Real Business

Link building is a very important part of SEO and online strategies, as search engines will count links to your website as proof of your authority. It is the internet version of word-of-mouth – if lots of people are suggesting your content as the place to go, it must be worth it.

Search engines analyse the websites that are linking to your content and work out how relevant the content of both websites are to determine just how much added search engine power you will be given. So links from any old website hold less weight than links from websites with similar content. Quality and quantity of incoming links are a key part of how search engines work.

Link building is the process of increasing the number of incoming links to your website. Here are a few ideas to get you started:

• Helpful content. Helpful resources, tips, guides and explanations are the types of content that do not easily date (unless you write them on an incredibly time-sensitive subject). This makes them perfect for link building, as you have a large window of time to get your content placed all over the web. These are also the types of content that are most likely to be re-posted by other people, which will all help your link-building efforts.
• Forums. Register to related forums and post links to any helpful articles on your website. Another good idea would be to post a link to your website in the signature of your forum profile, if it allows.
• Comments. If you come across a similar article online, place a helpful comment with a link to your related content where appropriate.
• Guest writing. Write articles on other blogs for free in return for being allowed to link back to your website from the host blog. It's also considered good etiquette to repay the favour by linking back to the host blogger's website.
• Content aggregation. Become an active member of content aggregation websites such as Digg, Reddit and YouTube. Post up your own content and other content that you find interesting – just posting the odd article on these won't have the same effect as investing time becoming an active and respected member of these communities however.
• Social media. Use Twitter, Facebook and other social media websites to promote new content to friends and followers – again, you need to engage your peers to have the best effect, not just post link after link.

Try to ethically link build. There are many services out there that may offer good link-building stats on paper by adding a link to many unrelated directories, but on closer inspection, these links have little relevancy and therefore won't give you the authority you need.

It's a good mix of quality and quantity you want – if you can get high amounts of both, you are onto a winner! Link building is used highly in search-engine rankings calculations, so don't ignore it.

But don't try to take the easy way out by paying for overnight results – this could end up wasting money, or even damaging your reputation.

Summary: Good link-building campaigns will take time. Bear with it, invest the time – I promise you, it's worth it in the end. Follow me on twitter: @dean_faulkner