While link popularity and Page Rank are definitely the subjects on everyone’s minds when considering effective SEO for websites, how, exactly do you determine whether your links rate high in the popularity category or not? The basic premise is that if other (quality) sites are linking to your own, it must be a winner, deserving a boost in rankings. After all, most people link to good sites rather than bad ones, right?
Review Constantly
If you are vigilant about constantly reviewing how your site stacks up against those at the top, then you probably do such things as completing link requests, making blog or forum posts, commenting on blogs, sending press releases, posting articles and placing advertising on a regular basis. Try to do all these things on a regular basis, then wait a few days and check the results. If your numbers increased—great—you are obviously doing something right. If they dropped, focus on the links, and try going back to your old pages, at least temporarily.
PageRank May Not Necessarily Reflect Link Popularity
Many do not quite understand the distinction between Google PageRank and link popularity, believing them to be one and the same. The difference lies in the fact that PageRank focuses more on the number of links, as well as their relative popularity while link popularity focuses more on the quality of the links on your site. Increasing your link popularity may come down to your ability to acquire links from other sites which focus on the same keyword phrases your site focuses on as well as links from relevant sites which are listed in major directories. If you are gaining tons of links whose focus has little to nothing to do with the topic of your own site, your link popularity is probably not going anywhere fast.
Do Reciprocal Links Count in the Popularity Game?
Reciprocal links have lost some favor with Google, and, in fact, some say reciprocal linking is near-dead, and the benefits are minimal. While this may be an overstatement, you do need to be careful when using reciprocal linking to avoid having Google rate it as spam. While exchanging links is a relatively easy way to get links to your site, don’t approach reciprocal linking in a random manner. Do your homework, and only request link exchanges with other webmasters whose pages are highly relevant to your own, are of the highest quality, and are currently ranked at least as high as you are, preferably higher.
How Much Should I Obsess Over Link Popularity
While link popularity is certainly important, it is, after all, only one aspect in the search engine algorithms. At this point in time Google places more emphasis on incoming links than the other search engines do, however how much incoming links actually boost your site’s rankings is debatable, and also depends on the words which comprise your anchor text. In many cases, having only a few links which are highly relevant and are comprised of strong anchor text can significantly increase your overall link popularity. Perhaps the best—albeit most time-consuming—strategy for increasing your link popularity is to consistently offer the best site on the Internet in your particular niche. Give your readers a well-written, high quality site which answers their questions in the most thorough yet expedient manner possible, and update constantly. If you can accomplish this, you probably won’t even have to go out looking for links—they will come to you in droves.
Tags: Lawyer Website Design
