As we all know, the benefits of inbound links to your website are paramount. What’s more important than the “amount” of inbound links? “Quality” inbound links. These quality links can have a positive effect on both your rankings in Google as well as your PageRank. The only catch is getting good links. Of course, the most obvious answer is to just create good content on your website that can inspire people to link to it. Another obvious answer is to merely create a “Link To Us” page.  Unfortunately, it really isn’t as simple as that.

In addition to having that exceptional content that people want to link to, the content on your blog or website should have a point of view; a perspective that’s controversial, funny or that really takes a definitive side of an argument. Anything that separates your content from the rest of the pack is always beneficial. Being original can really get you noticed as an authority in your field and will make attracting those natural links that much easier.

While social media may not be great for getting “link juice” or a “vote” from another site (most links from social media sites like Twitter or Facebook are nofollow), they are a helpful way to get your website or brand noticed and drive some traffic. This is done simply by placing a link to your site in your profile. Also, don’t forget to link your social media profiles together by saying something to the effect of, “Come visit us on Facebook!”. Social bookmark “widgets” are good too and are free and quite easy to implement.

Of course, if you haven’t done so already, submit to directories like DMOZ or the Yahoo! Directory and make sure that you are in the correct categories for each. These directories, as well as a few others, are considered to be the most trusted and links from there are considered highly important. This also goes for any kind of link from an .edu or .gov site. Any links from a relevant site with that kind of domain should help your site’s PageRank and rankings exponentially. To find these types of websites, simply type “site:.edu keyword” on Google. Substitute “keyword” for the most targeted, indicative and descriptive keyword of your site.

Lastly, having fun content like “Top Ten Lists”, contests or free widgets are great for tempting people to link to you. To get inspired, look at the websites of some other websites in your field and see what they are doing. See what kinds of backlinks they have to get an idea of who to target and, above all, write your content for the user, not for the search engines. A human being will be reading your content and you need to write with that in mind. Remember, you can never have too many quality inbound links.

In past blogs, we have talked about how important it is to get other websites to link to your site and the benefits associated with this.  When focusing on your linking strategy it is also important not to neglect your internal linking structure.  An internal link is hyperlinked text that points to a different section of the page you are viewing, or more commonly to a different page on your site.  The most common internal links are found in the main navigation of a website and throughout the body text of the pages.

If your page keyword targeting and the anchor text of the links pointing to those pages don’t coincide, now might be a good time to revisit and make the anchor text reflect the page keyword targeting.  When you optimize a page for a certain keyword, the links from your site pointing to that page should reflect the same keyword theme.   The first places to consider a change are in the main and footer navigation.  Use keyword rich text in these areas to give extra weight to the targeted page.  Instead of just using the word “Services” in your navigation, you should use a term that is more keyword targeted such as “Internet Marketing Services” or “Banking Services”.

Another place to use keyword rich anchor text is within the text of your website when you want to direct a user to another page with more information.  Many times we will see that a website uses the hyperlinked text, “click here” or “learn more” to lead a user to a page with more information.  These terms are great if the page you are leading them to is optimized for “click here” or learn more”.  In most cases there is a better phrase to use.  When leading a user to a services page, use the main keyword phrase of the targeted page as the hyperlinked anchor text.  Example: 

 Please see our Internet Marketing Services page for more information.

In this example the page that the hyperlink is pointing to is about “Internet Marketing Services”. 

When using anchor text to point to other pages, it is important to use different versions of the text to point to the page.  This will allow you to target more keywords and not make it so repetitious for the user.  It is important to note that when varying your anchor text, you should use keywords of the same theme.  So for our above example, other beneficial keywords to use for anchor text would be “Online Marketing Services”, or” Web Marketing Services”.  While online press releases might be a product of “Internet Marketing Services” it would not be good anchor text because it does not describe the whole theme of the page but rather one point within the theme.

One of the best ways to generate some buzz for your website is to submit online press releases.  Aside from the obvious benefit of media attention, press releases can also be a way to build links to your website. Online press releases have become very popular and have proved to be good for SEO efforts.  When you create your press release for online distribution, there are a few items you should take into consideration.

Pick something newsworthy to write about. - Releasing a new product, service or new website design can be events worth telling your devoted customers and potential customers about.  The more interesting the item, the more likely it will be linked to by interested parties.

Optimize the release as you would a page on your site. - When writing a release, do keyword research to target keywords people are searching for in relation to the information in your release.  The idea is to have the release support content within your site and have it be displayed for important keywords in news feeds and aggregators.  Once your release is syndicated, journalists can search these news feeds by keywords to find items that they are interested in writing about.  If you can put your release in front of the right people, you can greatly increase exposure and linking opportunities for your website.  Targeting the right keywords can help you achieve this goal.

Utilizing interior links with anchor text. - Press release submission sites may allow you to use anchor text pointing to interior pages of your website.  Building links to your interior pages can help boost their rankings in the SERPS.  You can target 4 or 5 interior pages per release.  Pages to target should include your homepage, main service or products page, featured products pages, an about us page and a contact page.  It is important to use keywords in the anchor text pointing to these pages in the release.  The anchor text can help give these pages more weight in the eyes of the search engines.  By including interior links you also give the reader multiple channels to explore your website, pointing them in the direction you want them to go. 

Choosing the right media channels. - Many press release submission sites give you the opportunity to choose which outlets your release will be submitted to.  It is important to explore all the channels within these press release submission sites.  Choosing the right channels can give your release the proper exposure to the right people in your industry.

Utilize additional features. – Some submission sites allow you to upload files, logos, podcasts and video along with your release.  Adding these files can make your release stand out from the masses.  If releasing a new product, it could prove beneficial to have a video demonstration showing why this product is better than the rest.  When people see this in the release, it could prove to be a great viral marketing tool.