Link Blog

People are always asking what is the fastest way to build links? To be honest, the fastest is way is to purchase them, but this can put a strain on a company's pocketbook. Some companies, particularly new ones, have more time than they do adverstising budgets. That means they are available to do a lot of the footwork to begin link building themselves.

Link exchanges are a good way to start developing links. Offsite Optimization offers a forum where you can request a link exchange. DigitalPoint is an excellent forum and they too have a category dedicated to link exchanges (this site is best viewed in IE, btw). This is a nice way to find other people to swap links with and develop relationships. However, for a truly effective link campaign, exchanges are only part of it, but they are a great place to start.

Another way to begin developing links is directory submissions. Now, directory submissions are an terrific source and many of them offer listings for free. The only drawback to the free submissions is that it can take weeks before your site is reviewed and many of them do not send notices to let you know if your site was accepted or rejected. So, you could submit to 100 directories and think that your really building up some links only to find out two months later (through your own investigation) that there was problem with your site and it was not accepted. When you are submitting to directories make sure that:

1. Your site is compliant with the directories guidelines and terms and conditions. Before you start submitting, make sure you have read the directories guidelines. This is the single biggest mistake I have seen people make when submitting their sites. If you don't know what the directory is looking for in a submission, the chances are that you are going to make a mistake and get ousted before some even looks at your site. The guidelines and TOS are there to help you, take the time to read them, it will make your directory submission link campaign MUCH easier.
2. All of your links work. This is very important, if someone is considering a site for inclusion into their directory they are not going to list a site with broken links. There are several tools available for this, but I recommend either Xenu or Trellian SiteMapper.
3. Easy to find contact information. This too is extremely important, especially if you have an e-commerce site. The editors want to know that there is a way for them to get a hold of you and that your customers can easily contact you. Since posting a general email address on your website can lead to tons of spam email, you may want to consider using a contact form. In addition for a way to be emailed, you should include a phone number and a brick and mortar address. Not only will this add credibility for a directory editor, it will add credibility to your customers.
4. A privacy policy is a good idea. Having a privacy policy listed may not necessarily influence an editor's decision on whether or not to include your site, but it is a good idea to have one, not only for directory editors, but your customers.

Now that you are aware of some of the things that might help you get included, you need to know where to find these directories.There are a couple of directory resources I have mentioned in the past, SEO Directory Whiz and Info Vilesilencer . These sites provide lists of directories that you should find very helpful. There are also ways that you can do searches that will help you find even more directories.

Go to your favorite search engine and type in the following keywords:
"submit site"
"add site"
"add url"
"submit site"

Be sure to use the quotation marks so you will be delivered pages that have that text. You can even narrow down your search by typing the following:
"Submit Link | Latest Links" niche keyword.

On a side note the expressions that you are using to perform these searches are known as boolean. If you are not familiar with boolean searches, you really should be. Using boolean expressions helps to eliminate a lot of spam and unwanted results. Take a moment and read Danny Sullivan's article on boolean searching. It was written in 2001, but the information is still the relevant.

Until next time,
Happy Linking!