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e_Marketing Blog Traffic: Why Links Are Important Why are links so important to website owners? I haven't spelled out the answer to this question in a very long time. So here goes... Web Traffic: SEO and Links You want people to visit your website, and one of the important ways to get these visits is from the search engines. By some counts, around 70% of all website visitors come from search engines. So obviously getting help from the search engines can make a big difference to the success or failure of your site. Question 1: To score well with the search engines you need to impress them that your site is worth visiting. OK, so how do you do that? Answer: You have to convince them that your site is an important and helpful resource for specific search terms. Question 2: How do the search engines determine what is an important and helpful resource for a specific search terms? Answer: They evaluate each and every web page in terms of its "quality". Question 3: How do the search engines determine quality? Answer: There are two important factors: on-page content, and inbound links. Question 4: What do you mean by "on-page conent"? Answer: The text on every web page is analyzed to determine what that page is about. The search engines look for "keywords". They assume when specific keywords are mentioned in a page then that is what the page is about. Question 5: How is the "quality" of a page's content determined? Answer: This gets a bit trickier. There are many factors considered by the search engines, but the most basic are the amount of text on the page that focuses on specific keywords, and the presence of specific keywords in critical places that the search engines assume are important places (e.g., the title tag, the main headline, the first bit of text on the page, etc.) Question 6: How else is the "quality" of a page's content determined? Answer: In-bound links. When the search engines see a link pointing from an outside site to a page on your site, they assume that means your page is important enough to be considered a resource worth looking at. The more links you have pointing at your page, the more important your page is considered and the higher it will rank when people search for the type of content your page is about. Question 7: So links help the search engines determine the quality of websites? Answer: Yes. In the eyes of the search engines - especially Google - links are like "votes". When someone links to your site the search engines assume that is like saying "this is a worthwhile resource worth looking at." The more "votes" like this you get, the more likely the search engines are to consider your site a worthwhile resource. Question 8: So is that the whole story on links? Answer: No. Not all links are given the same weight by the search engines. And some links never get discovered because they are on pages that are never visited by the search engines. So you don't get credit for those links. I'll say more about linking strategies in the next post. Resources: Traffic: Optimizing Internal Pages Usually, each page within your site should focus on a narrow sub-set of keywords, with one dominant keyword. For example, let’s say you are creating a site about "golden retriever puppies". If your research tells you that term gets good traffic, then that should be your primary keyword for your home page. So let's say one of your secondary pages is about "buying a golden retriever puppy". So "buying a golden retriever puppy" should be your primary keyword for that specific page. Your page should also contain other closely related keywords such as "golden retriever puppy habits", "golden retriever puppy behavior", "golden retriever puppy pricing", and so on. Resources: Traffic: Optimizing Techniques To "optimize" each of your pages, here is what you should do: 1. Your primary keyword should appear in the "title" tag - the text that shows up in the blue title bar of the page. 2. Your page should begin with a <h1> heading tag which contains your primary keyword. For example, your title for a secondary page might be "Buying a Golden Retriever Puppy - Some Tips" 3. Your introductory paragraph should contain your primary keyword, and probably one or two instances of other closely related keywords. 4. The rest of your page should focus on related keywords with those keywords emphasized in the text and in sub-headings (using the h2, h3, or h4 tags.) 5. Most "experts" say your closing paragraph should also contain a few instances of your primary keyword. 6. Your page should contain a navigation menu with anchor text using the primary keywords for each page pointing to all the other important pages within your site. 7. You may also want to include a "resources" section which links out to other important resources - including other closely related things you have created - such as articles, videos, products, squidoo pages, blogs, and other websites. Start thinking of your pages from the optimization point of view, and they will begin to do much better in the search engine rankings. |
Review-of-the-week.com features Product Feature Pages — pages dedicated to descriptions or reviews of products or websites. Product Feature pages can include photos and graphics (as long as these are readily available), and can have links pointing back to your (single) site. Product Feature Pages are linked from at least 5 blogs, a number of high traffic article and announcement sites. Developing a Business Opportunity - Choose Your Product CarefullyMar 14, 2006 - Linknet Business News Developing a Business Opportunity - Choose Your Product Carefully Mar 14, 2006 - Linknet Business NewsLike all new entrepreneurs, whether you take the "all or nothing approach" or the "spare time approach" you should be very tight-fisted with your limited resources. That means do not invest any serious money in a product or business idea until you have checked it out thoroughly. The best way to "check it out" is to Talk to people who are already selling the product or service Establish the credibility of the person or company providing the product or service Make sure the company provides on-going support for their product(s) Make sure there are no hidden or unexpected costs (such as franchise fees) that will eat away your profits This applies whether you are looking at an "online" product such as an MLM or affiliate scheme, or a more traditional product or service aimed only at local customers. For example, a client of mine produces Business Card Displays. The idea behind this product is that it provides new entrepreneurs the opportunity to set up an advertising service for local businesses. The entrepreneur creates a network of displays placed in high traffic retail outlets like grocery stores, hair salons, and bowling alleys. Then local advertisers can place their business cards in one of the sixteen slots in the displays across the network. If someone browsing one of the displays sees a service they are interested in, they just take a card for future reference. The manufacturer can show you examples of successful advertising networks where his displays are used. He will also provide testimonials and contact information from real people who you can ask how well the product is working for them. And to top it off, he uses the product himself in a network of over 40 displays, and can provide hands-on information about how it actually works in a real-life situation. For advice and "mentoring" he can be contacted by toll free telephone, email, Skype, or MS Messenger. This is pretty rare in the world of "business opportunities". Many are run by "take the money and run" types who make wildly exaggerated claims about how successful you can be. But in many cases they have never actually made the idea work for themselves. As any successful entrepreneur will tell you, your choice of products is crucial to your success or failure. Many products are simply bogus ideas with no hope of working. And many others are designed to produce maximum profits for their creators, and minimum profits for people like you and me who sell them. So no matter how hard you work, or how committed you are to being successful, if you choose the wrong product you will be operating with a millstone around your neck. Rick Hendershot publishes Linknet News | For an exciting money making business opportunity, see Freecard.com | Buy a cheap mobile phone - Free tips and secrets avalaible! Mobile Phone Insider's Guide. Save hundreds of dollars on your mobile phone costs.
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