Getting Started with Link-Building (Advice, Please)

[Travis-W]

Hi forum, my company has done almost ZERO link building, and most of the traffic we receive to our site is for our branded search terms (people searching for our company name). Our content and on-page SEO is pretty solid, but how would you suggest getting started in link building? We've dabbled in comment marketing, but almost all of these were unfollowed links. We already do PR and submit it to prweb.com. We have submitted to quite a few online directories and are currently working our way through relevant directories provided by SEOMoz. We do not want to pay for links, and we want to do all of this in house. We are committed to putting the time in to get high quality links by hand. Does anyone have any advice? A "Beginner's Guide to Link-Building" would be excellent. The specific site we are working on is http://www.consumerbase.com/index.html if that is of any use. Thanks!

[DarinPirkey]

Not sure if you saw this but we have "A Beginners Guide" here on seomoz.org

http://www.seomoz.org/beginners-guide-to-seo/growing-popularity-and-links

Read this first and let us know if you have any questions about it.

Darin.

[GuestBlogPoster.com]

Hey Zora,

The thing to note about link building is that you need to do it with your brand in mind, not for the purpose of manipulating the search engines. Excellent link building methods include:

• Guest blogging
• Submitting to truly relevant directories
• Local directories (even if you're not a locally-focused company it's still acceptable)
• Press Releases (although Google doesn't count those links anymore)
• Comment linking (when you are actually adding a helpful response)

Do not get mixed up in this garbage:

• Link trading
• Mass article submissions
• Content spinning
• General article directories
• Link purchasing
• Privately owned blog networks

Make sure you understand what Google means by "paid" links. This doesn't mean hiring an agency to help you is a "paid" link since you're paying them. A "paid" link is a purchase where you are dealing directly with the site owner that is irrelevant and holds no value whatsoever. The recommended link building methods above have other purposes besides just the link.

You should check out our infographic we made to help people with guest blogging. I think you'd like it: http://www.guestblogposter.com/beginners-guide-guest-blogging-infographic/

Just remember, any of these link building methods can become spammy. It's how you treat them that makes them effective. Do not over due it either. Make sure you are varying your anchor text and don't put all your eggs in one basket. Don't do all guest posting or all directories. Mix it up and be legitimate!

Does that help?

Kevin Phelps
http://www.linkedin.com/in/kevinwphelps

[Travis-W]

This is definitely useful, thank you Kevin.

Can you go into more detail about the benefits of comment linking?  Almost  all of the sites I found made their comment links no-follow.  Even when I used a "do-follow directory," to find blogs - most, if not all, were no-follow.

Is a no-follow link still useful when working to boost DA?

(Just to be clear, when you say comment linking, you mean attaching a website URL to your 'comment-author-name's' anchor text when posting a comment on a blog, right?)

[Travis-W]

Perfect, thanks Darin.  I will give that a read today.

[GuestBlogPoster.com]

It's debatable on whether Google takes no-followed links into consideration. I've heard arguments on both sides but where they are most beneficial is creating discussion on a forum or comment board to boost your brands image.

I know comment linking is easy, but do not get caught up in it. In my early days I had the "lazy seo" mentality (as much as I want to deny it), and one of my personal sites got dinged hard. I actually blogged about it when I used to work at SEO.com here: http://www.seo.com/blog/staying-off-googles-naughty-list/

Here is an article about how JC Penney got slammed for buying links: http://www.seo.com/blog/seo-jcpenney-disaster/

There are ways of link building that aren't spammy, but like I mentioned, any legitimate link building tactic can BECOME spammy if you are lazy.

I forgot to mention, but infographics are a great way to build links as well, but don't have the "if I build it, they will come" mentality. You need to promote it and share it for it to grow

I hope this is helping Zora!

Kevin Phelps

[irvingw]

there is an easy way to find sites that have dofollow comment sections but I will not list it here since this is something you definitely want to stay away from.

The problem with comment linking is that if it's a dofollow it is anly a matter of time before all the spammers start posting on it and what USED to be a decent link is now a like with a hundred spammy med, adult and casino links on it. These sites quickly become toxic and pose a risk to your site.

[DarinPirkey]

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/link-building-101-the-almost-complete-link-guide-updated-for-post-penguin

After you read that info on the beginners guide I would read through this post by scott mclay as he talks about setting up campaigns.