Inbound links for SEM

[mac928]

I understand that inbound link is the most important aspect in SEM.

Therefore, the more inbound links your site has mean the higher page rank your site is.



The main question is, if you are a new start up website, How can we convince other websites (whom have high page rank) to link to your site?



Are there any other technique or strategy for inbound links? :huh:

[Will]

I don't think its the most important thing, not by a long shot. But that's just my humble opinion. Matt Cutts wanted it gone, and other Google senior folks, Tomer Honen ditto. They think it had been misrepresented as a concept to the world. I think it's really a mysterious 'factor-x' the snakeoil salesmen can use to sell SEO services to the gullible and naive. Not that it doesn't carry some weight, just not the amount that's bandied around.

Here's what Cutt's said on his blog about it: "I’ve seen a lot of sites and bloggers do very well with great content, insightful analysis, or by providing a useful service. In my experience, the better your underlying content is, the more of a head-start you have when trying to get people to notice your site." He added: "By chasing a great user experience above search rankings, many sites turn out to be what search engines would want to return anyway"

The best way to look at it I think is like a guage of how popular your site is. This should really be due to natural linkage, as was the case many years ago. Nowadays, all your doing by backlinking is creating a 'false sense' of your site being good. Plus they tweak this algorithm lots, and bad back-links can affect you/get you pulled.

If you do want to build it up though, get emailing the owners of sites from who you would like a link explaining why you want a link, why you deserve one, and then offer them one in return. Realise that they're probably receiving hundreds of such emails from 'SEO Experts' touting their sales so try to ensure you separate yourself from them in some manner.

[James]

Disagree with you Will, I think incoming links are still the most important thing. Quality content is of course vital, because this can attract unsolicited one-way links. But the problem is you can't attract links no matter how good your content because your site is not found! Catch 22.

It is quality of links though, not quantity. A couple of links from related trusted sites can be worth 100 links from low quality irrelevant sites.

My advice is to start with link exchange. We know exchanged links have very low value, but it gets you on the bottom rung of the ladder. It's hard work but if your content is great, some webmasters will agree to exchange links. Once you are on that bottom rung then maybe the great content can do more talking, but until then ... hard work ... every evening, every day ...

If you are confident in your content, consider submitting to Yahoo and BOTW directories. Not cheap but helpful getting to the bottom rung.

Dare I say, SEO isn't the only way to market a website - you can try Facebook, Twitter and YouTube but you need something really interesting to say, otherwise you will be ignored.

[Tom]

I think keyword frequency and specialisation are also important. If a site is about nothing but kite flying then it will do well. And another site, with even better info about kite flying, will not do so well if it also has information on other outdoor games. This could be part of the explanation for James's success with only one link to his test sites.

[mac928]

James, you mentioned about adverting through Youtube. I have seen many large and small business website use youtube as part of their online marketing stragety. I think it’s a great idea. However, youtube does also have page ranking as well .... similar to google .....
If you use youtube to advertise your business
How does youtube ranks your video.... ?
How can you have your youtube video ranks on the first page?
Does youtube works simlar way to google page rank ?