Facebook Likes, Google +1s, business reviews, site usage metrics; there are a thousand things Google takes into account when ranking your site and the fact that they are constantly changing their algorithms makes it all the more difficult to stay in tune with the changes in the SEO world and act accordingly. Amid all this chaos, here is what might sound like music to your years; quality articles and quality links still occupy the numero uno position when it comes to SEO.
So, if you’ve been link building for quite some time, don’t worry; your efforts won’t go in vain. Mind you, we’re not talking about the bad, spammy links here… we’re talking about the good ones, the ones that are relevant and are of value. Don’t know how to get them? Read on then.
- Submit your company to the local Chamber of Commerce: There are Chambers of Commerce websites which contain a directory of all the businesses in the local area with links to the websites of those businesses. Get your company on the list.
- Become a member of the Better Business Bureau: The BBB keeps a directory of all members with links to their sites. It’s time you got yourself on this list too!
- General business directories: And then there are these. Find out which directory is the most popular in your country and get your business listed on it.
- Specialized directories: Want to take niche specific action? What are niche specific directories for? There are directories for just about any niche and chances are there is one for yours too!
- Office Parks/ Buildings: Maybe it’s time to get listed on the directory of tenants of your office park or office building.
- Guest blogging: This might take a lot of time but it sure does have its benefits. So what you should do is find a blog in your niche, get in touch with the owner of the blog and offer to write a guest blog post in exchange for a link to your site.
- Leverage your existing blog posts: Have existing blog posts? Post them on other sites and make them link back to you.
- Network: No, this isn’t about Facebook or Google+. It’s about real people; your friends, family, clients, business partners, vendors and so on. Let them know about your brand new site. We are sure they wouldn’t mind mentioning your site (with a link, of course!) on their blogs too.
- Local news outlets: Find the local news source in your community and invite a reporter to that big community event you are holding this week or tell them about the release your awesome new website. Sometimes, it’s good to seek attention and more so for link building!
- Look at your competitors: This might sound like spying and stealing but you can run a report on your competitor’s site in Open Site Explorer. This tool will show you all inbound links to their site, some of which you can get for yourself too!
So, these are 10 ways in which you can get more links for your site. Just make sure the business name, address and phone number exactly match the information in the footer of your website when submitting to directories (because search engines see this matching information and use it as a way of determining trust for your site in local searches) and stay away from shady directories that only care about generating revenues (pages filled with spammy ads are red flags!).
