Google Webmaster Guidelines and Link Building Pt.1

Posted by James Harrison on Dec 31, 2007 in Blog, Link Building & Development | 11 comments

When Reading the Google Webmaster Guidelines (which is my SEO bible), Google gives you 5 specific steps for getting Google to index your website.

So, I am creating a 5 part series called; Google Webmaster Guidelines & Link Building. So let’s get started on Part 1 - 4 ways to find relevant sites to get links from.

Google’s 1^st bullet under “When your site is ready” states “Have other relevant sites link to yours.”

Fair enough… so let’s get some links from some other sites relevant to ours.

*NOTE – These strategies are made for sites actually relevant to the key terms targeting.

TIP 1: Searching using query; link:http://www.competitorsite.com (link:http://www.guitartricks.com)

For this Post, I will pretend I am FreeGuitarLessons.ws & that I am trying to rank #1 for the keyword phrase; “guitar lessons”.

Do this in both Google & Yahoo. Each search engine will show you the links that they recognize and find relevant in their own algorithmic order.

Seek to get links on the same pages as the competition

• Try to get better placement

• Make sure your targeted keywords are in the anchor text.

• Look to see if links are in Alpha-Numeric order (for higher placement)

LINK BUILDING TOOL: SEOChat.com has a tool called the PageRank Search. This tool gives you search results with a website’s Page Rank.

When using this tool;

1. Type keyword into search bar.

2. Identify competition & note their PR scores.

3. Type link:www.competitorsite.com in search bar.

4. Get links from those sites

TIP 2: Search in Google using this query; related:http://www.yourwebsite.com (related:www.freeguitarlessons.ws) and see what sites that Google says you’re related to. Once you find what sites Google says you are related to, make links pointing to your site from those web pages.

Now, search related:http://www.competitorsite.com (related:www.guitartricks.com) and see who Google thinks they relate to. If that site is ranking high on Google, you might want to be in the same area as them. Seek to get links from all sites that Google thinks relates to your competition. After all, you do feel you deserve top placement just as much as your competitors, right?

LINK BUILDING EXPERT

This tool allows typing in up to 10 urls of your top competitors and seeing which links they all have in common. Once again, if you want to rank higher than your competitors, you must be more relevant than them, so other sites WILL want to link to your site as well, Right?

1. Type in the urls of the top competitors ranking on the 1^st page of Google for your targeted key terms into the Common Backlink Tool.

2. Go à and the tool will show you all the common back links that each of your competitors share.

3. Work your magic…

TIP 3: Search using these queries; “keyword” “add a link” or “keyword phrase” “submit site” or “key term” “submit url”, etc.

i.e. “guitar lessons” “add url” or “guitar sites” “suggest a link”

Here is a list of phrases you could search with your keyword in the “ “ format to find relevant sites that allow you to “add a link”

• Add link, add a link, add site, add a site, add website, add a website, add url, add a url

• Suggest link, suggest a link, suggest site, suggest a site, suggest website, suggest a website, suggest url, suggest a url

• Submit link, submit a link, submit site, submit a site, submit website, submit a website, submit url, submit a url

These are a variety of ways to find pages relating to your keywords that allows you to add links or suggest a site. This is a good shortcut instead of having to search through a site to see if they except links. Most of the time, the search engine listings point directly to the pages that makes submitting a site effortless.

• You can also search for more terms like site:competitorsite.com “add” or site:http://www.competitors.com “links”, etc.

TIP 4: Last is search with intitle:guitar lessons or “add url” intitle:guitar lessons

This will show you the pages most relevant to the phrase “guitar lessons” with “guitar lessons” in the <title> tag.

1. Identify top sites and seek to get links from the same sites as them using these previous steps.

2. Or Google site:www.toprankingsite.com “add” to see if there is place somewhere on their site where you could add a link.

3. Work your magic…

These are what I found to be some of the easiest and the most efficient ways to build links that are relevant to your site.

Keep in mind; Google states “have other relevant sites links to yours” so if you want to rank #1 for your targeted term, just make sure you are relevant to it.

This blog was dedicated to my buddy T-Bone.