I felt that was a bit of a confession.

We have been doing this for years and one thing that we have always tried to stay true to is – relevance.

With more and more “new” outsourced agents springing up, we have been inundated with link requests , content requests, and the like; and we are spending more and more time explaining / teaching people how we work.

Consider this post a learn session,  slash, rant!

Relevance  to me is:

1. I want to build links to a lingerie store

2. I write some content around lingerie (Yes I said write!)

3. I use keywords / topics within the content to make it RELEVANT

4. Once the content is ready, I find a RELEVANT site to post it on.

Relevance means finding a lingerie site, fashion site or a lifestyle site with a RELEVANT section.

5.  Once I think I have found the site I want – I visit it to make sure my article is RELEVANT

6. Then and only then, do I approach the site with the content offer.

7. If the site is not RELEVANT – I move to the next site – I do not try and force the issue.

I find this method works very well.  Yes it looks time consuming and I guess it is – but it works and hopefully stops other webmasters having to write detailed posts about how they only accept relevant content with relevant links to a relevant site.

So what about the Big G?

Relevant links helps Google to determine how and where to rank a site.

Consider:

Link A

Relevant link on a relevant article using a relevant keyword to a relevant site

Link B

Relevant link on a non relevant site using a relevant keyword to a non relevant site

Do you see the disconnect? Link B could even go so far as to stop Google understanding what the site is about, especially if you are building lots of these types of links, and therefore stop the site from ranking for the very keywords you are trying to.

Might explain why all your efforts have having the wrong effect?

Yes link building is easy, anyone can do it.  But doing it right will help us all.

So if you want to trade content with us or any of our clients, please please please make sure your content and the links you want to use are relevant – BEFORE you send it to us.

• the easier it will be to build quality links;
• the more likely your activity looks natural;
• if one type of link activity falls out of favour you will be safe as you will have spread the types of links to your site;
• it can lead to more direct traffic and sales – so not just SEO benefits.

With this in mind, make sure you plan accordingly and have a number of slices in your cake. A minimum of 3 or 4 slices is a good starting point. Simply carrying out one activity is not going to “cut it” anymore.

Need some ideas for link techniques?

Here are a few of the different ways to build links to your site

• Article Marketing
• Guest Blog Posting
• Link Exchanges
• Social Media links
• Profile Links
• Directory Submissions
• Mini / Micro site creation
• Blog Commenting
• Forum Posting
• Press Release Syndication
• Link Buying

These techniques can be used in any combination to cut your cake but do choose a few. Some of these techniques have gotten a bad name as some people try and take the easy way out and simply use tools and auto tools to do the work for them. This has lead to certain techniques being written about as no longer working – but as part of a bigger range of activities any of these techniques above can drive links and boost your rankings.