Better Link Building for Improved Search Engine Rankings

"Understand the relationship between proper link building and improved search engine rankings."

Better Search Engine Placement through link building is one of the most important strategies in getting your website ranked higher on search engine results - and the most misunderstood.

It is not all about linking, but linking with a clear-cut purpose, and that is to rank on either the first or second page results of the more popular search engines, such as Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL to name a few.

Building links is building connection. The more you connect, the larger your network becomes. However, in search engine optimization, you cannot just link wantonly. You have to consider important factors like quality and relevance of the websites you would want to build connection with, in relation to yours.

Getting links from sites without necessitating a link back is a strategy followed by many. The rationale is quite simple: as links are the stepping stones upon which you rest your ambition to be first among search engine results, you would not deprive yourself of some marbles to step on, by giving it away, would you? In SEO parlance, you won’t “bleed” yourself of links by linking back.

Here are some tips on how to link like a pro for better search engine rankings:

• It is important to get links to other pages of your website, more commonly to your content pages, and other pages as well. This is considered “deep linking”. Others erred in believing that they should focus their optimization efforts through link building, on the homepage alone.
• The rule of thumb is to gather all the links you can, provided they are not from banned sites. You may gather links from forums, directories and social book marking sites. Submitting and distributing content among article directories will also get you all the links faster.
• In anything you do, like creating content for your pages or gathering links, be consistent. Do the exercise regularly, not sporadically.
• In acquiring links, be sure these are quality links: relevant to your site, permanent and with clear, targeted traffic.
• Go for “text links”, one that attaches to a rich keyword phrase.
• Be wary about links having “nofollow” tags.
• Improve search engine rank, but observe specific search engines’ guidelines. You won’t get too far when you “misbehave” online. Worse, you can get banned.
• When sending emails, be sure that you are contacting a decision maker- someone who has a say on links - such as the webmaster himself, the site’s marketing guy or the discussion moderator.
• Find the decision maker’s full name and personal email address.

Building links like a professional and improve search engine rankings is nothing else but linking more, linking deep, linking smart and linking for search engine benefits. Following closely the guidelines stated here will not get you in trouble, and will ensure that your efforts will not be put to waste. Overtime, your linking strategies will pay off.