The landscape of website development has evolved significantly, with a growing emphasis on search engine optimization (SEO). Developers are investing more time and resources into making their sites more appealing to search engines. This often involves paying review fees, such as the optional $199.00 fee at Yahoo!, or hiring specialists to optimize metatags, keywords, and titles. While search engines remain crucial for a site's success, reciprocal linking with other sites is becoming increasingly important as the internet continues to expand at an astonishing rate.
Google, one of the most popular search engines, derives its raw search data from The Open Directory Project. It has designed a system where a site's rank in search results is determined not only by its content but also by its link relationships and the number of times it is mentioned or referred to on other sites. In simple terms, Google values sites that are linked to many other sites, be they directories, competitor sites, or message boards.
The rationale behind this is that if a site is worth linking to or mentioning, it must be of interest. Google's system not only ranks how many times your site is mentioned in link pages, but it also evaluates how "linked" the sites carrying your reciprocal link are. While this may sound complex, it ultimately provides the searcher with a more precise and quick search experience.
There are some peculiarities to Google's system. For instance, if you type the phrase "more evil than the devil" into Google and hit the "I'm feeling lucky" option, you'll be directed to the homepage of Microsoft Corporation. This is because numerous pages on the internet have referred to what they perceive as the negative aspects of Microsoft. This is a powerful, albeit unintended, effect of the vast network of links and discussion boards on the internet.
Let's discuss how you can use links to your advantage. Do you maintain reciprocal links on your page? Perhaps to client's pages, supplier's pages, or pages that would be of interest to your visitors? It's advisable to create or expand such a page. Then, reach out to each of the sites you've linked to, inform them of the link, and request a reciprocal link. Many sites will return the favor, and some that usually charge for banner advertising may give you a link for free.
Have you found sites that you'd like to link to you? Spend some time reaching out to them. The worst they can do is decline your request. As more sites link to you, you'll find that more visitors arrive at your site this way, especially if your site deals with a specialized topic. Creating links is a way of finding your "target" audience. And of course, Google will rank you higher, hopefully not as a demon.
At artsiteguide, a single free link from a major art site accounts for one-third of the site's traffic. To track this, I recommend using Stattrack. This tool will tell you which of your links is bringing in the most traffic. You might be surprised to find that as you build up links, they may outperform the search engines by a significant margin.
Here's another idea: create an award that you can give to one or more of the websites that you'd like to link to your page. I have an award called "editor's choice" with a small but attractive banner. When I've given this to other sites (with real selectivity), they often display the banner with a link back to artsiteguide. This amounts to a free banner ad, possibly from a site that may not have linked to you before.
In the future of the crowded internet, link relationships are of increasing importance. The emergence of search engines like Google and Clever underscores this development.
