Avoid fatal mistakes! Learn why link relevance really matters.
Trusted Sites.
During the Search Engine Optimization process, a lot of emphasis is usually placed on linking, or more specifically, “backlinks.” This is referring to a website that provides a link to your website. When another page links to yours, that page’s ranking and relevance will pass on its link-juice to yours. “Link Juice” is the term coined to define the effectively intangible, but seriously mathematical, impact that links have on relevance. The link juice received from a backlink relies entirely on the linking site’s current ranking, which is why trusted sites are so important.
A Trusted Site is a term referring to the amount of authority and credibility that a website has on any particular subject. For instance Cisco and CNN are well known and respected institutions in their specific industries. The search engines give them proportionate PageRank. If Cisco links to your site due to some fantastic information that you were providing, you can be sure that the search engines will not only take notice, but they will begin crawling your site more and most likely provide you with a better ranking.
Educational Reference.
Educational institutions benefit from the same “trusted site” accreditation. Any .edu site will have the immediate and sustained attention of the search engines. The content provided with a .edu extension will be considered above most other content to be more relevant and more educational. Getting linked to by educational websites is often a top goal for SEO specialists and webmasters.
There are many ways of getting links from these sites. Often they can come from a student sourcing your information on a report that has been posted online, or possibly your company has sponsored an event and is linked to on the event webpage. By networking with people and social communities, you will create many opportunities to ask for links. By being active and credible in the right circles, your hard work will start paying off in the form of links.
Link Values.
Understandably, large conglomerates and educational institutions are more credible when it comes to providing information, therefore, links from those websites are more valuable. But what is the actual value of a link? This is where things get a little murky. Often anything you do on the web can feel very intangible when it comes to deciding how much things are worth. A really great link can literally push your website to the top of a search, which can translate into thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. This happens more frequently than you are probably thinking.
Because it is so difficult to put value on links, we must always refer back to traffic statistics. The amount of money you put into your campaign, whether it be $1,000 or $5,000, should always be less than what you are making additionally each month. This ratio is the only real way to measure the net financial gain during any online strategy. Keeping in mind that it can take 6-12 months for a campaign to start producing results, you may not recuperate your full initial investment until the second year. Once the initial ranking point is hit within 6-12 months, your ranking, as well as financial return, will build cumulatively over the years continuing with your program.
Become Relevant and They Will Come.
Even with the power of receiving backlinks from trusted sites, it is by no means the end all SEO technique. As the industry of search engines and SEO has evolved, it has become abundantly clear that being relevant is no longer about having the best links or the most keywords. Becoming relevant is about being diverse and informative. This means varying your strategies and spreading your budget. Video is as important as ever.
The key to getting these really great links is to provide relevant content. Plain and simple. There is no better way to assert your dominance and credibility than to provide information that users either can’t, or don’t, want to get anywhere else. Providing great content is not easy however, and will require a lot of time and patience from you and your business to accomplish. Setting up a workflow to produce and release content is essential to getting the most out of any marketing campaign, especially in today’s saturated online environment. Getting noticed is not difficult if you apply the correct mentality to every piece of content you create. VISAO Solutions is here to apply that mentality. Call us for a FREE consultation on Content Centered Marketing.