| f the most problematic and confusing issues most | | | | - Participate thoughtfully in blogs and user reviews |
| webmasters have with Google concerns linking. How | | | | related to your topic of interest. Offer your |
| your links are ranked? How you should link out? How | | | | knowledgeable perspective to the community. |
| you should construct your internal links? How you | | | | - Provide a useful product or service. If visitors to your |
| should get more inbound links? How many links should | | | | site get value from what you provide, they're more |
| you have on a page? And the list of questions goes | | | | likely to link to you. |
| on... | | | | (End Quote) |
| Perhaps, the most annoying aspect for the struggling | | | | SEO experts have been telling webmasters for years |
| webmaster, has been Google's secrecy in how it | | | | that creating valuable, unique, relevant useful content is |
| actually ranks links and pages. Google's whole | | | | one of the best ways to get your site and pages |
| PageRank and Ranking Algorithm is so complex that | | | | highly ranked in Google. If you create valuable content |
| no one can fully boast they understand how the whole | | | | then other sites will want to link to you naturally. |
| system works. | | | | Linking out to other sites should be done in a "common |
| Google's ranking secrecy and complexity has probably | | | | sense" manner and it's a way of offering value to your |
| been well-planned mainly because there are millions of | | | | visitor's experience. We expect helpful relevant links |
| webmasters who would like to "game" the Google | | | | when we visit other sites since it's a natural way a |
| Algorithm and achieve high keyword rankings through | | | | good quality site should work; so be careful of linking |
| manipulation with so-called "black-hat" SEO techniques | | | | out to spammy sites that only offer pages of links with |
| and reverse engineering. | | | | very little or no unique content. |
| Wouldn't it be ironic if this whole secrecy and | | | | There are several things every prudent webmaster |
| complexity is more of a smokescreen rather than an | | | | should be checking like making sure your site hasn't |
| actual deception on Google's part. What if the keys to | | | | been hacked and hidden links placed on your site |
| the kingdom are actually yours for the taking? What if | | | | without your knowledge; those with WordPress blogs |
| the solution is hiding in plain sight for everyone to see? | | | | should be installing the latest security measures and |
| What if the secret to high rankings in Google is not a | | | | updates. Make sure you keep checking all your |
| secret at all? Wouldn't that be a hoot! | | | | outbound links regularly since you may initially link out to |
| Actually, that's not a far-fetched assumption to make, | | | | a valuable resource, but over time this page may be |
| mainly because many of Google's linking policies and | | | | closed or replaced with one of those |
| recommendations are freely given by Google. | | | | spammy-links-holding pages. It can happen to the best |
| Whether you can believe Google is actually giving you | | | | of us. |
| the goods is another issue that we'll put on the | | | | What has confused things lately is all the "link buying" |
| back-burner for another day; but for now, Google's | | | | which Google greatly discourages and has shown its |
| advice on link building is rather generous and | | | | displeasure by de-ranking many paid directories. The |
| informative. | | | | size of your "wallet" shouldn't be the determining factor |
| As a part of Links Week held recently, Google's Maile | | | | in how pages and content are ranked. If you're selling a |
| Ohye gave some pointers on what Google is looking | | | | link, it should have the "no-follow" tag so that it doesn't |
| for and how it does its index ranking. No big surprise | | | | pass PageRank along and confuse the system. |
| that content and inbound links are the two most | | | | Policing or deciding what is or what is not a "paid link" |
| important factors. This is what most SEO experts | | | | has become a major problem for the search engines, |
| have been saying for years. | | | | including Google. |
| A site's content is one of the main factors. Therefore, | | | | You should not have more than "100 links on a page" |
| you should have a compelling site with interesting | | | | as this can overload the search engine robots that |
| information and/or offer quality products, entertainment, | | | | regularly crawl the web, indexing pages. Likewise, your |
| opinions... | | | | site's "linking architecture" should be natural and easy |
| (Quoting Maile Ohye) | | | | for both your visitors and the robots to follow. Make |
| "One of the strongest ranking factors is my site's | | | | sure your important pages are no more than a few |
| content. Additionally, perhaps my site is also linked from | | | | clicks away from your homepage. |
| three sources -- however, one inbound link is from a | | | | As to interior linking, the two main points being: Intuitive |
| spammy site. As far as Google is concerned, we | | | | Navigation for your visitors and Crawlable Text Links |
| want only the two quality inbound links to contribute to | | | | for the search engine robots. Use descriptive anchor |
| the PageRank signal in our ranking." | | | | text links that explain your content to your visitors. The |
| "Given the user's query, over 200 signals (including the | | | | anchor text is the underlined clickable part of the link |
| analysis of the site's content and inbound links as | | | | and many SEO experts suggest you place your |
| mentioned above) are applied to return the most | | | | keywords or variations of them in your anchor text. |
| relevant results to the user." | | | | Make sure your site is transparent. Do not use "link |
| "As many of you know, relevant, quality inbound links | | | | cloaking" on your site. Make sure what your visitor |
| can affect your PageRank (one of many factors in | | | | sees is what the robots are indexing. Use a 301 |
| our ranking algorithm). And quality links often come | | | | Redirect if you have permanently moved any |
| naturally to sites with compelling content or offering a | | | | webpages. Again, there is stressed the need for a |
| unique service." | | | | sitemap as this can be very helpful for both your |
| (End Quote) | | | | visitors and robots to see and find all your valuable |
| Then Maile Ohye explained further how to create | | | | content. Make sure you have a sitemap and all your |
| unique and compelling content for your site: | | | | important pages are listed on it. |
| (Quoting Maile Ohye) | | | | One final note, many professional webmasters and |
| - Start a blog: make videos, do original research, and | | | | marketers don't worry about PageRank as much as |
| post interesting stuff on a regular basis. If you're | | | | they are concerned with SERPs. Getting those top |
| passionate about your site's topic, there are lots of | | | | rankings for their sites in the search engine results is |
| great avenues to engage more users. | | | | what really matters. Again, quality content and building |
| - Teach readers new things, uncover new news, be | | | | quality links play an important role in achieving those |
| entertaining or insightful, show your expertise, interview | | | | top spots and maybe Google has already given you |
| different personalities in your industry and highlight their | | | | the formula for getting them. Maybe, maybe not. |
| interesting side. Make your site worthwhile. | | | | |