B2B Web Strategy Blog - eMagine

Link Building and SEO: Time to Get Back to Basics?

July 17th, 2008 Posted by: Matt Roche

We’re continually amazed by the number of our good clients who are happy for us to help them with search engine optimization (SEO) …until it comes time for link building.  They’re quite happy for us to worry about their keyword/keyphrase identification, page or H1 tags, alt-tags …all that gritty technoid stuff.  But mention inbound links, and often as not we observe a glazed-over expression and hear, “Yeah, yeah, we’ll take care of that over the next month or so.”

Come to find out, on our 3rd or 4th monthly SEO checkup, that virtually nothing was done on the link-building front.  Result? …their site is hovering on about the 9th or so page of SERP results, when everything else suggests it should pop up much higher.

Reputation – or the imputed “authority” of a website, as indicated by the number and authority of sites that point to it – has only been important since… oh, around 1998, when Google put up V1.0 of its search engine.  Reputation, in fact, was the “big idea” that convinced Sergey Brin and Larry Page that creating an alternative to AltaVista et al. was more critical than finishing their Stanford PhDs.  Without access to Google’s current algorithm (and accessing the gold in Fort Knox may be easier!), it’s not clear how much weight its engine puts on reputation vs. other factors;  we just know it’s considerable.  (In fact, we once got a site that was built entirely with images and no text to rank in the top 10 for twenty important keyphrases – all with link building!)  And the other engines chasing Google have had to incorporate some version of it, too.

So how does any B2B end up ignoring one of the most important variables determining their site’s page rank, while simultaneously tossing real dollars at the techy bits that might actually be no more important?  We can’t answer that for certain, but suspect that it goes something like this…

()  the work looks (and is) straightforward, no special skill required; so
()  it only takes time; but
()  time is the one thing that simply can never be found, in any organization.

In her highly useful article, “Good Old-Fashioned Link Building”, Julie Batten reminds us of the back-to-basics of link building, including:

• Directly asking your partners, suppliers, resellers or vendors to link to you.  To increase your success rate, you could even incorporate a requirement in all partner contracts that they provide a relevant and prominent link to your website.
• Leverage your company’s PR strategy.  Be sure to optimize your press releases for search engines, use an online distributor such as PRWeb or MarketWire, and submit releases to news and portal sites for suggested inclusion.
• Your thought leadership program can also garner incoming links.  Include a byline at the end of each such article giving the author’s name, company name and URLs, making sure to use keyword-rich hyperlink text.

Oh… then there’s perhaps the oldest, oft-neglected but perhaps most effective means of encouraging inbound links:  actually building link-worthy content into your website.  Or as Julie puts it, “If you want other sites to link to yours, you need to ensure your site is actually worth a link.” Examples of such content include how-to articles, product reviews, tools, tips, resources and case studies.

We don’t typically go all normative in this vehicle… but this one is just so clear-cut:  importance – critical;  cost – fairly low.  So, task someone and hold them accountable; hire an intern and make this their first/only project; or let your SEO consultants do it.  But just get it done.  Your SERP rankings will thank you.

Entry Filed under: B2B Web Strategy, Driving Traffic, Search Engine Marketing