is a fantastic source of information for SEO, many thanks to everybody who has provided advice. I am so glad I asked on here before launching down the wrong road.

 

[nimahen]

Some of the SEO strategies that will help to get genuine backlinks are , blog posting , Article Submissions and blog commenting .

 

[MoreForLess]

Try to get mostly links that are from a relevant sources. In the best case scenario this links should also bring you direct users independently of Google.

Use your social presence to distribute your content = natural links and traffic.