How do you get links? This is something every newcomer to search engine optimisation tends to find themselves asking after a while, possibly accompanied by a scratch of the head. Getting a good link profile is possibly the hardest part of SEO. Getting one that will still be good in a year’s time is even harder.

SEO experts have come up with all sorts of tips and tricks when it comes to building link profiles. You can buy links. You can use online directories. You can form a reciprocal relationship for links. You can use article directories. You can do a thousand and one things that get you an easy link, but in the end, an easy link isn’t going to be of the best quality. If your links aren’t quality, they’re unlikely to weather the storm when Google and the other search engines change their algorithms.

Protecting yourself against banned techniques

Some of the above techniques aren’t exactly smiled upon by the search engines, and that may turn out to be a problem for your site. Although your SEO company should do whatever it can to ensure that your optimisation stays within Google’s guidelines, those guidelines are pretty vague. They also aren’t solid over a length of time. When you’re building on your own, you’re on even more unsteady ground. You can talk to us at SEO Consult about the advantage of experience when it comes to SEO.

A certain amount of future-proofing needs to be taken into account when you’re building your link profile. It’s much better to spend your time on getting a small amount of quality links than spending it on getting a large number that will be banned in the next algorithm change.

What to look for in a link

• The page is already in the index. This is the basic requirement. If the page is not in Google’s index, it cannot pass any link juice to you. This makes linking to new sites a bad idea.
• The page has a decent ranking, one at least equal to your own. Getting links from low-ranking sites is like associating with a bad business in Google’s eyes.
• A decent linking strategy on their part. If the linking site provides links to lots of dissociated sites, there is a chance that Google will devalue its links.

All links count for something

It’s important to remember that all links count for something. None of your linking efforts are really wasted. This gives you a little freedom to experiment when you’re trying to get some links in. Even if you land a link and later find out that it’s a nofollow, and therefore of little direct worth to your SEO, that link can still bring traffic to your site. It doesn’t hurt to chase quality links.

A link coming into your site can’t get you into much trouble. It’s the links going out of your site that you really need to watch. Work on your links, work on quality, and your profile will accumulate worth over time.

Get Involved