March 31, 2008
What is a Backlink and Why Would You Want One – or More
I was recently asked what a backlink is and why would one want one for their website. Here is some important information about backlinks. They are vital to the success of your site.
What is a backlink?
A backlink is simply a web link that points to another site. This is also known as an incoming link.
What is the purpose of a backlink?
In simple terms, backlinks point out other sites. These are links that people or search engines bots can travel from one site to the next.
Why are having backlinks important?
Backlinks serve a couple of important purposes. First, they get you noticed. Think of it this way; if you saw a person point to another person you might notice. If you saw many people pointing to single person it would do a better job of getting your attention. The more people that are pointing at you with backlinks, the more you would get noticed. And in this case you will be noticed by an important party, the search engine bots, also known as spiders. These bots are what find and crawl your sites to get them listed in the search engines.
Second, backlinks bring you traffic. This traffic is the real people who are reading web content and click on one of your backlinks to get to your site. The more places you have backlinks the more likely you will be seen.
Backlinks are also a bit of a popularity contest. The search engines use knowledge of the links pointing to your site to help judge how high your page will show on the search result pages. There are many other factors that also help with this ranking. At one time it was a race to see who could get the most incoming links to their sites so they would rank the highest. This created link spam. Unscrupulous people made automated programs that would slap out backlinks as fast as possible in many different ways. Once the search engines caught on to this, they changed their secret ranking formulas so that the person with the most links is not necessarily the winner. So please don’t try these gimmicks that get you thousands of links with a click of the mouse. These don’t work.
One thing that matters more in links these days is the trust or authority value of the site that is linking to you. This means that the higher the authority value of the site pointing to your site, the more the value you get. Think of it this way. You are in a university class and you point to another student. Now the professor points to that student. Between you and the professor, it would be the professor that would hold more authority and thus have more “value” in pointing.
So why bother chasing after links from sites that you have never heard of? Well, first, you don’t know the trust/authority value of a site. This is a hidden value. Therefore all links have some value. It comes down to working in a time efficient manner to get links that should be the best value for you.
For the best time value you want to find a place to put a link that can include getting some user traffic while including some trust and authority value. You should be looking to get links from sites that are within the theme of your market. If you are in the real estate market, you would not get a lot of value with a link from a dog training site: whereas, if you had a link on a mortgage site this link would be of better value to you.
One easy way to get themed backlinks is by joining conversations on blogs. You find blogs related to your market, read the posting, and leave a comment about that posting. Blogs were built for commenting. This interaction with the site users is very well liked by the search engine bots. The important thing to note here is that I said to join the conversation. This means you need to read, or skim the post and leave a worthwhile post. Don’t just leave a “good info” comment with a link to your site. This is considered as spam and will most likely not get posted and/or it will get deleted.
When posting a comment, blogs generally ask for your name, email, and a URL. This URL entry box is where you can enter your site and then leave your comment below without any links. The blog will automatically link your name to your site. If you put a link in your comment it is more likely to be considered as spam.
Want to see how it works? You can scroll down below this post and enter a comment. Yes, I said on theme links are better, but any link is better than no link.
If you have not already done so, you can download a special program called Comment Kahuna that will help you find on theme blogs that you can leave comments to and start getting links.
backlinks Internet Marketing
41 Comments on What is a Backlink and Why Would You Want One – or More »
April 1, 2008
Saurabh @ 3:42 am:
Really helpful article.
Keep up the good work.
Thanks.
David Jones @ 4:02 am:
Hi Charles, very informative article which was easy to understand. As you say a link is a link is a link, no matter if its not directly related to your website theme. I do try as you say to read aticles and blogs on my theme of Consoles & Games
David Jones @ 4:06 am:
Hi Charles, very informative and yes i have left a reply for another of my sites. This article does point out that these sites offering thousands of links are rubbish and i hope enough people read your article to make sure they dont fall into the trap of using them.
Prakash Sinha @ 4:12 am:
CapStone is a INDIA based BPO company and offer Outsourced Data Entry , Website Design & Development and Accounting and Bookkeeping Services to our customers in USA, Canada, UK and Australia.
Captain Randy Lingenfelter @ 4:55 am:
Hi Charles, Just wanted to say that the information is great but what about us people who have little or no idea of what your talking about. How about maybe Step by step to get these back links
Randy Lingenfelter
www.1stchoicecharters.com
MRRBADRAN @ 5:03 am:
i WOULD LIKE TO ADD THESE BACKLINKS INTO MY WEBSITE. pLEASE HELP ME.
THANKSMRRBADRAN
Aminuddin @ 6:58 am:
Dear Admin
I have visited your site and would like to add these backlinks into my website.need your assistance
Regard
Aminuddin
Rob Hill @ 7:20 am:
good advice about backlinks. It does seem to take time thouhgh to filter through system. I'm wondering if there are quicker places to get backlinks connected to a website recognised, like directories or something?
Milija Veljovic @ 7:37 am:
Nothing new in article,Charles,but Comment Kahuna is a great program.
Charles @ 8:25 am:
Randy,
I will be teaching how to get these links.
There is no single way to get backlinks. There are hundreds. I will be showing you many.
Some of the methods, like using Comment Kahuna, are quicker. Other methods take a bit longer but provide more a more valuable link.
More to come soon.
-Charles
martin @ 6:41 pm:
thanks for the info
raj @ 9:07 pm:
I want to learn how can we give effective blog commenting…..
Sai BPO Services(UK) Ltd @ 11:12 pm:
Thank you for the helpful information.
I would like to know something about online marketing,If you could please answer me!!!!!!!!!
1. Is any relation between google page rank and number of backlinks(incoming links)
2. What is three way link building
3. How can we implement the Pay per click
Thank in advance
April 2, 2008
badr @ 11:34 am:
charlin ca va? thinks you for the message
April 3, 2008
Charles @ 9:26 am:
Hi Raj,
To give effective blog commenting you need to do what you have done here. Join the conversation. Read the post and leave a comment or ask a question that is related to the post. If you look at the comments above, you will see some that have done that and you will see some that haven't. On many blogs the comments that don't join the conversation may be removed be the blog owner. So, find blogs of interest to you can join in.
Hi Sai,
1) Relationship to page rank and backlinks - No, there is not a direct relationship. In the past people would use programs to blast out links to get to the top of the search engines. Google became wise to this and basically stopped the blasting out of links from working. Links still count but you want to do it slower and you want to get links from "trusted" sites. These trusted sites often have a higher PR that can get passed to you. So having a couple of good trusted links can be better than thousands of crappy automated links. I personally don’t use any of the get thousands of links now programs.
I do use several systems that speed up the process of getting better links.
2) Three way links - This is where site a point to site b and site b points to site c and site c points to site a. This makes a complete circle without any two sites pointing to each other (known as reciprocal linking). Personally I don't do any three way linking. I don’t see any real benefit of reciprocal linking. I do some reciprocal linking but I don’t chase these as some programs allow you to do. If people email me for a link, sorry, but I don't normally respond. This takes to much time to manage. I mostly do backlinks from third party sites, using commenting, blogging, article marketing and web2.0 sites.
I will be talking about this in my next post coming soon.
3) Pay Per Click (PPC) - this is a huge topic. So much to cover there. Right now I am working on covering some of the more basic free marketing. I will in the future be discussing PPC and I love doing that for fast traffic.
-Charles
April 10, 2008
Ray Pugh @ 1:06 am:
Charles
You wrote "Links still count but you want to do it slower and you want to get links from "trusted" sites. These trusted sites often have a higher PR that can get passed to you."
How do you determine what is a trusted site? And regarding PR, how can I be ranked on the first page of Google search results for certain keywords, yet only have a PR of 1? Will Comment Kahuna help increase PR?
Thanks
Ray
Ahmed @ 6:01 am:
hi friend send me theorical data about web site backlinks and send me money making subjects and keywords.i am student and i am new in this field.I want to know how much time a google blog take to became famous.
ok with best wishes
Ahmed
Charles @ 9:14 am:
Ray,
Finding trusted sites. Good question. I will be covering this a lot in my future lessons.
PR and trust are not the same. Most trusted sites do have a decent PR, but so do some that are not worthy.
See my other post on content marketing for the start of that information.
Let me help you save a whole lot of time from checking and worrying about PR… ignore PR.
I don't know or care the PR on my sites. I care about the results they bring me.
All the time I see sites in the top ten that have a zero PR. PR is NOT the judge of who gets to the top ten.
And a second secret. Don't just try for one of the top ten. Try for many or even better, all of the top ten.
-Charles
May 8, 2008
ocean @ 5:57 pm:
very useful artical.thanks.
May 13, 2008
Jamaal @ 11:02 am:
This article is extremely helpful, keep up the good work.Persons are contantly looking for ways to build quality traffic to their website/s.
May 15, 2008
irem bright @ 9:20 am:
you post on backlinks is just perfect and good, i followed it up, and it is working on my psp daily updated site..www.playstationportal.blogspot.com, while my forex blog also enjoys same, wwww.forexpipsminer.blogspot.com
May 17, 2008
Best Online Money Making Ideas @ 12:49 pm:
I now understand what Backline is all bout
Thanks
Yaz
May 23, 2008
Somal: Social Community Network @ 4:19 am:
I agree with someone who already posted a comment here saying that a step by step instructions on adding backlinks for your site would be very helpfull. However, the commenting to gain back links is easier and I guess this should serve as an example to those who are in the dark of how to promote your web site!
June 4, 2008
Nirav Patel @ 11:17 pm:
Hi,
This is really a very good and helpfull article.
could i have known how can i increase back link for my website in short, please?
find my website: http://www.technoinfonet.com
any suggestion, please tell me.
Thanks..
June 10, 2008
Charles @ 11:26 am:
In short - use the Comment Kahuna program that I mentioned at the end of the article.
-Charles
June 11, 2008
moneythinker @ 10:09 pm:
First I thank you!
I am a foreigner!I am not good at English!
So if there are some questions!
Please help me! Thank you!
June 25, 2008
gout symptoms @ 10:03 pm:
hai…your explanation very useful and very detail about backlink…., your post increase my information about back link and free traffic from search engine…thanks
July 3, 2008
Albert Pregliasco @ 10:34 am:
My intentions of getting backlinks is bringing traffic through so my page will reach the top pages. Thank you for your help. Albert
July 10, 2008
Swapan Kumar @ 4:19 am:
Nice Post. The article is really helpful for us. But I have a question how can we determine for trusted site? How will be helpful for us.
July 11, 2008
Charles @ 7:50 am:
Hi Swapan,
That is a good question.
Lookng from the side you are of not knowning these sites, I'm not sure to tell you how to really find them and know if there are good. The best thing I can tell you is to find some people that can teach you about these things.
A couple of sites I can mention are a few of what are called web 2.0 sites. For the most part these are sites were users generate content and interact with other users.
Some of the good web 2.0 sites are:
squidoo.com
twitter.com
gather.com
wetpaint.com
digg.com
There are so many web 2.0 sites.
Another good one for marketers is ezinearticle.com.
And there are training sites/systems such as PortalFeeder that would teach you about these sites and how to best use them.
July 14, 2008
Rev Andre Brink @ 11:31 am:
Hi Charles.
Thank you for the training, as a novis and a person with a new career it is hard to get kmown. to set-up desighn and market a web site can be fruitless. I am learning alot and im looking forward to the next lesson. i will join after I posted this comment.
Rev Andre.
Marsh @ 9:05 pm:
Hi charles…..
This is really a very nice article about internet marketing.
can u plz give some tips to increase back link for my website: http://www.eduloaninfo.com.
like wise want to know how to write a effective blogs…
in step by step process
any suggestion, please tell me.
Regards,
Marsh
July 23, 2008
Yasser @ 9:17 am:
Thanks Charles
i am very thankful to you that you have creat a site for the traning of SEO. I am your new user, i dont know about SEO but i want to learn it.
July 31, 2008
Sascha @ 4:48 am:
Hi Charles,
Thanks for this helpful article; especially for your suggestion about Comment Kahuna. I didn’t know about this program and I just downloaded it. Curious if it’ll work for me. I look forward to your articles about PPC!
September 16, 2008
myuniv @ 11:51 pm:
really detail information, useful sharing about link building, thanks
September 26, 2008
meenakshi @ 4:56 am:
Silicon Valley provides Outsource Website Development,
Outsource Web Design, php programmer India, php programming, web
developer, hire php programmer ,ajax programmer India, ecommerce web
development India, offshore web development, offshore outsourcing India asp.net, web designer India.
October 23, 2008
K.Charanyanond. @ 11:08 pm:
Thanks for your Comment Kahuna and I can learn abot backlinks.Your software is very interesting.I'm just started to use it. thaks again.
November 13, 2008
yosep @ 2:09 am:
I've Visit your web, tell me how I can get big backlinks?
Thank You
yosep @ 2:19 am:
I have a blog but until now I only get little traffic, please tell me, what wrong with me?
December 8, 2008
Augtics @ 3:04 am:
I have submit our site ,but till now
I don't to get any information,At your end ..why ? ?
Augtics
April 13, 2009
heartburn @ 12:40 am:
I do not understand in depth, but the link is needed to improve the rank of a blog