The SEO writing world is an evolving matrix of content creation and it’s no secret that the practice of link building is deployed with the goal of getting ranked in major search engines. While link building is an effective strategy, like anything else, there are people who abuse the system. While Google does its best to limit manipulative link strategies, at base level it’s up to the writer to produce legitimate content and actually earn their link. It feels good to help a webmaster truly revel in your article’s meaning.
It’s a safe bet that algorithm updates will begin to be increasingly efficient as we push forward into a new internet frontier. The days of submitting spun articles to content farms and achieving first page results are becoming a thing of the past. Illegitimate SEO strategies have been thwarted by Google’s Panda and Penguin updates, the latest on May 22nd of this year, and it’s becoming imperative for guest bloggers to take more pride in their work.
Producing average content for average sites with the goal of achieving one of many average links is bad practice. It’s time for SEO writers to step up, play by the rules and help people. Not only do low quality articles and links pollute the internet, they suffocate the experience of the end user.
Below is a two-step checklist to utilize if you’re link building, whether you’re doing it for business visibility or individual authorship. It’s your obligation not only as an SEO writer, but also as a human being, to produce legitimate content. Not only does it enhance your visibility in the targeted SERPs, it never hurts to provide actionable knowledge to the end users scattered across the globe.
1. Is the content well researched?
Too often there are articles on the internet that don’t help anyone. With the internet being a multifaceted platform for information creation and transmission, content will always be king. No Google algorithm will ever compromise content with true integrity. This should be music to the ears of all guest bloggers. If you do your research and write informative articles for the greater good, you control your own fate in the industry.
This first step in your checklist is to determine if your article is well researched and if it has the potential to actually teach someone something. A guest post goes from a boring thread of words to a game changing article when adequate research is done. You should be an expert in whatever industry you are guest blogging about. If you aren’t, you better do some serious research.
Why a webmaster will appreciate you:
Any site owner will feel honored to post a piece of content that they feel is well researched and could provide true benefit to their readership. Guest bloggers often require the approval of a targeted domain; you need to embrace this approach and mentality. Make it worth it and your success rate, and your reward, will be much better.
2. Is the topic relevant to the site?
A relevant-first mentality when it comes to link building is a top priority when webmaster appreciation is concerned. Site owners want progressive material because it helps their domain authority and keeps their blog fresh.
Someone that operates a blog exclusive to NBA basketball doesn’t want an article on lacrosse. Furthermore, it’s a waste of everyone’s time to even pitch this idea. Even if a site owner accepts an off-topic article, it will end up hurting you more than helping when the next Google algorithm rolls out.
Backlink portfolios littered with irrelevant links are prime targets for penalization. An unrelated article also does nothing for the end user because their intention was to read content associated with the domain they searched.
This second step is meant to test your relevancy. Google has been cracking down on content that is just sprayed blindly over the internet. You need to be calculated and focused when you select a home for any article. Not only does it have to be well researched, the location of it needs to make sense. If you don’t take note of relevancy, someone will.
Why a webmaster will appreciate you:
Fresh, informative content is like a ripe blackberry to a site owner. Of course they want it, and yes, they will appreciate you. It’s important to view this on a human level and try and separate yourself from the SEO world in a certain sense. At the end of the day your goal should not only be to build links, but to teach people something that can enrich their life. The rankings will follow.
Link building, when done with relevancy, makes sense for everyone involved. If you’re promoting a business, it’s being promoted in the right place and in the correct fashion. If you’re trying to gain authorship in the basketball world and you write a stimulating article on LeBron James, your authority in the niche will skyrocket.
Link building, specifically when done through content creation, can be a beautiful system. Everyone in the world has authority and is an expert in some life experience. In life, teachers are obligated to be educated in what they teach. It’s just as important that SEO writers understand the industry they’re explaining and that they strive to gain the respect of both accepting webmasters and the resulting audience. Google does its best to create fair and genuine rankings, but the bottom line is that the integrity of link building is up to those participating.
Author:
Peter Buffington is a writer who’s been cage diving with Great Whites. When he’s not anticipating the next NBA playoff series he creates content for Page One Power, a relevancy-first link building firm based in Boise, Idaho.
“…a code name for a Google algorithm update that was first announced on April 24, 2012. The update is aimed at decreasing search engine rankings of websites that violate Google’s Webmaster Guidelines by using black-hat SEO techniques, such as keyword stuffing, cloaking, participating in link schemes, deliberate creation of duplicate content, and others.”
Essentially, Penguin is anti low quality links, over optimised anchor text and keyword stuffing.
Linking naturally
Google and the other search engines use links to define the authority of a website. They are what hold the Internet together, helping us to seamlessly navigate from one site to the other.
That’s why it’s important to link for your reader.
Good copywriters have long understood that effective website copy should, first and foremost, be written for the reader and not the search engines; the same goes for your linking strategy.
Before you add a link, think about what you want to achieve.
The purpose of linking should be to improve reader experience, so it should be in a context that makes sense, using anchor text that also makes sense.
In a nutshell, the words you use for your link must explain the information the reader will be taken to when they click on it.
How to recover from the Penguin attack
Numerous website owners fell pray to the dreaded Penguin, seeing their rankings (and of course their traffic) fall through the floor almost over night.
Recovering from such a catastrophic event is no mean feat, so to help you understand what went wrong and how to right it, you might find this post on seomoz.org useful.
In it, Jimmy explains what happened to one of his sites and what he did to recover from it.
Link building is probably, the most important element in your search engine optimisation strategy.
Why?
Well, it is the most important factor Google uses when working out how relevant your web page or website is for ranking purposes.
When someone types in a search query, Google heads off to find the most relevant pages that satisfy the query. It ranks them in authoritative order and the factor used to determine that is, you guessed it, its link profile.
The ayes have it
Every inbound link that points to your website and web pages is seen by Google as a vote for it.
The more ‘votes’ it has, the higher its perceived authority.
The higher its perceived authority, the higher it’s ranking.
But not just any old links will do, Google’s far cannier than that. Every link must have:
Relevance – it must come from a site of the same, or closely related topic
Authority – the site should be seen as authoritative in its own right
Trust – the links pointing to the initiating site should be good quality links
So the key is to attract authoritative links from related sites. But how do you do that?
Attracting link love
Knowing you need to attract links is one thing; actually getting them is something else entirely.
Where do you start?
First, there are links from directory submissions, but make sure you opt for directories that are relevant to your industry or market.
Then you need to produce great content that people will want to link to. Generating a lot of high quality, useful information can be time consuming, which is why many companies choose to contract it out to professional copywriters. However it is created, make sure it offers expert advice, opinions, and demonstrates your authority.
Once this has got out into the search engines it may well attract links straightaway, but you may also have to do some legwork. If one of your articles compliments another authority site, get in touch with them and direct them to it to see if they want to link to your content.
You should also hang out on the same online forums as your target audience. This is a great way to interact with other industry experts and could lead to a few links.
Another method is by writing guest blogs and articles. Authority bloggers always need great content, so if you write something that’s targeted for their readers that’s well researched and put together, they will publish it and include an all important link back to your site.
Link building campaign
Setting yourself a link building strategy is vital as it should be an on-going process.
Your campaign should look at attracting:
Links from authoritative sites
Links from a number of different domains (50 links from 50 different sites is much better than 50 links from 1 site)
Deep links – i.e. not just linking to your Home Page, your other pages need links too
Anchor text links – where you keywords are used as the link text
Local links – don’t forget local directories and your Chamber of Commerce as they will help with your local rankings
But one word of warning, never ever be tempted to pay for links. This practice is well and truly frowned upon by Google and any short-term gains you may experience will soon be lost once Google discovers what you’re up to.
A natural link building strategy is by far the best way to go. Try to build your strategy into your working week to make sure it is a constant process.
In the world of search engine optimisation, building links is essential if you are to achieve and maintain good rankings.
But how to you make sure you are using the most effective anchor text linking structure?
For many, the answer is using their keywords as their anchor text, but it is this too obvious? With Google’s very increasing sophistication, should you now be looking to mix up out linking by also using contextual anchor text (i.e. using something generic such as ‘click here’ but in close proximity to your keywords)?
I came across a very interesting post on Seomoz.org that looks at this particular issue. By conducting an experiment, both options were tested with some very interesting outcomes.
So, if you want to learn more about getting the most out of your linking strategy, grab a coffee and take 5 minutes out of your day to have a read of:
