Backlinks

First, a bit of vocabulary: the text that is displayed in a link is called « anchor text ». Google quickly established itself on the internet thanks to a revolutionary idea: backlinks, that is to say the links pointing to your site from an external website. Each link is seen as a vote of confidence suggesting that you are providing quality content. Of course, cheaters quickly stepped into the breach by creating « link farms » on an industrial scale. Successive updates have put an end to these practices. The current method closest to this type of cheating is to create hundreds of blogs with each containing more ridiculous articles than the other, often generated by artificial intelligence, filled with keywords and links to external sites. It works less and less and only on a small scale: if you get thousands of backlinks in a few weeks Google will infer that you cheated, and blacklist you. Also, since these sites never have any visitors, Google will not consider these to be interesting backlinks.

This is where we come to another concept: the prestige of the site. The criteria are not officially unveiled, but a little common sense is enough: A government website or a reputable newspaper such as Liberation or the Wall Street Journal is of course a very strong vote of confidence and quality. As a result, Google forbids the purchase of links, just as a politician is forbidden to buy the votes of his constituents. However, this is a very common practice. To make it go unnoticed, the sites are offered turnkey content of good quality, and extra money: at least twenty dollars. Yes, that’s almost unfair. These articles will of course deal with the topic of your website and provide links to it.

There are many other questionable techniques that can be cited: using contact forms to spam massively, flooding forums with messages, etc. Nobody likes it, neither does Google. The huge advantage in terms of SEO of being honest is that you will never suffer during Google algorithm updates except for technical reasons, if for example you haven’t updated your site to be readable on a phone. And we’re not kidding: during the Penguin update, sites that created thousands of links with strictly identical keywords were blacklisted overnight. You can, however, list your site in directories such as Google business or Tripadvisor, depending on your activity.

Find sites for backlinks

A tactic old as Google itself is to grab the list of backlinks from your rivals. You can then contact the corresponding sites and offer them to talk about you. A derivative technique is to look for dead links, identified by the infamous 403 error and write to the site pointing out the broken link and … offering yours instead. As we can see, this is hardly technical, it is more of a communication job and anyone can do it. You can also offer them free, quality content that will link to your site. Please note: this content must be exclusive. Not only would these websites be scarcely interested in having the same content as everyone else, it could also greatly affect their SEO, and yours as a result, since Google takes into account the fact that identical articles are found a little too often on the web …

Videos

Internet users love videos. In addition to kittens and dancing babies, they appreciate tutorials, video game demonstrations, product unboxing … It’s up to you to find a theme that will encourage Internet users to view them and visit your site.

The link bait

As we have already mentioned elsewhere, it is about creating compelling content that ideally goes viral. It’s enough to work on the form rather than the substance: for example, « ten free tools to become the master of SEO » or « crush your competition with these secrets that SEO experts will never reveal to you ». Be careful though! The more attractive the shape, the more you will attract the crowd that is, let’s say… a little low-end? Some content writers go as far as to add spelling errors in their texts to make sure they attract people who are not too smart, and therefore naive, and therefore likely to buy their junk. Fortunately, there are more noble link baits: for example, filling out a form that will allow you to retrieve very serious and interesting content such as SEO or methods to seduce someone even if you are old, ugly and dull. We leave you the pleasure of discovering which of these two subjects will meet the most success.

Don’t ask for link exchanges

A bad habit is when a site offers a link exchange with another site much more important than its own, it will hardly appreciate the request and the time wasted reading your message. Be smart: spontaneously link to their site and send an email saying you really enjoy what they do. In the majority of cases, they will return the favor. Exchange has an unpleasant connotation of trading, while betting on benevolence is usually not a mistake, as many seem to believe. How to find such websites? List the sites you visit regularly, use keywords related to your activity in Google, then add them to your blog. Then send them a message. Of course, do not use this method with The New York Times but with bloggers, success is guaranteed. You can also flatter their egos, which is really very easy, by offering them an interview, in writing or on video. They will then be happy to promote your site. Another tip, testimonials: see which sites offer testimonials on their home page, buy their products, or test their services, then offer them your testimonial, if they are interested, they will have to demonstrate enthusiasm. The downside of this very effective technique is that you obviously can’t give hundreds of testimonials.