OK, here is my theory on link building and SE rankings. RAW: Just put as many anchored links as you can on the web. The search engines will give you serps based only on this method: MSN: 90% Yahoo: 70% Google: 60% Themed Links (IE a page seen by search engines as a motorcycle website linking to your site with anchor text of "Motorcycle Forum") MSN: Sees it the same as any other link. Yahoo: 40% Google: 95% Lastly is weight or PR of the site giving you the link: MSN: 0% Yahoo: 20% Google: 60% So, to get to number 1 on MSN, just build as many links as you can anchoring your desired search phrase. To get to number 1 on Yahoo! You are going to need more links than your competitor, and also, a few quality industry specific links. To get to number 1 on google, you will need links of high PR from websites with the same theme as your own. This is my own theory, I am by no means an SEO expert, just my twittlings. Flame away....
Look at msn, the tons of backlinks to my sites from this forum. Then yahoo, very few backlinks from this forum. Google, not a one yet! So to get on msn, post your links here. Might be a few get picked up by yahoo. And google? Who the heck knows????
Google *hides* the backlinks that it sees in its link: function. It broke it on purpose quite some time ago. It also may be ignoring forum links, because they are *easy* and don't reflect the quality or importance of the site, necessarily.
Henny, you pretty much have it. Google also likes links that have been up for a while as well (link age). Other then that, you're good to go. No mystery here.
I have 0% evidence google cares about themed links have you guys actually seen any terms where sites with mostly themed links are in the top spots? and if so can you share them?
Don't you think on page optimization plays a part too? I certainly do. A couple sites I've got have alot less pagerank and less age yet outrank competitors for virtually any term I want. As those pages get older and more inbounds it gets rediculously easier. The only difference is on page optimization. Therefore, a it's quite feasable to outrank a site with more IBL's with better on page seo. Links may play a large role, but it's not the only one.
That the first page of any search results from google are all paid. So someone give me a million dollars (american please, not canadian) and I will then purchase top results for my sites.
I am starting to use msn search if I want to find the newest information. It seems they update and index information way faster then google anyway.
MSN Cares more about on page factors. MSN value keywords in the domains more. And yes, Msn likes all links in a way that none of the other engines does.
Thats just not true. I rank down in 300 and something place on G for my main keyword phrase, yet I appear on page 1 for a few terms I didn't even know where searched on that much, and I certainly haven't bought anything from G