Quality linking is such a critical part of the long term success of any website.  It is also one of the most difficult pieces of the SEO puzzle to excel at.  That’s why I’ll be getting deeper and deeper into linking strategies in the coming months.

It’s so easy in the beginning of a linking campaign to get tempted by the many $19.95 programs that exist.  While many of these may seem to work on a short term basis, this type of linking strategy will never last long term.  Anything that is too easy in search engine optimization is usually not good for long term stability.

For now, I want to leave you with some great ways to learn more about quality linking: 66 Ways to build links, 101 Ways to build link popularity and Over 125 (Legitimate) Link Building Strategies.

Happy Linking

Backlinks, or inbound links, are one of the single-most important factors in SEO. And quality is the most important factor in backlinks (not quantity). Here’s what you should look at when determining the value of a backlink.

• Anchor text – does the anchor text include your targeted keywords?
• Relevance – How closely related to your site is the site/page the backlink is on?
• Other Links- How many other outbound links are on the page that links to your site? If there are 59 other links, the link to your site will not be as valuable as if it would be if there were only 2 other outbound links.
• Domain age – Google especially places extra significance on links from older domains.
• Permanence – Your backlink should be static / permanent to offer good SEO value.
• Page Prominence- How prominent on the site is the page that links to your site? A page buried 5 clicks from the homepage will not likely give you a very valuable link.
• Link popularity – How many backlinks does the site / page that links to your site have? The more quality backlinks the site has, the higher quality the link will be.
• Other Links – Are the other links on the page related to your site?
• Site Traffic – How popular is the site that links to your site?

You can use this list when building backlinks to help you find and choose the highest quality links you can.