Link Building is one of the most controversial topics when it comes to SEO (Search Engine Optimization). The days of using spammy software and cheap link building are far behind us. But with all the recent updates to Google’s Algorithm many SEO consultants are scared to even consider large scale link building for themselves or for their SEO clients. I mean just look at all these updates listed on the MOZ.com Google Algorithm Change List. Just in the last couple of months even giants like Ebay, Ask.com and the History Channel lost a considerable amount of Organic Reach to slaps from the Panda and other updates. So with everyone scared to even approach link building in 2014 how does one do it?
1. Stop Link Building All together in 2014, NOT.
That’s right I said it. I hereby advise that everyone competing in my or my clients niche’s to stop link building all together. That way I can keep link building and surpass you all in the SERP’s.
The bottom line is link building is not going away anytime soon. You just can’t cheat anymore.
3 Things to Stop Doing in Your Link Building Immediately
- STOP: Over optimizing your anchor text.
- There is no way your site gets thousands of links that say “Get Auto Loan” naturally.
- STOP: Using directories.
- 99.9% of the directories out there are crap.
- Only submit to directories in your area or industry.
- STOP: Buying links.
- Especially on sites like fiverr. You will end up with over optimized links from sites either not in your industry or not even in your language.
- Buying links is clearly against Google’s Guidelines.
3 Things to Start Doing in Your Link Building Immediately.
- START: Focusing on Great Content.
- If you build great content the links will follow, naturally.
- START: Using social media in your marketing.
- Place social sharing buttons on all your pages.
- Share your content on all your social networks.
- START: Getting rid of old low quality links
- You can use Google Webmaster for this.
- And Google’s Disavow Tool. <–use with caution. If used incorrectly can severely hurt your rankings.
2. Engage your visitors.
Creating engagement for your visitors is a lot easier than it sounds. With Google there is something called a bounce rate. A bounce rate is the percentage of people that leave your website with out clicking on any internal links or taking other actions. i.e. if your bounce rate is 100%, then everybody who visits your site is not engaging with your site before they leave. This is not good as Google sees this as an indicator that users are not finding any value on your website.
3 Tips to engage your visitors.
- Separate blog posts into multiple sections requiring the site visitor to click on a link to keep reading.
- Make your social sharing buttons HUGE.
- Upworthy.com is a great example of this. Just look at any single post.
- Have interactive media on your site.
- Slideshows
- Video (make sure they start and stop the video)
3. Do your research.
Best part about natural Organic SEO is it is easy to find out which of your competitors are doing it and how to match and beat their efforts. Here are 3 tools you can use to do research on your competitors SEO efforts.
If these tips helped you please give us a share. Thank You.
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