Webmaster Papers




Google
 
Web webhostingpapers.com




/pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js">

Building Link Popularity with Topical Articles


One of the important factors in ranking high in search engine results is link popularity. It is not enough to just have the best website in the world--other sites have to point back to you. The thought is that if your site is good enough for others to link to you, then you must have a great site.

How do I increase link popularity?

Building link popularity is hard work. You've searched endlessly. You've sent every reciprocal link email you can think of. What else can you do? Surprisingly, writing articles on your topic can lead you to a wealth of link popularity.

What are the benefits of writing articles?

Think about it. If you write articles, you get to use them on your website and you build your website content. You can also submit your articles to other sites. With both methods you get a lot in return:

*You build your content. More is better when it comes to site content.

*You promote your website. With more keyword-rich text on more pages, you will increase the number of pages indexed by the search engines.

*Other websites link back to your website content. Sites focused on related topics link back to you.

*You receive a link back to your website from the site you submitted the article to. Remember to include a link in all guest articles you submit.

*You become an authority on your topic. Search engines reward sites with a larger number of inbound links from sites dealing with similar topics.

What do I write articles about?

The saying goes "write about what you know." Sometimes it takes thinking in a creative way to open the door to a new route for link popularity success. Think of what your visitors might be looking for. Why do they come to your site? What can you help them with when they arrive on your website? Answer their questions about your topic. We all search to find information, so give them what they are looking for.

So what are they looking for? That is easy enough to find out. Review your web server logs to see what keywords and phrases your visitors are using when they find your site through the search engines. Run your own searches using those keywords. What kinds of sites are returned in the search engine listings? Pay attention to visitor feedback. Know your visitors. Answer the questions they are asking, or even those questions they do not know yet to ask

Most importantly, write because you have something to say. If in the process of building your content and inbound links, you benefit your readers with your content, all the better in terms of providing visitor satisfaction. This is the best reason to write, which is the way of the web, to seek out and share information.

Where do you put articles?

On your site. The first and obvious answer is to put them on your site. After all, you have all this knowledge; why not share it with your visitors? You may want to create an Articles page on your site. This will give you a place to put your articles, and any new ones that you write. Make sure to add this new page into your site navigation, and especially to add it to your sitemap page. Add a link to your main articles page on your sitemap, and a link to each new article on your articles page, and you are on your way to having your good content indexed. Make sure your visitors and the search engine robots can find your new pages.

Adding article content not only answers your visitors' questions, it adds to your website. Your visitors will have a richer experience with your site when there is more content. Not only can they buy the widgets you are selling, but they can also learn more about how to select widgets, exciting news from the world of widgets, and so on.

The more pages you add to your website, the better chance the already visiting search engine robots will also pick up your new pages to be indexed. More pages mean more links. Be sure to make an archive of your articles on your website. Always keep your pages in directories close to the root of your site for optimum indexing by the search engine robots.

Submit to the search engines. As always you will want to submit your new pages to the mainstream search engines and directories. In addition, look for specialized, topical directories that deal with your particular subject. There are also many general business directories available.

Submit guest articles. In addition to submitting your articles to the various search engines and directories, think about submitting the articles themselves. Submit your articles to sites that accept guest articles. It may take a little detective work to find some of these locations. You can start small, submitting to lesser-known portals seeking information on your topic. Some sites are focused on one topic; others need articles about all sorts of topics. Get searching and you should be able to come up with a healthy list of sites to submit to. Searching in Google and in categories in Yahoo! and ODP (Open Directory Project/Dmoz) would be helpful.

Once you are featured as a guest writer on a website, you will notice that most sites archive these articles. How many articles can you write? How many articles are archived and linked? How many different search engines indexed those pages? You get the idea.

Always include a bio of the author, article re-print instructions, copyright information and a link back to your website. Add an active link in your link text in your submission or request one for your listing. Be aware of dynamically generated pages--a static URL also increases the chance that the article you have submitted has the optimum chance of indexing by the search engine robots.

What if I don't write?

What if writing is just not your thing? You are in luck, because there are sites out there that have free content and articles available to you. When you add them to your site, you still build the content on your website.

Legitimate links, no spam

The best part is that your new links are all legitimate and not just junk links. You add important information to your site, and that is good for your visitors and good for your image. Naturally, using your keyword phrases in your Title/META tags and the text of your articles as you would in your regularly optimized pages makes sense for good search engine ranking.

It will pay off

Be creative when writing articles and submitting your content for linking, it takes hard work but will be worth it in the long run.

Resources

*General Content

EZinearticles.com (free content/submit articles)
http://www.ezinearticles.com/

GoArticles (free content/submit articles)
http://www.goarticles.com

ArticleCity (free content/submit articles)
http://www.articlecity.com/

World Wide Information Outlet (free content/submit articles)
http://www.certificate.net/wwio/

*Marketing Articles

IdeaMarketers.com (free content/submit articles)
http://www.ideamarketers.com/

Marketing Seek (submit articles)
http://www.marketing-seek.com/articles/index.shtml

*Business Articles

BPubs (submit articles)
http://www.bpubs.com/

*Internet and Web

Web Source (free articles)
http://www.web-source.net/free_articles.htm

*Site Carrying Links To Free Content Sites

Freesticky (free content)
http://www.freesticky.com/

Daria Goetsch is the founder and Search Engine Marketing Consultant for Search Innovation Marketing, a Search Engine Marketing company serving small businesses. She has specialized in Search Engine Optimization since 1998, including three years as the Search Engine Specialist for O'Reilly Media, Inc., a technical book publishing company.

Copyright � 2002-2005 Search Innovation Marketing. http://www.searchinnovation.com All Rights Reserved.

Permission to reprint this article is granted if the article is reproduced in its entirety, without editing, including the bio information. Please include a hyperlink to http://www.searchinnovation.com when using this article in newsletters or online.

RELATED ARTICLES


Were You Bamboozled by Google?
It's still happening. "Florida," "Boston," "Ginger," and "Brandy" are just a few of the many Google updates that have hit within the last few months. And Google is still issuing periodic updates as we speak. No one can say for sure whats going on or what to expect. One thing is for sure... unless you want to get bamboozled by Google (again!), youd be wise to take action to prevent it now.
How Do I Improve My Web Site Conversion Rate? Part 3
Question 1
Developing A List Of Keywords For Marketing
Keywords aren't just some words that allow search engines, like Google, to find your web site. They are also key elements for creating attractive language to use in your marketing or advertising material. For instance places such as: brochures, business cards, flyers, and ads. Keywords can also fit well into speaking engagements scripts or audiotapes scripts as well as audience handouts.
Anchor Text Optimization
Anchor Text (also called phrase linking) can significantly improve your web pages relevance in the search engines. Optimized or keyword rich anchor text can help your web site gain positioning in the search engines as well as help drive better targeted search traffic.
3.5 Tips To Help You Avoid Becoming The Next Search Engine Outlaw
Tip 1 - Hide And Seek
How and When Should I Submit My Website to Google?
As soon as you register your domain name, submit it to Google!
New MSN Search Engine: How Good is it?
If you have an online business or you just use Internet as one of your marketing tools, you know that how important are the search engines in your quest to get more targeted visitors to your website. The changes in search engine field can have unexpected outcome for your online endeavors. That's why it is important to be well-informed on impending progress in this sphere.
Top 5 Search Engine Optimization Mistakes
There are a lot of ways to promote your website and, unfortunately, a lot of these methods are mistakes. Here is a list of some of the more common mistakes (often referred to as Black Hat SEO) that you should steer well clear of.
Put the Full Power of Google to Work with 11 Google Power Search Tips
Google has many ways to help you find want you want easily. Here are 11 Power Search Tips to make your Google Experience easier and more fun. These Search Tips were found on the Following Google web page http://www.google.com/help/operators.html
Search Engines The Masters Of The Internet Universe ? Part 3
This is part three of the article series and deals with the paid inclusion and organic search results from search engines.
Things You Must Realize When Searching
For the uninitiated, searching for web pages can seem a slow, obscure process. Unless you have a high-speed Internet connection, web pages may seem to take days to load. And the searching itself ? you have to admit it looks weird typing in bunches of plus signs, asterisks, parenthesis, and other funny symbols and operators to find what you want.
SEO For Ecommerce
Ranking well under the free listings in the major search engines basically mean one thing ? Lots of free, recurring, and targeted traffic. Major search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN can be very powerful weapons in your internet marketing, if you know how to optimize your website to rank highly for your keywords. This article will focus on how you can optimize your website to rank on the top positions in search engines.
SEO Quickstart - 3 Things You can Do to Improve Search Engine Rankings Right Now
Increasing your search engine rankings should certainly be one of your main goals if you are looking to increase your targeted traffic. The reason for this is if you improve your search engine rankings, you'll increase the amount of visitors your website receives, and when you increase traffic to your site you are going to increase customers and sales. All of this potential has webmasters spending a lot of time and money getting their pages in the top 10 results on large, popular search engines like Google. There are only 10 spots on the first page of a search and thousands upon thousands of web pages are competing for these top spots. You have to put together an SEO marketing plan and include some of the proven ways to increase your search engine rankings today. Read the following suggestions, implement them in your marketing plan, and watch your traffic increase!
Improve Search Engine Rankings - The Real Deal!
Ok, here's the deal, follow these steps and shoot me if your rankings doesn't improve. I know that there's been so many articles on how to improve your search engine rankings but most of them are either incomplete or untrue. So I've put up a list of what works best to improve your rankings and I'm telling you now this works but it's no walk in the park.
Six Reasons Why Your Alexa Rating Is Still Important
1. Additional Exposure For Your Site.
SEO Trade Secrets - 8 Great Tools for Search Engine Optimization
About 80% of website traffic comes through search engines. And research shows, if you're not on the first 2 pages, most people won't find you.
Get a Number One Google Ranking With This Simple Technique
You probably do this already - complete regular searches in Google for your key phrases and see how high you rank. It's well known that the first three results are far and away the sites that get the most clicks. If you can get one of the top three results in your key terms then you will have more targeted visitors coming to your site. If you can get the first result, well that is even better. Of course all your competitors want to do the same.
Writing SEO Copy ? 8 Steps to Success
We all know that the lion's share of web traffic comes through the search engines. We also know that keywords and links to your site are the two things that affect your ranking in the search engines. Your keywords tell the search engines what you do, and the inbound links tell them how important you are. This combination is what determines your relevance. And relevance is what the search engines are after.
When Google PR Tool Bar is Down!
Where is the need to worry? Who needs a PR Tool Bar Anyway!
Five Ways To Win The Favor Of Search Engines
You've got a cool new website with all the works: cool Flash presentations, eye-catching colors, informative text, easy-to-use layout, and an interesting topic. You think your site is amazing, and you know that others will agree with you. If only they know it exists.