Are You Killing Yourself?

We all participate in link exchanges but how many can kill your site? A link to your site has traditionally been accepted by Search Engines as a vote for your site. A link from a topic or theme-related site to yours is better than a link from a site having a completely different topic.

BUT, things have changed. The fact is, Google doesn't approve of link-building schemes, and have recently made the leash a bit shorter.

Bad links can kill your site. Say you get involved in a link building foursome with a porn site you didn't even know you were linked to because you're too busy linking to everyone; you have just created a bad link and this will have a negative impact on your site.

Reciprocal Links are helpful but worthless at the same time. You link to a site in exchange for a link on their site. A link from you to someone else basically deducts one vote from your total vote count... meaning its value is minimal when compared to a 1-way incoming back-link!

1-way Outward Links really are one of the worst things you can do to increase your PR. Yes, it's selfish but that's how it is the big world of money hungry sharks. You gain nothing by giving out links with no return. This is why people participate in the no-follow attribute. By doing this, your basically telling the search engines that link is not a vote for your site by that site. Get it? Please know that I do not recommend being selfish. It will only come back to bite you in the butt. If you share, you gain potential readers and maybe future linkbacks.

It's imperative to build links relating to your posts and post titles. Don't link to just your sites name. That doesn't help at all.

Do some research on keywords and your posts and when your linking, be sure to connect the two. It takes time and a little bit of trial & error but if done right, your PR will shoot up.