Can We Seo Without Inbound Links Options

[wassim]

Hello SEO Experts,

I know most of the SEO techniques, but one important factor as we all know is pagerank, and to have a higher pagerank we should get inBound links to our site.
My question is, can we make our site appear in top Search Engine Results, without having any inBound links? even for challenging keywords?

Everything related to SEO seems very logical to me, but the most important thing is to have inBound links to your site. It's really time consuming, to send emails to web masters and ask them for a link. I know a good website will result people to link to us without we ask for, but what if my site is a personal site for example, and it is a normal site, I don't think people will link to me just like that in my case ! Does that mean I will never be in first page? (Note that I am now in page 10, but I'd like to be in page 1, for a challenging keyword).

By the way, I have submitted my site to some free directories, but I am not sure if this will help my pagerank (currently I am 0/10 and i published my website 4 months ago)

Please advice and let me know how should I go on from now, because concerning the content of my site, I assume it is * VERY WELL * optimized for Search Engines, the only thing remaining is the PageRank issue.

Best regards,
Wassim

[Randy]

Without any links at all pointing towards your site not only will it not rank very well, but it won't even stay in the index.

Tis the way of the web. The search engines expect people to link to things those people find to be of value. So if no one ever links to your site they make the (correct) assumption that it has no value to their users.

[mickmel]

You should also keep in mind that you don't necessarily need to beg for links. If you build quality, useful content, people will link to it.

[wassim]

Without any links at all pointing towards your site not only will it not rank very well, but it won't even stay in the index.

Tis the way of the web. The search engines expect people to link to things those people find to be of value. So if no one ever links to your site they make the (correct) assumption that it has no value to their users.

Hello Randy,
thanks for your reply so far. What you're saying is absolutely correct, and it is what I stated in my post initially. But what I am really amazed of is, for example when someone pay a firm to make the SEO of his website, how do they go about increasing the pagerank of the site? do they create inBound links from their own websites? Do they submit the site to the directories? This is a question that I always ask myself about, and I never get an answer for!

And besides this, the SEO firms aren't making your site more valuable, but instead cheating the engines, is that correct?

Best regards,
Wassim

[Randy]

The devil is in the details Wassim.

Are some SEO's cheating Google and their clients by taking shortcuts, submitting to every crappy directory under the sun, hiring Pay Per Posters to go out and spam people's blogs/forums/etc? Are there SEO's who slap up links on their own sites to client sites, or even slap up links on one client's site pointing to another client's site? Yup, there are definitely more than enough of these shady types.

Then there are the other type of SEOs who actually know what they're doing and are able to research a market and find truly valuable places that would love to link to someone else who has built a quality site that solves the problems of their users. It typically takes a lot fewer of these types of real links to gain the same amount than the shortcut guy above would have to attract. But there does have to be some thought put into which sites to target for a link.

The shortcut guys stuff is like a shotgun approach, where with each shot a lot of little pellets are put out there hoping a couple stick. It often works in the short term, but will eventually start to fail or produce diminishing returns.

The real SEO's method is more like a sniper, who only needs one shot to hit what they're shooting at. Not only are these links likely to stand the test of time a lot better, but they'll actually help attract other good links without any extra effort on anyones part.

[wassim]

Randy, a million thanks for the great informations you provided (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
I would really love to be in the snipers side (in its good meaning ofcourse hehe). The only difference is that it will be harder at the beginning, but as soon as I go through optimizing several websites, I will have the ability to do it again more easily.

Today was my first day in this forum, and i asked two questions, and got the answers I was expecting, where I couldn't find any solution for online.

Thanks for HighRankings.com for this great forum and great guys, who are always looking to answer people's questions.
I am adding HighRankings.com to my list of quality resources (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) Thanks a bunch.

Best regards,
Wassim

[THE BERG]

My first day too, though i've been reading it for a long time. Great forum!

I've noticed in my own experience that the best links are obvious. Highly relevant, quality websites. You hear it over and over, but my reasoning for calling them the "best links" is not merely for Search Engine ranking help. The reason they're so good is you can see that these referring sites send good traffic. Viewers that come regularly with long stays and many page views. Again, the idea of buidling your site with links for the "viewer" not the engine comes into place. These people find my link and really appreciate it. There not looking for Paris Hilton Naked, then coming to my site and wondering what the heck they're doing there.

Viewer is #1. The search engines are working really hard to make this their goal, so even if you don't intend to do well in the rankings, a well built site with quality pages and worthy linking will do well with them.

[Randy]

Welcome The Berg ! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/hi.gif)

My experiences agree with your assessment 100%.

My best links are places that send me traffic. Or more specifically Converting traffic.

For instance, I just looked at the stats one of my little sites I'm considering tweaking a bit and can see that there are 10 of these best-of-class sites out there that link to me. No recips, I don't even think I asked for half of them to link to me. Each of those 10 sites send me around 100-150 visitors each month and have done so for many, many months now. Of those 1,000-1,500 visits coming from those 10 links approximately 70% convert one way or another.

It's good for me, obviously, because I get 700+ additional sales per month I probably wouldn't have gotten otherwise. And these are sales that aren't directly driven by Search, which is all the better. It's good for the other webmasters because they're recommending something their readers apparently want and need. And it's good for the search engines because both my site and the sites linking to me are doing right by real visitors.

It's really not rocket science. But it's not necessarily always easy to start developing such mutually beneficial relationships with other webmasters either.

[BBCoach]

Welcome The Berg ! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/hi.gif)

My experiences agree with your assessment 100%.

My best links are places that send me traffic. Or more specifically Converting traffic.

Very true!

But it's not necessarily always easy to start developing such mutually beneficial relationships with other webmasters either.

Most definitely hard to do via email/phone! With my hobby site I've tried via emails/phone to get links, but that is a very poor method. It's cheap, but I may only get 1 outta 100 that even respond and it's very time consuming.

I've decided to take it to them in person. I now use email as an introduction and to tell them I'll be in their area on this date/time and will stop in to explain more in detail about why it's beneficial for them and me that we link to each other. One other thing I do is offer to help them SEO their sites to improve their performance in the SEs. It's more expensive and driving 4-6 hours to meet with them takes a lot of my free time, but a face-to-face pitch is the ticket as far as I'm concerned. My conversion rate in person for link backs is almost 100%. Oh and one of the best places to meet 'em is at industry trade shows. I picked up 5 a few weeks back at a local trade show and didn't have to drive hundreds of miles to get 'em. Also, join industry specific associations that meet regularly. Mmm good!

[wassim]

BBCoach... Thankss (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)
You answered my last question but the administrators unfortunately closed it so I couldn't thank you. My question was about how to get google's position easily, and you told me about cached trick.
I was attempting to send you an email and thank you, but I couldn't because you have some kind of privacy in your account.
Thanks so much for the trick, I am using it alot (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Best regards,
Wassim

[BBCoach]

You're very welcome wassim. I don't publish my email on forums because in the past (not here) I used to get spam from hell when I made it public. As a new member you can't send PMs yet which I do accept. When you get that privilege, PM anytime. Anyways, hope everything works out for you. Have a good day!

[Randy]

Knowing how you approach marketing I'm sure you've probably already tired this BBCoach, but I'll throw it out there for others since it fits in with the discussion.

One totally wacky way I've gotten some of my best links is by advertising in newsletters other people run that are already going out to my target audience. Do I make those ad purchases for links? No. Do I care if the newsletter gets a permanent home on the web so that my link is out there on the page? No.

I make them for exactly the reason you'd suspect, to get my product or service out there in front of the folks I want it in front of. And to some degree to piggyback my offer on the good name someone else has already built up with my target audience.

The very nice side benefit I've seen from some of these ad purchases is that the really good newsletters always seem have among their readership other people who maintain web sites that have Useful Resources pages constructed specifically to help people who find themselves in the same boat the webmaster is in. So when this advertisee (IMG:style_emoticons/default/giggle.gif) finds me via the newsletter ad and either purchase from me or sometimes simply see how it can help, often some of them will link to me from their site. Sometimes they'll even write up a little review, which is how I first discovered the ultimate origin of some of those high value links.

Double the bang for your buck if you can identify a good newsletter or two and take out some ads. Some of the best advertising money I've ever spent actually, since it's still giving and giving years after the fact. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink1.gif)

[BBCoach]

I have actually done that Randy and it is a very good method that I've used with other ecom sites that I've built/SEO consulted with. Like you said the key is advertising in a targeted high quality newsletter. Another similar idea is to place ads in industry specific magazines that have been around for years. You know the ones on the last few pages with those two/three line ads. They are very "sticky" and produce some amazing results for years as well.

Unfortunately for me, my wife limits my expenses for my hobby and my hobby web site. I have three kids in college and one in middle school. Two kids are in your state of MO going to SBU. BTW, at the end of this semester if you live anywhere near Springfield, I'd like to meet you when I bring the UHaul to take all of their stuff home. I'll buy lunch or dinner. Until I can start making money with my hobby site, my wife has me where it hurts . . . in the pocket book. And yes, with the price of gas she's pulling in on the reigns of my travels. That's when it went "bing" hit the trade shows that come to town. BTW, I'm in sniper training school too. One problem that I'm dealing with is that a lot of my target link back population don't have web sites. They're very small single owner mom/pop operations that only care about those that walk in their front doors. But at trade shows you can't find a booth that doesn't have a web site. To address this problem I'm offering a bidness card web site of no more than 15 pages for $60/yr hosting fee only for those that don't have a web site. Guess what? Most don't want a web site. So I continue looking for the bidnesses with web sites first and put my focus into selling them.