Part 4: Internet marketing and linking strategies

Search engines think of links to web pages as votes. Good web pages have many incoming links. On the other hand, nobody links to bad "spammy" web pages. It does make sense if you think about it. If you want to rank well in the search engines you need to attract incoming links to your web pages.

Please note that we are talking about web pages and not web sites. Link popularity relates to web pages. Your web site has many web pages. More about that later. Let's start by looking at the incoming / outgoing link ratio.

Page rank and link popularity

Link popularity is exactly what it says. Popular web pages have many incoming links. The Internet is about information. People link to good informaiton. And page rank is quite simply Google's way of measuring the link popularity of individual web pages. To my knowledge no other search engine has an equivalent to Google's page rank. But it is safe to assume that link popularity affects search engine rankings across all major search engines.

Are all incoming links worth the same? No. Links to your web page from popular web pages with many incoming links count for more. This is where Google's page rank score can be helpful. But please note that "all" links to your web page are good.

If all your incoming links from other sites link to your main page, search engines will consider this page to be most important. This page will most likely rank better in the search engines than your other pages.

But what about your other pages? In the example above your main page received all links or votes from other web pages. Per above this means that your main page now has link popularity. If your main page in turn links to other pages on your web site these other pages will in effect receive votes from a popular web page, Sure it is your page. But again, when we talk about link popularity you have to think about the individual pages. And a link is a link. Period.

Now, let's look at reciprocal links vs. one-way incoming links. A reciprocal link is a link exchange where you link to me and I link to you. A one-way incoming link is of course a link from you to me. Period. It is easier to get reciprocal links. It is more valuable to reveive one-way incoming links.

From the above you already know that it is ideal to receive one-way incoming links. Why? With one-way links you can distribite all the popularity your main page receives across your web site's pages. If you on the other hand link to another site - an outgoing link - some of your popularity is given away to that other site.

So are all reciprocal links a zero-sum game? You receive a vote and then give away a vote for a sum of zero? No. I have found two ways to benefit from reciprocal links.

Exchange with more popular pages.

If you receive a link from a page that has higher link popularity than your web page - you win. Simple as that.

Have more internal links

If you exchange links with a web page that has the same link popularity as your web page it may at first seem futile. But there is a way you can benefit. Think internal links.

Let's say that the web page you exchange links with has 10 other links on the page where they place your link. That means that you are sent 1/11 of the page rank of that page.

Do you see where we are heading? Let's place at least 11 links on your page. Now you are sending 1/12 of the page rank of your web page while retaining the other 11/12.

Consequently, you win. You reveice 1/11. You give 1/12. Simple as that.

How to get one-way incoming links

I have three favorite ways to get one-way incoming links. In order of importance:

Write articles

My favourite way to get one-way incoming links is write articles. I choose a topic I know and write between 550 and 750 words of good relevant information. At the bottom of the article I include a resource box with a link to my most important web page.

I post the articles on web sites that act as article directories. Other webmasters go there to find articles to post on their web sites. I get one one-way incoming link from the article directory. And each time a webmaster post my article on their web site I get another link - also one-way.

I did not invent this technique. Go to the resourses section for information on where you can post your articles for free.

Post on message boards

Visit popular message boards and forums and join in the discissions. You can register for free and most forums will allow you to include a link in your signature file. This link will be displayed each time you post a message. The link will be of little value but it all adds up.

But do not post for the sake of it. Join in the discussion, ask questions but do not post just for the sake of getting a link.

And the obvious - ask nicely

It does not harm to ask, But make it personal and make sure that there is a reason why they should link to you. After all, it is a bit much to expect that they will link to you just to be nice.