Google Says - Part 2

Next we need to build our website and Google provides us with some definite steps we should take to ensure our success in getting pages found on the Internet.

Google Says: Make a site with a clear hierarchy and text links. Every page should be reachable from at least one static text link.

For those of you using flash or JavaScript navigation and find some search spiders like googlebot only crawling your index page, it is due to the fact that googlebot cannot crawl the flash or JavaScript. It can’t follow the links to other pages on your site.

Google Says: Offer a site map to your users with links that point to the important parts of your site. If the site map is larger than 100 or so links, you may want to break the site map into separate pages.

Again we want to use text links on our sitemap pages so that googlebot can crawl the links and award the proper Google PageRank as well. If you are using flash or JavaScript navigation, build a link from your home page to your sitemap page so the bot can crawl all your pages easily.
Google Says: Create a useful, information-rich site, and write pages that clearly and accurately describe your content.

This is a biggie folks and many do not understand this simple instruction. When Google says to write information rich pages to accurately describe your content it does not mean for you to copy someone else's writing and use it on your website. Nor does it say to buy a software program to scrape content from different websites and make pages from these. You need to write original content that is clear and concise. Googlebot understands what is jibberish very well, and it usually sends your pages to the supplemental index.

Google Says: Think about the words users would type to find your pages, and make sure that your site actually includes those words within it.

This is more important than many realize. Doing some research here will pay dividends in the long run. While you will see keyword terms like "Amboy pizza Jersey New Perth shop" and these will be easy to attain front page rankings on the search results organic pages, typically few real people like you and I would type a search like the above. It would typically be written as "Perth Amboy New Jersey pizza shop" a term more likely to drive traffic to a pizza restaurant in Perth Amboy.

Author : Clint Dixon

Google Says - Part 1

You remember the childhood game, Simon says; the leader would say, “Simon says jump on one foot,” and you had jump on one foot. If you stopped, or if you did something Simon didn’t say, you were out. This article is an adaptation of the game, and it is called Google Says. In Google Says, we will see how following information from Google can bring your website to the top of the Google search results organic listings.

I want to preface this article by saying that one should not assume everything Google says is practical, nor is it the only method of getting websites to the front page of the organic free results. Use this as more of a foundation building plan.
Since we are building a foundation, we should start toward the beginning of search engine optimization and building websites for users. You will first need a domain name for your new website.

Google Says: Certain signals may be used to distinguish between illegitimate and legitimate domains. For example, domains can be renewed up to a period of 10 years. Valuable (legitimate) domains are often paid for several years in advance, while doorway (illegitimate) domains rarely are used for more than a year. Therefore, the date when a domain expires in the future can be used as a factor in predicting the legitimacy of a domain and, thus, the documents associated therewith.

As we can see Google tells us in their March 2005 patent filing release that Google considers websites with one (1) year registrations to be related to spam websites. As such you should register your domain name for a period of five (5) years or more, the closer to ten (10) the better, but since most businesses in the offline world work with views five (5) years ahead this length should be fine.

Next you will need somewhere to host your website!

Google Says: Also, or alternatively, the domain name server(DNS) record for a domain may be monitored to predict whether a domain is legitimate. The DNS record contains details of who registered the domain, administrative and technical addresses, and the addresses of name servers (i.e., servers that resolve the domain name into an IP address). By analyzing this data over time for a domain, illegitimate domains may be identified.

What Google is trying to tell us is registration contact and technical information related to your web site's hosting server will for legitimate businesses stay the same year to year, and Google by indexing this information and comparing it each year can determine whether a domain is used to give users information or to spam their search results.

So in order to build the solid foundation make sure you are not switching servers often, The best server environment is a dedicated server that you control and is set up properly to allow easy crawling by the various search engine spiders. If you cannot afford a dedicated server look for a reliable web host(IP) address, which has much the same effect as a dedicated server.

Author : Clint Dixon

Do not submit your site to SE's

Before answering this question we have to know what is the difference between a search engine and directory. Here is a brief explanation.
Main difference between search engine and directory lay is the way websites get entered into their index. People submit their sites to the directories, which are reviewed by human editors. Think of the directories as collections of Internet sites organized by subject. Search engines work by sending out a spider to fetch as many documents as possible. Following, another program called an indexer, reads these documents and creates an index based on the words contained in each document.
Having said that, let’s see why you should not submit your site to the Search Engines.
More than 90% of the search engines traffic comes from three major search engines Google, Yahoo! and MSN.
You can see many ads on the Internet which look like this: "submit your site on X00.000 search engines…"
Submitting your site on hundreds of thousands of search engines wouldn’t help and is simply not worthwhile. Save your money as you would do when you see ad’s like: "loose weight while you sleep".
These three search engines provide results for many other search engines, and if you are listed on these three search engines, your site will be listed on many other search engines as well.
Altavista for example show results from the Yahoo! index. Rankings are not the same, because the algorithm is different but the index is the same. If your site is new and is listed on Yahoo but not on Altavista, be patient and do nothing. Altavista will show your site when they update their index from yahoo. AOL (America On Line) and Netscape use Google index. They additionally receive listings from DMOZ. There are many examples.
The so called "Meta" search engines like DogPile or Metacrawler are showing results from Google and Yahoo amongst. These search engines actually search the top search engines and show combined results.
If your site is not new, there is a chance that search engines spiders already find your site and index it. So before doing anything check if your site is already listed, even if you did not submit your site to any search engine. But what you should you do if your site is just uploaded?
As we already explain search engines are equipped with spiders which will find on your site. All you need is to submit your site in Directories, and search engines spiders will find your link and your site will be indexed. But be sure to provide enough "food" for the spiders. That is, submit your site in enough directories, and you will make that process shorter.
While submission to the search engines is wasting of your time, submission to the directories is not. You will benefit from submitting your site to Directories, not only because search engines will find your link there and index your site, but you will also increase your link popularity. Search engines consider each link which is pointing to your site as kind of vote and give it a "credit" for each "vote".
That’s why you should submit your site to as many directories you can. However, don’t expect bulk traffic from the directories. Even the biggest directories like Yahoo! or DMOZ are not able to deliver load of traffics. On the other side, traffic delivered though the directories is usually quality traffic, because these people are browsing to the find products or services that you offer.
Submitting your site more than once to search engines might slow down indexing time. If you still want to submit your site to search engines, do that just once, and do that manually. Companies which advertise that they will submit your site on X00.000 will not do that manually, that is for sure. They use automated submission software, even all major search engines mention in their submission guidelines that you should submit your site manually. And major search engines are what you should care for only. You remember the fact where the over 90% of traffic comes from?
Remember that only submitting your site to the search engines does nothing to increase your ranking in most cases. If web site optimization on your web site is not properly implemented or is not implemented at all chances are small that your site will be on first few pages with results. And having in mind that only about 7% of the people look further then third page, top is the only place you want to be.
How to calculate if the search engine optimization is worth to invest in? Consider this: What is the annual worth of one customer to you?" Is it 25 €, 250 €, or perhaps 2500 €? How many customers you need to get the invested money back?
Optimization of your website might be one of your best investments ever, if is planed and implemented right.Zoran Makrevski is the president of SEO.Goto.gr. We offer customized and affordable SEO Services.

Increasing Link Popularity

Search engines are the gateway to the Internet; they are the first tool that potential customers use to find the products and services they need. This is why link popularity is so imperative. If the customers do not find your website, you have no possibilities of making any sales.

You're probably wondering what the blazes is popular about a link! Well, in a word - plenty! Link popularity refers to the ranking assigned to your website by the search engines, and it determines the ranking your page gets when keywords are entered into a search engine. So, you're probably wondering, how do I make my link popular?

Search engines are discretionary, giving status and ranking to sites that have links to their pages from related, quality sites. It's a simple formula, but a very important one. Google created the system, and now virtually all the most popular search engines employ it to rank your web pages in their indexes.

The more commonly used your keyword is, the harder it will be to achieve link popularity, but without achieving this step, it is almost certain your site will never rank highly on any search engine. But don't be discouraged; there are tried and true ways of achieving link popularity using the most competitive keywords.

There are a few things you should be aware of. The first is that just linking up with a large number of other websites will not achieve link popularity. In fact, it may have quite the opposite effect. This is particularly true when pertaining to websites that are nothing more than "link farms" - pages containing line after line of indiscriminate links. Search engines may aggressively discriminate against your website if you are associated with a link farm, so steer clear of them!

The next thing to bear in mind is the quality of the site you are linking to. Never link to a page you have reservations about your visitors seeing. The last thing you want your website to appear as is indiscriminate and cheap. Linking to sites of poor quality will only lessen your link popularity, if not completely destroy it.

So let's get to what you need to do to achieve supreme link popularity and improve your rankings to stellar status on all the popular search engines.

The first step, and the fastest way to get your foot in the door, is to get a listing in a popular directory, such as Open Directory Project and Yahoo. If your site is business-related, you will want to be listed on Yahoo, and despite the fact that it will cost you around $300 a year, it will be money well spent. If your site is non-commercial, the listing will be free, but it will take time and follow-up to actually get it listed. Open Directory is gives you a free listing whether you are business-related or non-commercial, but be prepared to make a lot of follow-up inquiries before you see your site listed.

You are aiming to get listed in the highest level of appropriate category, and this just takes some common sense. For example, if your company ships Alpaca wool from an Alpaca farm located in the middle of Nowhere, Tiny State, do NOT submit your listing to "Retailers from Nowhere, Tiny State." BIG MISTAKE! All you have to do is look a little deeper - and submit your listing to the "Fine Alpaca Wool" category. You will not only associate yourself with culture and quality, but you will be listed in a national category.

The next step after you have attained directory listings is to locate other quality sites that will increase your link popularity. Try to find sites that are in some way related to yours, so not only will your link popularity increase, but your customer base may also be expanded. You want to avoid your competitors and look for sites that are useful to your site's visitors. Let's look at the Alpaca Wool site example. Linking up to a site that sells knitting supplies would be helpful to your visitors, and the chances of the knitting supply site wanting to link up to your site are also greater. By linking to a related site that will be relevant to your website's traffic, you are increasing both of your site's business prospects - and both of your sites' link popularity.

Not all sites want to link to other sites, so you will have to do some research when you are looking for possible linking partners. Google is an excellent starting place for your search. Make sure you enter keywords that you think quality customers will also enter to find your own site. Remember, your criteria are quality, highly ranked, non-competing websites that have a links or resources page. Go to these sites and objectively assess them. Look at the quality of the product, the graphics, and the ease of use. Then check out the other sites they are linked to, and determine if your own site would fit in with the crowd.

When you decide you have found a good prospect, you must set out to woo them. The first thing to do is to add a link on your own links page to their site. This is an essential first step; it shows good faith, and ups your chances significantly of their reciprocity. After you have added their link, you must contact the webmaster of their site. Since this is almost always done by email, you want to make sure it is immediately clear that your message is not junk mail. This requires that you tell them right off the bat that you have added a link to their page on your site. A hook like this almost always insures the reader will read on.

Next, be sure to be flattering and let them know how much you appreciate their website. Make sure you emphasize that you have actually visited their site, and that their site is not just a random pick. Give them the address of your links page, and ask them to check out the link for themselves. It's a good idea to mention that they will not only benefit from the increased traffic your website will direct their way, but you will also increase their link popularity. Briefly, explain why link popularity is so essential, but do this in a sentence or two so you don't sound like a professor! Finally, tell them you would greatly appreciate if they would reciprocally add a link on their own links page to your website.

Go through this process with as many appropriate sites as you can find, bearing in mind the criteria of quality and non-competitiveness. After you have emailed all relevant sites, be sure to check these website frequently to see if they have added a link to your page. Give it about a month, and if no link appears, try another charming email. Then give it another month, and if your site is still absent from their links page, it's time to remove their link from your own links page. The only time you want to pursue a link further than this is if you believe a site is crucial to your link popularity and your business needs. Just remember to keep all your communications complimentary and cordial.

Then set up a schedule to check your ranking in search engines frequently to see if your link popularity has improved. This is not achievable in the blink of an eye. It will take some time and a good deal of work. There is no way around the labor-intensive quality of improving your link popularity, which is why search engines regard it with such importance.

By the way - make sure you have a beautiful, streamlined site or you will never persuade anyone to link up to you. Be prepared to keep plugging away at this process, as long as it takes, until you achieve link popularity stardom!


About the Author -www.profit.ne1.net

Best ways to get inbound links

SEO One-way Web Links
I've only seen five strategies that really work consistently for getting hundreds of links.
Less Effective One-Way Link Strategies
Yet there's perennial interest in alternative linking strategies. They range from bad to OK, but none offer as much potential as the five major ways of getting links.
Link farms never seem to die. The latest variations try to pass themselves off as Viral Marketing, but are really a sort of endless pyramid scheme: you link to me, so I link to someone else, who links to someone else, and on and on down the line. Link farms can get you delisted from search engine indexes, so don't even try them.
Affiliates can provide you with one-way inbound links if you use affiliate software that links directly to your site rather than through a redirect. But many, many affiliates are now placing all their affiliate links in redirects of their own invention, to help protect their commissions from pirates who will simply apply to the program themselves to get a discount.
Posting to web forums and blogs regularly will get you one-way inbound links, but they'll only have search-engine value a small percentage of the time. Many blogs and bulletin boards use search-engine-unfriendly dynamic file formats, automatically encase links in script, or use robot instructions to prevent spiders from following links.
Many one-way inbound linking strategies fall into the great-if-you-are-lucky-enough-to-get-it category, such as winning a web award or being featured on a high-PageRank website just for being so great.
Other one-way incoming link strategies are in the this-will-take-forever-to-get-anywhere category, such as offering to provide testimonials to all your vendors in exchange for a link to your site. (Hint: If you can get more than twenty links that way, you probably need to simplify your supply chain.)
Now, on to the five major ways of getting large numbers of one-way inbound links. Some are better than others, but they all have more potential than some of the more madcapped strategies. Of course, none is a good strategy all on its own. You have to understand all five strategies in order to really gain a distinct advantage in the one-way link hunt.
1. Waiting for Inbound Links
If you have good content you will eventually get one-way inbound links naturally, without asking. Organic, freely given links are an essential part of any SEO strategy. But you cannot rely on them, for two reasons:
Unfortunately, "eventually" can be a very long time.
Worse, there is a vicious cycle: you can't get search engine traffic, or other non-paid traffic, without inbound links; yet without inbound links or search engine traffic, how is anyone going to find you to give you inbound links?
2. Triangulating for Inbound Links
Search engines will have a tough time dampening reciprocal links if the reciprocation is not direct. To get links to one website you offer in exchange a link from another website you also control. This would seem to be a mostly foolproof way of defeating the link-dampening ambitions of Google and the rest. If you have more than one website, you probably are already employing this linking method. There are only a few drawbacks:
You need to have more than one website in the same general category of interest or the links won't be relevant.
The work required to set up this kind of arrangement and verify compliance is not insignificant. The process cannot be automated to the same extent as direct one-to-one reciprocal linking.
As with traditional reciprocal links, a very big drawback is that the links are mostly on "Resources" pages that are just lists of links. There's only a small chance of getting significant traffic from these links. Plus, any "Resource" page may well eventually become an easy target for link dampening, if that hasn't happened already.
3. Submitting to Directories
They are the legendary fairy lands of SEO: PageRank-passing, no-fee-charging, and actually well-run directories of relevant links. Yes, they really do exist. An SEO acquaintance tells me he knows 200 good ones just off the top of his head. Plus, there are other kinds of directories: directories of affiliate programs, of websites using a certain content management system, of websites whose owners are members of this or that group, of websites accepting PayPal, etc. etc.
Ah, a link in a PageRank-passing link directory: it's a good deal if you can get it. But let's say you do get links from all 200 such directories and a hundred more from the little niche directories--now what?
4. Paying for Inbound Links
Buying and selling text links on high-PageRank web pages has become big business. Buying good traffic-generating "clean" links is a great alternative to pay-per-click advertising, which confers no SEO benefit. But, there are a number of pitfalls of relying primarily on paid links for SEO:
The cost of the hundreds of links required for substantial search engine traffic can become prohibitive.
As soon as you stop paying, you lose your link--you are essentially renting rather than owning, with no "link equity" building up.
Google is actively trying to dampen the impact of paid links on rankings, as revealed in various patent filings. A website can try to mask the fact that the links are paid, but how well it does that is out of your control.
Given Google's mission to dampen paid links' effectiveness, paid link buyers have an interest in verifying that a potential paid link partner is "passing PageRank." But identifying appropriate PageRank-passing paid link partners is quite a task in itself.
Google also has a stated mission of dampening the value of any "artificial" links. Having most of your links on PageRank 3 or higher web pages would seem to be a dead give-away that your links are "artificial," since the vast majority of web pages (note: not necessarily websites, but their pages) are PageRank 1 or lower. Meanwhile, buying PageRank 0 or 1 links would have so little impact on a site's PageRank that it would not be worth the expense.

About the Author
Webmaster :- http://pixeltechnologies.net/, http://shainaoverseas.com/

How to Submit to Directories

Unlike submitting to search engines, submitting your site to directories and niche portals usually involves a lot more than simply typing in your URL. You often have to start by researching the various topic categories to find the most appropriate area to submit to. Then you generally have to provide some detailed information about your site, its’ content, your company and your contact details.
When selecting the most appropriate Directory category to submit your site to, conduct a search for your main keyword phrase and view the various related categories. Study the sites listed within these categories and choose the category that is the most relevant to or closely related to your site content. Some directories like ODP have specific Category Descriptions you should read before submitting, to ensure you have chosen the most relevant topic for your site.
Another way to choose your category is to search for sites belonging to your direct competitors. It is likely that the category they are listed in will be the most relevant to your site.
If your site targets or discusses a specific regional market, you will need to submit to a regional category. For example, if my site was about rental cars for hire in Sydney, Australia, I would need to submit it to the regional Yahoo category and not the general Yahoo rental car category.

I find it useful to submit a slightly different description of my client’s sites for each directory submission. That way, I can gauge which descriptions are more effective in terms of encouraging people to click and also which directories are providing my clients with the most traffic. Many directories feed their database results to other engines and directories, so if I have a description unique to each directory and I see that description pop up on other search sites, I know it is the result of that original directory submission and immediately recognize the value of that original submission.
Remember that directory editors don’t care about your site’s ranking in their search results. If they are reviewing a site submission that contains an obviously keyword stuffed title and description, they are unlikely to find it appealing or beneficial for inclusion in their database! Always make sure your submission details are relevant, interesting and accurate. Try to highlight your site’s benefits for the visitor and unique content that makes it stand out from others in the same category. If your site sounds just like a cookie-cutter version of others of the same topic, there is no incentive for the editor to include it.

Submitting to the Yahoo! Directory
There are a couple of sites where you want to take extreme care and do advance research when submitting your site. One of these is the Yahoo! Directory. The way you submit your site to Yahoo! can make or break your site’s ultimate ranking in the Directory and if you’re not careful, could also cost you USD 299 for nothing.
With Yahoo!’s huge market share and popularity worldwide, I believe it’s vital that your site is listed in Yahoo!’s Directory. The best way to get listed quickly is by paying the fee for Express Submission. Yahoo! Express is an expedited fee-based site suggestion service for web sites submitted to the Yahoo! directory. A member of Yahoo!'s editorial staff will look at your site, consider your suggestion and respond to you within 7 business days. Important: Payment does not guarantee inclusion in the directory, site placement, or site commentary. It only guarantees that Yahoo! will respond to your suggestion within seven business days, by either adding or denying the site.
The secret to obtaining excellent results via your Yahoo! submission is to choose the most appropriate category and include a carefully-crafted description that contains your main keyword phrase/s without being too verbose. For those of you offering a Yahoo! submission service to clients, be sure to charge a generous admin fee for your expertise in researching the category and writing the description for your client – a successful Yahoo submission can pay dividends for your client for years.
Example of a successful site description for Yahoo!:
ABC VIP Adventures - offers tailored adventure travel and vacation packages to New Zealand including day tours, exotic corporate trips, luxury travel packages, kite surfing, and extreme sports.
Example of an unsuccessful site description for Yahoo!:
ABC Travel – we are the best! We are the only company to contact for your vacation. Call now!
The latter does not use the actual company name, plus it contains lots of hype but no keywords and few clues as to what the site is about. In this case, the Yahoo! editor would have to visit the site submitted and come up with their own description and it’s doubtful the edited description will be something the submitter would be happy with.

Submitting to Open Directory
Another Directory where submission is critical is the Open Directory. DMOZ is run entirely by volunteers and your site submission must be hand-reviewed by one of these volunteers before it can be considered for inclusion. DMOZ is extremely under-staffed (I know this because I’m a DMOZ editor!) and it can take 6 or more months before your submission is reviewed – you must be patient. When submitting to DMOZ, make sure you follow the directory submission guidelines above and prepare to wait, wait and wait some more.
Procedure to follow for a successful DMOZ Submission:
1) Submit site
2) wait for 3 months
3) follow up email to category editor
4) wait for 3 months
5) escalation email to category editor above your category
6) wait for 3 months
7) ask for assistance in the Open Directory Public Forum
8) wait for 1 month
9) escalation email to DMOZ senior staff & post to various forums seeking help

Rules of Submission
1) Do it once: Despite the hype, there is NEVER a need to resubmit to a search engine or directory unless your site is dropped entirely (which is a very rare occurrence).
2) Do it properly: Be very thorough when submitting, especially to directories. Take the time to research and locate the most appropriate category for your site.
3) Be brief: Don’t waffle on about your site in the description field. Get to the point and describe your site in a short sentence or two.
4) Be accurate: Don’t try to trick potential visitors by using vague or misleading descriptions about your products or services.
5) Be relevant: There is a fine line to tread between relevance and keyword optimization when creating your site descriptions for submissions. Try not to cross it by using descriptions over-stuffed with keywords.
6) Be humble: “Best Web Site in the World!!!!” is not going to convince anyone and may earn you the wrath of search engine editors.
7) Be patient: Search engines and directories can take up to 6 months to index and list your site. Re-submitting won’t help things and could result in your site being shoved to the bottom of the review pile.

So that wraps up the directory submission process. It can be time consuming, but taking a little bit of time and care with your submissions can pay dividends for your site for years to come.

Copyright © 2005 by Kalena Jordan

About Link Popularity

Links make it possible for your website to be found in
cyberspace. Links and search engines work hand in hand to
make the process of seeking out information go more
smoothly.

Link popularity has to do with how search engines make the
decision to rank different websites. This can often make or
break the success of a site.

Search engines are extremely choosy when it comes to
deciding on rank structure for websites. They prefer to give
a higher rank as well as status to sites that are linked to
other sites with similar material.

Keywords matter in regards to link popularity. The more
often a keyword is used the more difficult it makes it to
obtain the end result of link popularity.

It's not as simple as managing to link up with plenty of
other websites. Quality is your aim, not quantity. Link
farms are everywhere on the Internet but they only make your
search for link popularity a nightmare. Look past these
awful "endless lines of link pages" and continue your quest
for exceptional quality.

It cannot be stressed enough- quality of a site must always
be put before quantity. Cast aside junk sites masquerading
as sites of worth and soldier on to higher peaks!

Now it's time to get down to the nitty gritty of how you
actually go about making link popularity a reality.

What you need to do first is to get your site listed in a
directory that is popular. Yahoo or an Open Directory
Project are two excellent choices. If you have a business-
oriented site Yahoo will charge you approximately three
hundred dollars a year but it is free if your site deals
with anything else. Open Directory lists sites for free no
matter what they pertain to.

Shoot for the stars as far as categorizing your site. Some
sites are less known or sought after than others. Think big
dreams and go after the successful "big cheese" kind of
sites.

Now you nee to increase your link popularity by finding
other sites that cater to the kind of people you hope to. If
you sell beauty supplies try to link up with another site
that does the same. You might in turn improve business for
the both of you.

Do your research first as not all sites have an interest in
linking up with others. Search out sites and see what they
have to offer and see whom they are linked to.

Now you have to draw your prospect in. First thing to do is
a measure of good faith- link to their website from yours
and then e-mail them right away to inform them of what you
have done.

In your e-mail let the other webmaster know that you are
pleased with what he/she has going at their site and are
glad to be in some small way connected to the ongoing
success of the site. Be as cordial as possible.

Employ the same procedure with every website you care to
link with. And check each site on a regular basis to see if
they have made the decision to return the favor.

Visit the search engines often to determine if your efforts
are paying off. Don't be too discouraged if progress is
slow. Stay focused!

Is your site pleasing to the eye or an eye sore? Put a lot
of effort into making your site one others would be honored
to link to!

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Why Links are crucial

Links are a crucial part of attaining high search rankings, but you must be very careful about to whom you link. I'm going to help you develop a simple link strategy for your website that will help you decide which sites to link to so you're making your way up the search engine rankings and not accidentally hurling yourself backwards.

So the natural questions are:

Should I link to everyone I can find?

Should I allow everyone to link to me?

Should I get one of those "link to 2,000 site for $10" things?

The answer to all of the above is NO!

Develop A Link Strategy

We're going to do an easy-to-digest version of what a search engine optimizer would do if you were to hire one. There are many reasons for having your site professionally optimized which would take up articles in themselves. This is one of the attack strategies for determining optimum, quality links for your site.

Step 1 Where are your competitors linked?

Don't arbitrarily find random sites that you like and link to them. A little bit of research goes a long way. Start with your competitors. Type the keywords for your site into a search engine. You have them, right? This is the list of key word phrases that you want to score the number one position when someone types them in a search. Who appears in the top 10 positions? They're your direct competition that is doing something right or they wouldn't be coming up first. So let's look underneath and see how they got it to work and save you a year of work!

Go back to your search engine and type "link:www.competitorsite.com". Up will pop a long list of sites that have a direct link to your competitor. Do this for your top 10 competitors. Do you see any trends in those results? Do you see any similar sites, or perhaps directory listings? Take some notes. A spreadsheet or a few sheets of loose-leaf paper is helpful and analyze what you've uncovered. You should have a good solid list of links that are helping your competitors rank high!

Step 2 Search for similar themed sites.

Look at your keyword list again. Do these words appear more so on any of the pages you have listed so far? Narrow down your list to sites that have at least the same theme or related content to yours. Even your competition will have quite a few odd links.

If there are 300 links to a site that sells pumpkins, it's natural to have a car dealer or an airline in there too. Chances are they were so pleased with their pumpkin purchase that they added the site to their own web page. You can disregard these right away.

Take your list and look at the potential link site for similarities to your topic. If in the pumpkin market your competition links to a site that tells all about how to cook pumpkin seeds, see if you can find other sites that tell how to make pumpkin pie, make jack-o-lanterns AND cook pumpkin seeds. Make a list of these sites as potentially better ones.

Step 3 Look at the Google Page Rank

You can find a page's page rank by looking at your Google tool bar if you have it installed or by going to a site like http://www.top25web.com/pagerank.php. The actual importance of Google Page Rank to Google searches in particular seems to depend on whom you talk with. It shouldn't be the make or break, but it can help to choose between several similar sites if your unsure of which one to go with.

Page Rank is more of a relative scale of the number and quality of links to a site. The higher the rank, the higher the number. The lower, the worse. It's not unheard of for a link from a site with a Page Rank of 6 or 7 to boost up a low score by a couple numbers. This seems to, at least in Google's case, get a site indexed much faster. And the faster you're indexed, the faster you can start climbing.

Step 4 How many sites link to your selections so far and how good are they?

The more links a site has pointing to it, the more important it appears to be to the search engines. Say your looking at company ABC to put a link on their site to you. Let's first see how many sites link to company ABC. (Just as you looked at your competition). We know search engines place more weight on sites linked to you that have similar content. Now the big search databases seem to know what kind of content is on those linking pages.

Using the pumpkin model, if your potential target is teaming with 100 inbound links from gambling, girls, horses, moons, leprechauns and horoscopes then throw it in the trash pile fast, even if it has a Page Rank of 8 (very rare).

Find that site that has 10 links good, quality links to it. From a pumpkin farmer, a vegetable recipe blog, Halloween and Thanksgiving festivities, how the first settlers used the pumpkin to build houses, etc and has a Page Rank of 5. This is the better choice. Quality, related themes and content to your site and keywords outweighs quantity of random, useless links.

Step 5 Your final list

Don't think you can do this in an hour, or a day! It's quite a bit of work just to find good, potential targets. Here's a bonus... when you have your finished your first wave a link possibilities, here's great way to give it a solid foundation.

Find some relevant directories to list with. Directories of a given theme will have many, many similar links pointing to it. Directories are usually considered to have Authority. (It's not uncommon to have to pay a fee for the good ones anyway.) Try to find a directory of pumpkin farms and pumpkin recipes to build your other links upon.

Another bonus. Avoid this mistake at all costs! Do NOT link to Link Farms or Free for all sites or any sites that will give you 1000 links for $10. These are not directories, but collections of completely unrelated links that exist solely to try to boost search engines rankings. Search engines ban many of these sites. The consequences of being listed with a banned site could ban you, and then you're doomed. The only way to succeed is to build your links honestly and strategically with a plan and method.

Note: Search engines give more weight to one-way links rather than reciprocal links. i.e. links that link to your site without asking for one in return. The easiest way to get these is to buy them. This plan will work on all the different kinds of links you can get.

So now you have some potential sites to link to. In the next article learn how to phrase your link for maximum effectiveness. The sites to link with is only the first half... the quality of the words you use that make up the link's content called anchor text are just as crucial! Hint: using the same link in every web site is a very bad idea.

About the Author:
John Krycek is the owner and creative director of http://www.theMouseworks.ca.

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