More Ways to Get Good Incoming Links

You Need Incoming Links

You really can’t have too many links pointing at your website, so I’m always on the lookout for new places to get good incoming links.

Incoming Links are Votes If you’ve been following SEO for a while, you’re probably aware that many search engines have downgraded the importance of reciprocal links (you link to my site and I link to yours). When that happened, some webmasters stopped doing reciprocal links altogether, and as usual with the lack of consistency in SEO, some webmasters still swear by them.

But, in any event, you still need good one-way incoming links to your website. The main reason you need those links is because search engines use them as a way to gauge the importance of your website for particular keyword phrases. One way to look at it is that the search engines see links coming to your website as a “vote” for your site.

Basic Linking Rules

Of course, there are some rules - some that are even pretty widely-accepted:

Your incoming links should be from related websites - strong real estate websites are ideal, but at a minimum, make sure that you’re not depending on links from your cousin’s personal blog to increase your authority on the web.
The words that are used to link to your site are important. Since the search engines use incoming links as a vote, make sure they know what people are voting for! If someone is going to link to your website, make sure they use one of your targeted keywords, not something like “Click Here”. Real keyword phrases help the search engines figure out that you are being referenced as an authority on “City Real Estate”, for example.
Vary the keyword phrases that are used to link to your site. If every link coming to your site uses exactly the same words (called anchor text), the search engines will figure out that something nefarious is afoot. Try to obtain natural sounding links that use variations of your keyword phrases.
Find ways to get links to all the key pages of your real estate website. Don’t always link to your home page. For example, make sure you have links to content pages that are optimized for specific city or neighborhood keyword phrases.
If you have a blog or a second website, use the rules above when linking to your own site(s).
Be careful about paying for links. I haven’t seen this as a problem with the major directories that charge a fee for displaying a link. But, there are a lot of websites out there who would be glad to take your money, and the odds are they aren’t very particular about the links they display.
Don’t build links too quickly. Search engines are looking for a natural progression in the build up of incoming links to your site. So, even if you could take a week and concentrate on getting as many good incoming links as possible, don’t do it.