Where should you get backlinks from?
Backlinks have a lot of importance in the algorithms of modern search engines like Google. The more backlinks your blog has, the better is your ranking in the search engine result pages (SERPs).
Of course, if you have your keywords in the backlinks, your rankings would be even higher.
But where should you get these backlinks from? What should be the source? Is it fine to get the backlinks from any website or blog?
No! The type of sites from where you get these backlinks affects your ranking – and has the potential to even harm your rankings!
So, follow these principals in your link building exercise:
Site / Blog having content on a related topic
Try to get links from blogs that write about topics similar to yours.
For example, if your blog is about celebrities, try to get links from blogs about celebrities, celebrity fashion, or even movies.
Having a link from sites having related content adds extra weight to that backlink in the eyes of Google. (And if you can have your keywords in the anchor text of the backlink, it’s a big bonus!)
Site / Blog having a good Google Page Rank
Page Rank is an assessment of a webpage by Google. It ranges from 0 to 10, and the higher the number, the better is the page from Google’s point of view.
A page rank is assigned to each individual page (URL) of a blog or website. Thus, every webpage of a blog or a website has a different page rank.
Try to get links from pages or posts that have a high Page Rank. A backlink from a high page rank webpage carries a lot more weight than a backlink from a low page rank site!
However, in your link building efforts, do not focus just on high page rank sites – if Google sees that all your backlinks are from high page rank sites, it would assume that the links are not organic (that is, they are purchased). This can harm your rankings.
Therefore, have the backlinks from sites having different page ranks so that the distribution seems natural to Google. But you can put in slightly more effort in getting backlinks from high page rank sites!
Link farms?
There are many sites that exist only for providing links to other sites. These sites have thousands of outgoing links, pointing to all kinds of sites!
Such sites are called link farms, and are considered “bad” by Google and other search engines. (They are also known as “bad neighborhoods”).
Avoid getting links from these sites. A backlink from a link farm would have a negative impact on your SEO efforts – your rankings would actually suffer due to this.
Web Directories?
Web directories are also sites linking to other sites and blogs, and are usually arranged based on topics and subtopics. (Yahoo is a web directory)
The problem is that there is a very thin line between a link farm and a web directory.
Therefore, please avoid directories that include any and every blog in their listing. Submit your blog’s link to only those directories that have a manual or human review process for inclusion of links.
Conclusion
Follow these simple guidelines, and you should be achieving top rankings in the SERPs soon!
Do you think there are other types of sites from where links are desirable, or from where links are avoidable? Please let me know through the comments.
