There's been a lot of talk by SEO experts for years about the importance of incoming links, sometimes referred to simply as "links."
But, as much as we talk, SEO'ers haven't always done such a great job of explaining what links are, why they're important and how to measure the value of an SEO link building program.
The What
When the search engine optimization community uses the term "links," it really means a link from another website going to your company's site.
And not just from any other website. SEO link building requires that the site linking to yours must be trustworthy and related to your business. Valuable links come from places like:
- Universities or colleges that your company has a relationship with
- Associations and organizations your company or employees belong to
- Local business groups or chambers
- The local versions of major search engines
- Any number of relatively unknown but reputable business- and industry-related directories
- Industry-related publications and news sites
From an SEO link building standpoint, worthless links come from places like:
- Outfits that promise thousands of links within a very short period of time
- Sites that scrape (i.e. steal) content and directory listings from other websites
- Pay-per-click programs
- Your parent company or sister companies, along with websites that your company owns
The Why
Of course, from a business perspective, it makes sense to have links between companies that are related by ownership. You just can't expect to get an SEO boost from them.
The reason is simple: The search engines basically view each incoming link to your site as a vote for your website. Valuable links are counted as votes because the search engines assume that the site providing the link doesn't have a vested interest in linking to your site.
In this light, a link from your parent company's website isn't counted as a vote for SEO link building purposes, because it would be like accepting your mom as a reference for a job application. Yeah, she's a nice lady, but...
This "links = votes" analogy also explains why incoming links to your website are important, rather than links from your site to somewhere else. Links from your site don't tell the search engines anything about your website, whereas incoming links from reputable websites demonstrate your site's trustworthiness and value.
The How
Sometimes, there's an actual financial cost to SEO link building, say when an industry association requires an extra fee for a link in their directory. In general, there's also an indirect cost associated with accruing incoming links, related to the time and effort required to solicit them.
Because of these direct and indirect costs, it's critical for companies to remember their SEO link building goal when measuring the effectiveness of incoming links. From an SEO perspective, there's only one true measure of an incoming link's value: as a link from an appropriate website, it's a vote in your website's favor in the search engines' eyes.
When evaluating an SEO link building campaign, a company absolutely cannot judge the overall worth of an incoming link based on the number of visitors it brings to its website or by the number of people who see the link on the originating site.
An SEO-driven link has value simply because it's an SEO-driven link. Any boost in your company's traffic is a byproduct of that link helping your site to be ranked higher on a search engine, which drives traffic to your site. So, even though you can't measure the impact directly, high-quality incoming links do help bring traffic and leads to your site.
Beth Ann Earle is the director of client services at Pilot Fish, a search engine optimization firm based in Akron, Ohio. Pilot Fish specializes in helping b-to-b clients get found online.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Beth_Ann_Earle
