This week’s roundup is a two-for-one on the wrong way to get backlinks. What is a backlink? For those who don’t know, backlinks are the most effective way to boost your search rankings. It is not something we cover much in this blog mainly because it also takes the most skill of any SEO activity. Most of the SEO tactics we cover involve on-site SEO (in laymans terms the stuff that you put on or do to your site). Why on-site? Well, it is a lot easier to make changes to your own site than to request links and post quality content to other people’s websites. And that is the basic definition of backlinks or link building. (Check out Wikipedia for a more in-depth definition of a backlink.)
We will save the in-depth for another day. Instead, today’s article is meant as a cautionary tale of what not to do. In the past weeks, several large companies have been busted by Google for black hat (no nos in other words) link building practices. What did they do wrong? Paying for links on irrelevant sites and offering discounts for links. Check out the two articles for more.
Photo credit goes to Michael Hayslip Photography. Thank you!
