35 replies to this topic

[testor]

It seems to me that links will actually decide your position in certain SE's. I did a test on Google and that's what it looks like.

I'm just starting so by no means I'm an expert, but if I go to Google and seach on the name of my web site, I get several links with mine at the top. BUT, if I search for example, on the title of my site...word for word I get nothing but other web sites. Those sites, actually have many links pointing at them from many others whereas I only have few links so far.

Also, I think the more content the better. You night thing that your site is bloged with too much content, but that's actually better.

As for keywords, I think I have them at least enough to do some testing, but that didn't seem to influence the ranking.

Comments, corrections are welcome.

Cheers,

[qwerty]

There's no doubt that Google puts a lot of weight (probably too much) on links. That's why googlebombing works.

I'm not clear about what you mean when you refer to "the title of my site". Are you talking about the title tag on your site's home page? If you don't come up well for that, it just means that the SE views other pages as more relevant to those words. That may be because of links, but it could also be a combination of other factors. If, for example, you have the exact words in your title tag, but nowhere on the page itself, and you don't have many (or any) links, this could happen.

I consider the title tag to be the most important single tag on any page, but that doesn't mean that it alone trumps absolutely everything else.

[mazsola]

You are correct about the importance of links. You should make an effort to develop as many as you can pointing to your site, but it is not the only important thing you do, remember :-)

[SearchRank]

Links can certainly play a role but it really depends on how competitive the space is for a particular site. We have many clients who are either in niche markets or that do not have that many people competing against them who do very well with traditional "on the page" optimization. Others need a combination of both.

I think that on the page SEO should always be performed first because it is something you have complete control of and then seek to build link popularity because it is something that you have much less control of.

[excel30]

Since i started my link campaign my google rankings have risen weekly.

Link link link for google.

[jackson992]

The problem with Google is you can't get good rankings on Google through SEO alone

[SearchRank]

The problem with Google is you can't get good rankings on Google through SEO alone

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Yes you can! I have done so several times in my last ... umm ... 7 years of doing this.

Now if the field you are targeting is competitive, then yes SEO alone is not going to do it. But if it is not, then a site can obtain top rankings with as little as one external link pointing to it.

[OldWelshGuy]

The problem with Google is you can't get good rankings on Google through SEO alone

Depends how you define SEO.

I have loads of sites that are up there with a lot less links than their competitors. I have one site that is second, with 76 links, the one above it has 46,000 links, the one below 15,000, links are ok, but if you SEO your site, including making sure the navi system is done right, site map etc to allow page rank to flow around the site, and then have good quality incoming links, you can do wonders.

And if the competition is not that good well you can get away with murder

[jackson992]

of 6 sites they all suck ranking on Google. The only reason I can figure is not enough backlinks. To me this isn't SEO and is why I posted why I did

[BrianR]

Jackson992:

I'm not sure that there is any universally accepted definition of SEO. This forum tends towards a wider definition which would include link building as part of the SEO process.

As discussed earlier in this thread, if your rankings on Google are poor, then backlinks is probably the best place to start.

BrianR

[Nathan Malone]

To get high rankings in Google, you must use a variety of techniques, including link building and on-page SEO. They really go together and your rankings will take hits if either one of those things is missing.

Anyway, welcome to the forum and I hope you enjoy taking part in discussions here!

[Nathan Malone]

Also, I think the more content the better. You night thing that your site is bloged with too much content, but that's actually better.

I certainly agree with this. That is, assuming you are talking about content that is useful to your (human) visitors, not just doorway pages. An information-rich site full of useful content always draws lots of links naturally without your needing to ask and those are the best kind of links.

[wozza]

I have a client that has only 4 backlinks and yet a page rank of 6 and fantastic 1st place results for the most popular broad search terms in their industry, the top most searched terms in overtures report

Thousands of backlinks means nothing

Its about quality back links and Category listings

[exposure]

Here's a real-life example of how on-page SEO is all it takes sometimes:

We had a brand-spanking-new site up for about 3 weeks. One of the things we'd learned during the research for it was that a commonly searched keyword had little competition (about 10,000 other sites in G's SERPs). It was a misspelling, but one that many people used. So we optimized for that keyword on the homepage. It was #8 within 3 weeks on G, making sales for us with a PR of zero. And, we had not even gotten one incoming link. All of the traffic was coming from that high G ranking on that one keyword. So this example was 100% a result of on-page SEO.

Contrast that with a site we have had up for months now in a highly competitive industry. It has dozens of incoming links - some of them on high PR sites - and not an excessive amount of competing links. The PR is 4 (looks to be going to 5 in this latest G update apparently underway in the last couple of days). And it has over 200 pages of quality content. But it's not even in the top 100 in the SERPs at G for any major keyword. It's been slowly moving up every time G updates, but it's a slow climb. Why? Because it's such a competitive field. Millions of other sites are competing.

So yes, links matter. But no, they are not the deciding factor in every case. It depends on how much competition you have. As a side note, services like wordtracker.com are extremely valuable as a means to research which keywords to pick for optimization. That, plus picking niches that don't have an inordinate number of competitors, is the key if you're building sites from scratch.

[Scottie]

Good examples, John!