Why You Need Outbound Links by Paul Bliss

Why You Need Outbound Links by Paul Bliss

Just in case you've forgotten, an outbound link is a url that you have on your site that points to another website.

In today's Google PR obsessed Internet world, everyone is completely focusing on getting in bound links to your site. While you should always be on a mission to get more sites to link to yours, you must not forget their polar opposites.

Remember, by having outbound links from your site, you are in essence "voting" for the site you link to. This is part of the entire ranking algorithm process for all the search engines. The idea is, that if two sites are similar in content and design, a site with more links pointing to it would be considered more important by the search engine.

So then, why should you help out any other site? Actually, by carefully linking to other relevant sites, you are increasing the relevancy of your own site.

Pretend I have a pizza shop, and I am located in Anywhere, USA. It's a typical site that displays types of pizza, store location, hours, and coupons. I also know the power of outbound linking. For this case, I am going to link to 10 sites: Domino's, Pizza Hut, Little Ceasers & Papa Johns. Next, I link to 6 sites that are physically located in Anywhere, USA. (And their physical addresses are listed on their sites.)

Now, I will switch roles and view the site as a search engine spider. I navigate through the site, and determine that this site is about pizza. Then I find a resource page and discover some well-known links (Domino's, Pizza Hut, Little Ceasers & Papa Johns - and as the spider I know that these are major players in the realm of pizza). Next, I find 6 links to sites located in Anywhere, USA.

So, as a happy spider leaving the site, I now know that the site I just visited is about pizza (site content and links to the major players of the pizza industry), and that it is located in Anywhere, USA.

Next, I visit one of the 6 sites listed as a resource in Anywhere, USA. I find the local address, and it has the same zip code as the pizza site I was just at. Now I know how these two sites are related to each other.

Taking into account the fact that this local pizza shop has also linked to the major pizza chains, as the spider, I am lead to believe that this shop has relevancy to the zip code of Anywhere, USA.

So, as the spider returns the information to the database to be processed in the algorithm, it has pre-sorted some search results based on the links your site points to.

Another benefit of outbound linking is Geo Targeting, or Local search. There is a lot of speculation that local search is the next big trend in Search Marketing. While only time will tell, it won't hurt to have your physical address listed on your website for those who will be embracing local search.

As an experiment, I created a site with a very unique url (to avoid the possibility of people finding it by accident), and I made it only 1 page long. The only thing the page consisted of were 80+ outbound links to relevant sites in the SEO industry, tools, forums and some tutorials. When the PageRank was first updated for the site, it came out of the box with a PR of 3. It has since fallen to a PR of 2 (now that Ive pointed a few sites to it!).

The whole point of this experiment was to see how outbound links affect your own rankings of your site. I was able to generate a PR of 2 based entirely on linking to authority sites in the SEO industry. So, take the time to link to some relevant sites, the big names (if any), and enjoy the power of the easy, outbound link.

-To your online success!

Paul Bliss
About the Author
Paul Bliss is a leading authority in the emerging field of search engine optimization. Paul has more than four years experience in the field and has produced some truly amazing results. Email Paul at pbliss@seoforgoogle.com or visit his site at: http://www.seoforgoogle.com

Can't write articles? Write code! by Tim Smith

Can't write articles? Write code! by Tim Smith

If you've subscribed to an seo newsletter for longer than a week, you're well aware that writing articles with tips and advice pertaining to your website's subject is a great way to generate links and traffic. But what if you can't write or are afraid to write? Well, if you can write software, you're still in luck! In this article I'll show you a trick that can still garner you hundreds of links and won't require you know the difference between adjectives and adverbs.

I'll use my own little website as an example (I freely admit that I am neither a web designer nor a programmer). My wife and I own By Request DJ & Karaoke Company (http://www.byrequest.dj). Obviously, we specialize in weddings dances, school dances, company parties, and karaoke. We recently went through the process of converting all our CDs to compressed digital audio files which are played from a computer rather than hauling around thousands of CDs. In the process of ripping and encoding our music, I found many tasks were very repetitive and time consuming. Since I know a smattering of Visual Basic, it was simple to write a utility to automate these tasks. I figured that if it was helpful to me, some other DJ might find it helpful to, so I called my utility MP3G to ZIP and made it available for download from my website. I also decided to submit it to a few freeware sites just so it was easier to find.

What happened amazed me. Many of the links to my website from these freeware directories began showing up in Google. Given the name of my company and the descriptions of my freeware apps, this helped boost my site for some very competitive keywords. I decided to submit my software to a few more directories, and that's when I found two very handy tools: PAD files and RoboSoft.

A PAD file is a "Portable Application Description, and it helps authors provide product descriptions and specifications to online sources in a standard way, using a standard data format that will allow webmasters and program librarians to automate program listings." It takes the tedium out of submitting your software to hundreds of sites by enabling you to enter the URL to your software information rather than retyping all the information for every submission. It was created by the Association of Shareware Professionals (http://www.asp-shareware.org/pad/') and is a free utility.

RoboSoft (http://rudenko.com/robosoft/) is a semi-automated software submission utility that contains a list of known freeware and shareware directories that accept submissions. It is only semi-autonomous because it won't push the buttons for you, but it will fill in the blanks. This still allows you to quickly enter your software's information to hundreds of websites. Websites who will all link back to your website and most often don't require a reciprocal link. The RoboSoft database currently lists 420 freeware and shareware directories.

In the two months I have been using these tools I have seen my traffic jump from 800 unique visits per month to over 5000, and the link popularity of the page that has my two freeware apps has gone from 7 to 639 according to widexl.com (http://www.widexl.com/remote/link-popularity/index.html). While these are small numbers for someone like cnn.com, sprint.com, or even napster.com, they are huge for a small site like mine. Plus, they are beginning to get me links from my fellow DJs who have used and appreciated my tools. I'm certain that they will eventually lead to good things.

So, while it isn't a tactic that will make you number for "best website", it will get you a few more links. And it won't require you to submit any articles with tips about marketing your website.
About the Author
Tim Smith owns By Request DJ & Karaoke Company (http://www.byrequest.dj) with his wife Tammy. He is neither a web developer nor a programmer, but he can mix like a madman and is an avid "Do-It-Yourselfer".