Is it worth spending some time building links from link partner sites with topics close to my own? I noticed a lot of my competitors had gone down this line when I searched for their backlinks. A lot of them have PR3, PR4 and even PR5 link pages with only 20 links to other sites but I'd also heard that google sometimes ignores links pages.
We've seen very very good results reciprocal linking from completely unrelated pages but with precisely targeted anchor text in the link. Also, although they might not show up in a link search, by monitoring the effect with the Keyword tool it's obvious that what Google shows and what it uses to calculate SERPS are two different things. I don't worry about a page's name, I'll take links from any PR4+ page and have definitely seen it work.
There are always raging discussions about linking etc. Nonrelated is like how long is a pice of string? One can always have a links page titled "Something completely different" Outbound links are under the control of the webmaster so technolgy and humans can look at linking from and give it a value (pos or neg). A good structure will leave neither technology nor human visitors in any doubt what to expect. Any site can link in and there is not much one can and wants to do about it. The real objection I have to reciprocal are the ones where I should give them a high visible link for a return from a page deep down or with java or php on it. M
Guy's link is very good. Another thing I suggest is visiting the yahoo directory for your area and connecting with these people. If you tell them you are from the area, many times they will gladly link.
If your current page rank is below 4, then LinkPartners is worth the time/investment in my opinion. You have to be diligent about dropping sites if there is no reciprocating link, but it is a good tool to quickly get to PR3 or maybe even 4. There are a lot of sites with links pages not even indexed by google ... so you have to take the time to check each link if you use their service.
.....You have to be diligent about dropping sites if there is no reciprocating link...???? Either a site / page is worth linking to or it is not. Forget about the linkchasers or the webmanagers who have nothing better to do than watch links! Any decent fast growing site will encounter the requirement to rearrange links due to growth change of focus, etc, etc. What do you do? Inform all the link's partners? Waste of time. Most run cheap scripts that can't even find a moved link on a page. I can't say it often enough: If it's of interest to you and your visitors LINK if not don't. I do inform the sites I link to and if they don't link back it is their loss not mine and I don't let anybody dictate where their link is. They can tell me what anchor text they prefer and I will do my utmost to accommodate it. Don't forget there are more ways to link than just the links graveyard. I always reserve at least 4 link positions on each page and there are potential links in the text. A link from a railway page to a timetable is worth more to your visitors than having it burried somewhere. If they don't find what they are looking for they do wander off fast. M
Very true. We'll see what pagerank I get in the next update. I'm still on PR 0. I reckon I'll be about a PR3 if what Compars chart says is true and I'm reading it right.
expat - for some sites what you are saying makes perfect sense but for others it will never get you to the top of the serps. Try getting a real estate website to the top of the serps in one of the top 50 metro markets and you will see what I am talking about. Natural progression of backlinks simply won't do it. For these types of sites you do have to be smart about your own page rank and the value of your backlinks. In these situations, rather than dilute the power of your own links, you need to get something back for each link out whenever it is possible to do so. For example, every realtor website should have some type of area that provides lins to realtors in other parts of the country. It provides real value to your visitors. There is never only 1 good realtor site to pick from in a different market and so it only makes sense to link to realtors who have a strong web presense and who link back to you. I think for most highly competitive niche oriented sites or regional sites, there are lots options in terms of which links to provide for your users and if you are in a competitive space and just starting out, going for the recips makes sense.
Hi VR, expat - for some sites what you are saying makes perfect sense but for others it will never get you to the top of the serps. Try getting a real estate website to the top of the serps in one of the top 50 metro markets and you will see what I am talking about. 1. I'm not saying not to link I'm saying don't be a link slave. 2. I have written this before I have a holding domain in the insurance area (house & content insurance) which is a 6 pages and around P20 or so without extensive back linking BUT it has unique content - house value and content value calculator. So uniqueness and linking (regardless of reciprocal or not) get's you high up. Specifically in "congested" areas the visitor will look more to a USP (unique selling point) than just a standard site. (So to check this its house content insurance and the domain is house-content.com presently at about 20 or so) M
What a lot of people seem to be doing is only trading links from and to PR4+ pages. The thing to remember is that if the other party is actively trying to get links, his PR will go up rather quickly. If the site is on-topic then by all means you should check it out and see if you feel it has certain characteristics that would make it worth a trade. What I generally look for are how professional the page comes across as, how well their internal linking structure is developed, how agressive they are at aquiring links.
This may well be due to the fact that G only shows links to a site from PR4, thus when people hunt for links on G by looking at who links to whom these are the ones they see. Still more don't understand that a homepage can have PRX put the page they get a link from may well be 0 or be redirected / java scripted. M
I am sure it is. The thing is, these people are missing out on a lot of free links and extra traffic too. . This is more common than some would think. But if you dont do your homework, whose fault is it really
Yeah, I think this is quite true. Most WMs at the outset just identify what they find to be (usually through popular opinion across multiple forums) the key characteristics of link exchange and go for it. I remember when i first started it was nigh impossible to discern the crap from the realities - and I sure as hell didn't have the time for it. Just a very obvious (and common) need, and totally disparate resources to work with. Like so many, I took the only obvious timesaving route. Signup with LM, subscribe to list xyz, import, and broadcast. Most importantly though (and I'm actually coding an app right now for a site that will soon be deployed to address this) there didn't seem to be a site/service, paid or otherwise, that presented the relevant data about a link prospect in a centralized fashion. Moreover, none of them seemed to even bother giving you variety in terms of anchor text etc. It always seemed to be: Here's a list of websites. Define your link here. Now broadcast (usually via our system) and our bogus crawler will let you know how things are going. Wouldn't it be nice if you could view the characteristics of a links page vs a home page (from pr to complex urls, to number on-page links, to themed vs generic etc), and wouldn't it be nice if you could rotate through a variety of weighted anchor texts and urls when broadcasting ? (not to mention filters on incoming link requests etc) ? It's not far off Oh - and just a minor note. The PR4 thing is yet more of that pervasive (and incorrect) popular opinion - in terms of G searches I mean - I've seen plenty of results where the PR of the referenced page was 2.. but again, you're right about how ppl seem to be making decisions.. more homework is needed - back in my time though, it meant a quick trip to the library. Nowadays, the librarians are rare as hens teeth - impossible to see for all the Einsteins