Building
a Successful Link Popularity Strategy - Part 1
Link
popularity should be an integral component of your search engine
optimization strategy. Since there is so much information to
cover on link popularity, we're devoting a four-part article
to educating our clients on this cost-effective tool.
If
you are new to the search engine optimization arena, you've
probably heard about links and how beneficial they can be in
the search engine optimization process. What is a link? By our
definition, a link is a hypertext connection between two points
of reference that, when clicked, takes the viewer to a different
Web page.
There
are three basic kinds of links: internal, outbound and inbound.
Internal
Links
An
internal link will take you to another location within your
own web site. It may be on the same page or a different page,
but you will remain on your own Web site pages.
Outbound
Links
An
outbound link will connect you to another site from your own
site.
Often
times, Web site owners don't like using outbound links because,
in essence, the visitor will be leaving their site to go somewhere
else and they may forget to come back or find something more
interesting. And, let's face it-you want to keep visitors on
your site as long as possible in hopes of generating a sale.
So,
let's turn this negative into a positive. We know that users
have tons of resources available to them, but if you provide
them with other resources, they're going to spend less time
on search engines where they really could get side-tracked.
By providing relevant resources, you help to keep them focused
while at the same time increasing the relevance of your site.
By providing site visitors with high quality references, you
are actually adding credibility and value to your site, increasing
your chances that users will visit your site in the future.
Inbound
Links
Inbound
links send visitors to your Web site from other sites. If you
are wondering who is including a link to your site on their
Web pages, you can easily conduct a search for inbound links.
Go to Google and type in the following: link:www.yoursiteURL.com.
This search will generate all links to your site.
The
more links you have pointing to your site, the more search engines
will deem your site as a valuable resource. That's where link
popularity comes in. Building inbound links through a reciprocal
link exchange program is an easy yet powerful search engine
optimization tool. In Part 2 of this article, we'll talk more
about why link popularity is important and how it works. Stay
tuned

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