Link building services are the most commonly outsourced aspect of SEO. This process involves locating qualified and thematically relevant one-way linking partners who will link back to your website. As the online market place continues to warm up to the idea of SEO, link building has become main stage as it tends to be the most time consuming and important part of any internet marketing strategy.

At first look this sounds simple and there are hundreds of automated products in the industry that claim to add thousands of back links virtually overnight. The truth is there are no short cuts in cultivating authoritative back links for a site. Link building companies spend many hours link building by hand in order to get the best results. Spammy automated products often don’t cultivate valuable links and tend to do more harm than good. Here are a couple quick suggestions to help you get started.

1. Know What Keywords You’re Targeting

Make sure that the anchor text of the link has the keyword you are targeting. For example, if you’re targeting the keyword “chicken recipes” you’ll want to place that keyword in the anchor text of the link. Many companies go after links by using their company name. Although this does boost link popularity it fails to pass popularity for a specific keyword and can be seen as a failed attempt. Link building strategies are an extension of your current SEO practice. You’ll want to reference the list of keywords you have selected to optimize your site.

2. Create a Link Building Strategy

There are many strategies link building companies use to source qualified back links to their clients. The most tedious but often most rewarding method is manual linking requests also known as “cherry picking”. This method allows you to obtain exceptionally qualified links which can really help boost your position in the search engine results page (SERPS). A good place to start with manual link building is to look at your suppliers, vendors, clients, related organizations associations and more.

Besides manual link requests other well known tactics include:

1. directory submission (Dmoz, Yahoo Directory, Joe Ant, Add Me)
2. Classifieds (niche classifieds)
3. article submission (ezinearticles.com, articlebase.com, evancarmichael.com)
4. bookmarking sites (Digg, deliciuos, technorati )
5. optimized press releases (PRWeb.com, freepressrelease.com)
6. social media outlets (FaceBook, Linked In, Twitter)
7. Forums (niche forums)
8. Blogs (niche blogs)

3. Focus on Quality Not Quantity Authoritative Linking Sources

Search engines use links as votes of confidence for your website. It really pays off to focus on the quality of your links rather than the quantity. The more important and authoritative the site, the more consideration is given to the link and the subsequent keyword in the anchor text. It is also important for your link building to look natural and not an attempt to deceive search engine spiders in search of links. Try looking for sites within your industry rather than general, unrelated sites to get links from.

Link Building is a very time consuming process and link building companies spend a lot of time researching, testing and improving their techniques. Link building services are available for companies that don’t have the time to invest in manual link building. The bottom line is that with a little help anyone can link build and move their site up the SERPS.

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