Creating Inbound Links

Having a back link into your website (also knows as inbound link) is vital to getting a Page 1 ranking with the search engines, especially Google.  If you have a not-so-hot keyword for your site, this becomes less of a challenge.  If you however have a hot keyword, then you’re going to need some inbound links to get your site up where it will be found.

So how do you accomplish this?  There are several ways to do this:

Just ask!

If you find a website where your business is relevant and very useful for that site’s visitors, ask them for a link.  Worst they’ll do is say no.  They may require you “buy” the link – but I advise to be choosy and careful in that.  Google catches on real quickly to purchased links, especially ones that have no relevance to your site.  That will only hurt your ranking.

Business Directories

Listing in business directories is a great way to do this.  Some will require payment, some require a reciprocal link, while many are free.

RSS Feed Directories

Have a blog (you better in this industry)?   This is a huge secret (sshh!) of mine.  I literally went from 34 inbound links to 175 in just 4 days and I only got myself listed in about 8 free RSS Feed Directories up to that point.  It takes a lot of time.  It’s very mundane.  Honestly, if I were to sub out any work, it would be linking because it is so boring!  But the pay out is quick, and very worth the time.

Here is a link to hundreds of RSS Directories:

http://www.masternewmedia.org/rss/top55/

Start at Feed Page first since they will rank your blogs with a A-D grade and you can ensure you have the right feed.

http://www.feedage.com/myfeedage/login.php?ref=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.feedage.com%2Fdashboard%2F

To get your RSS Feed link:

Go to your blog and right click on the RSS symbol and select copy link.  Then paste it in the FEED field when you’re filling out the Feed Page form.  Feed Page will verify the feed URL and you’ll be certain you have the right one.  (Most blogs feed is the blog URL with /feed/ at the end.)

Classified Directories

There are many free classified directories out there!  Find them and take advantage of posting there.

Blogs & Forums

Start participating in relevant blogs and forums.  When I say “participating” I truly mean “participating”.  Take part of the community.  Don’t just start joining blogs and forums and start plastering your link.  That is spamming and it will only make you look bad and hurt your business image.  Be ethical in all your business practices, including link building.

Linked In

Linked In is a DO FOLLOW linking community!  Start joining groups and “participating”.

The True Secrets!

There are a few things to watch out for.

Make sure the links are a DO FOLLOW vs NO FOLLOW.

How do you do this?  First, I highly recommend you use Firefox (free and legit download) instead of Internet Explorer for your default browser.  Then use the SearchStatus Firefox Add On.  Once this Add On is downloaded you can choose to have NO FOLLOW links highlighted in pink.  If you go to a Blog/Forum/Directory, etc and you see that other links are NO FOLLOW, then yours will be too.  Yahoo seems to follow NO FOLLOW links regardless.  So submitting to NO FOLLOW sites is not a complete waste of time.  However, Google does not follow them.  (You will be disappointed to see how many forums and blogs are NO FOLLOW.  Greedy of them, in my opinion.  But that’s another topic we can discuss later.)

Discernment:

Use good judgment and discernment in your quest.  You will start to see some emails coming through offering you a new directory option, or free classified, etc.  Some of these are okay, some however, are MLM (Multi-level Marekting) scams (the worst in my opinion) or other various hacking attempts.  If you use Outlook and have McAfee installed, you will be forewarned.  (Places such as directmatches is one to avoid as it is a multi-level marketing campaign that will swarm your inbox with tons of useless garbage.)

Open a Spam Catcher Email:

What exactly do I mean by this?  I have a special email address that is something like jaimiespamcheck@whoever.com.  I use this email for my link building.  That way I can make sure I keep my business and personal emails from getting exposed to the “dirt” that filters the internet.  Just a safe precaution, and a recommendation.

Thank you!

Thank you for your interest.  I hope you learned something from this.  I would love to hear your feedback!

Author:  Jaimie VanSickle, J VanSickle Virtual Assistant - Enabling entrepreneurs with super powers!