Inbound Links: DO IT!!

Inbound links are a must. Adding correct ones continuously is one of the most important things you can do for your site once you have everything working properly on the site. I can not emphasize this enough.

In case you do not understand, an inbound link a “button” on another site that goes to yours. If you have one to theirs it is termed a “reciprocal link”.

Inbound links are votes of confidence. It is the virtual method of the old catchphrase “It’s not who you know, it’s who knows you.”

Besides quantity, links are judged on
· Relevance of the link Links from a bunch of pet stores wont help
· The rank of the site A link from a brand new site can be beneficial but not as much as from an often indexed( read by the search engines) site
· The Age of the link- If you have been linked to FindLaw for a few years, it counts for more in the ranking equation than a few months. This explains the duration from launch until you are ranked highly in every search. It is also the reason time is of the essence in linking.
· To what part of your site they are pointing- Don’t have them all pointing to your home page
· The word that links to your site The link will often not readily say the name of the site but be under a word or phrase such as Long Island School Bus Accident Attorney or Construction and Business Contracts in Nassau County (Remember the thing with George Bush/Jimmy Carter where if you typed in failure they came up? Linking was the reason.)
· Speed of the addition of the links

If someone adds a hundred links to your site all at once, it may shoot to the top but then get flagged by Google, Yahoo, MSN or one of the others. Several large companies have fallen prey to frowned upon linking practices only to have their sites removed completely from search results. As you can imagine, that is very detrimental to keeping business flowing.

If you keep asking legal directories, local directories, your bar associations and anyone that references you to add your site, you should be fine. Also make sure they are adding the relevant pages.

There is also the option of having it done professionally. FindLaw offers a couple of services that will manage your linking, and give you access to links almost no one else has. The Search Engine Specialists (some of the top in their field) doing this will not only work to increase your sites rank but prevent it from being admonished by the search engines. The results from these programs have been phenomenal, but they are in very limited availability. Call or email me to discuss them. If you really want to get serious about getting volumes of business off the internet, this is the way to go.

It can be confusing and that is why you have a consultant and the teams at FindLaw to help you navigate the waters. Adding a link or two a week will quickly add up and continuously help your site ranking. I offer in my newsletter one or two such links a week. Staying on top of that will help keep your site on top of many different pages.