19 replies to this topic

[vikman]

can we make backlinks on .org and .edu domain sites?
If yes give me some examples and how?
Please give me detail explanation
thanks

[Jill]

No, you can't make backlinks anywhere unless you own the websites.

[AgSEO]

Why concentrate on only edu, gov and org ? The domain extension has zero effect on link power or SEO.

[vikman]

No, you can't make backlinks anywhere unless you own the websites.

No mam, I am asking from the purpose of SEO. Is there any benefit if i make backlinks from .edu and.gov sites ?

[chrishirst]

Is there any benefit if i make backlinks from .edu and.gov sites

No more than from any other TLD

[bobmeetin]

No, you can't make backlinks anywhere unless you own the websites.

- And of course if you were rich enough to buy the U.S. government, then probably links would not be much of a concern.

Can we convert "make links" to "obtain inbound links" just for clarity?

No more than from any other TLD

Hmmm - I have a Web Marketing for Dummies book (p 173, 2nd Editon, very useful) which suggests that links from .edu and .gov sites are given a higher weight (can't confirm) as would a link from the Wall Street Journal as opposed to Country Joe's Plumber's website.

[Scottie]

They are not "given" any higher weight. However they tend to be sites that by their nature, are trustworthy and linked to by a lot of other sites.

The TLD is not the magic key... it's the trustworthiness of the site.

Part of the reason they are so trustworthy is that they don't have a bunch of junk links to irrelevant sites... ergo, you are unlikely to get a link on one. I guarantee that if you find a .gov or .edu site that is linking freely to everyone who requests a link... you won't get much value from it.

[Jill]

Hmmm - I have a Web Marketing for Dummies book (p 173, 2nd Editon, very useful) which suggests that links from .edu and .gov sites are given a higher weight (can't confirm) as would a link from the Wall Street Journal as opposed to Country Joe's Plumber's website.

Yep, that's another one of those common myths that have been passed on from generations without ever any proof, and quite contrary to what all search engines will tell you.

It may appear as if those TLDs have more oomph, but that's only because they tend to actually have more PageRank (the real kind). If it were me, I'd give LESS weight to .edu TLDs since kids get free accounts and then sell links from them to the dopes who believe the myths!

[bobmeetin]

I have no doubt in the power of myths, just reiterating what I read, am reading as I write. The page is a discussion of Google Pagerank. It gives a list of about 15 items that influence pagerank (yes we are talking about links I know).

It also says, "A Google sitemap generates extra value, while badly structured sites might diminish value." Here I ask myself, why? This sounds kind of blanket-ish. If you have a well structured site, why should a sitemap matter?

We should be in the business of selling grains of salt.

[Jill]

I'd throw that book away if it were me.

[qwerty]

I thought the idea behind those Dummies books was to help dummies, not to give other people reasons to call them dummies. That's not fair at all.

Actually, my experience with those books has been that they provide pretty clear explanations of the basic elements of their subjects. But if they're now getting into that level of detail, and they're getting those details wrong, I guess they're just not as useful as they were ten years ago.

[Randy]

If you have a well structured site, why should a sitemap matter?

It doesn't. A fact of which I am living, breathing proof considering not a single one of my sites has or has ever had an xml site map. Nor needed one.

[MaryKrysia]

Actually, my experience with those books has been that they provide pretty clear explanations of the basic elements of their subjects.

Unfortunately, so many people look for recipes for making successful optimized web sites that these books as well as man so called online SEO gurus have great popular appeal. SEO is honestly more of a practiced and refined Art than anything else.

[bobmeetin]

I bought the book as a supplement, to fill in some cracks. It has a lot of good information which I might, might not have found elsewhere. For folks whose business is SEO/SEM and have experience you might glance and toss because you've done it for so long and you have your tried and proven techniques.

But do this for a moment - think back to before you became a seasoned veteran. If you are lucky maybe you worked as a SEO sidekick until your learned the ropes.

How does it work for novices who haven't had that luxury? How do they know who is a true authority and who is not? Who's to say that highrankings is genuine, the real deal whereas the other 10 forums are more bogus than not? Or perhaps those other 5 books that I passed by when I made my purchase are better or worse?

I suspect that in this business that if you can find a topic or a technique that is agreed upon by 80% of the major players, it's probably accurate. The novice, by virtue of being a novice, does not even know who the major players are.

[qwerty]

That's my point, Bob. A Dummies book on SEO should only deal with the basics -- the stuff that's not in the least bit controversial. It should tell people to build sites that are easy for search engine spiders to index, that use text links from one page to another, and that use lots of informative, unique content that readers will want to recommend to others.

It would be a very short book, but it would actually be helpful to the people who know nothing about promoting websites. If it deals with any tricks -- stuff that some currently believe might work for the time being, stuff that appears to work but might just be a coincidence, or stuff that might work for you as long as you don't get caught doing it -- then it's not properly serving its target audience: people who think of themselves as "dummies" when it comes to SEO.

I think I've still got my old copy of HTML for Dummies somewhere. It describes the structure of an HTML page, and how to put one together. It names the various elements, tells you what they're for and how to use them. And it doesn't go beyond that.