How to get Backlinks:

Getting links back to your site is an important part of the SEO process. The major search engines tend to view a link back to your site as a vote in favour of its content. In other words, a link from one web page to another is an indication that the page being linked to has something to offer.

For the most part, a link from one page to another only conveys SEO benefit if it's not reciprocated. If I link to you, and you link back to me, our links will tend to cancel each other out. In SEO terms, you're looking for one-way inbound links.

As a general rule of thumb, the more one-way inbound links you get the better. In this diagram Site A gets 9 inbound links, and site B gets 3.

It looks like Site A is doing better than Site B, but it's not that simple. Search engines don't operate on the 'one man one vote' principle. Some sites carry more weight than others.

A link from one important site might convey 100 times more SEO benefit than a link from an ordinary site. This means that in the above diagram, it's theoretically possible that Site B outranks Site A in search engines.

PageRank:

Google operates a system called PageRank, which is a score from 1 to 10. The higher the score, the more weight a vote carries.

For example, a link from a web page with a PageRank of 5 will get you higher up Google's rankings than a link from a site with a lower score.

Link Juice:

All sorts of factors go into the PageRank calculation, including some that still aren't known outside Google. What is known is that a percentage of the PageRank enjoyed by one page can 'flow' to another. SEO professionals call this link juice.

Many amateur search engine optimisers attempt to get links back to their own site, without considering the keyword associated with that link. For example, consider the following links from the perspective of the site receiving them...

...visit monkeydesignhouse.com to get your...
...visit Monkey Design House to get your...
...visit this Search Engine Optimisation expert to get your...

The first example will convey link juice, but won't associate it with a useful keyword phrase. The second will convey link juice, and associate it with the company name. If the company name is well known, and generates a lot of searches, this might be useful. For most companies, it isn't.

Contextual Links:

It's far more likely the third option conveys the greatest SEO benefit to the page being linked to. In this case, the link conveys some PageRank to the homepage of Monkey Design House.

It also has search engines associate the keyword phrase 'search engine optimisation' to that page. This keyword matches the content on the page it links to, and so conveys the maximum possible value.

SEO experts call this type of link a contextual link, because it conveys context that helps a search engine index the page effectively.

As a general rule, contextual links are the most difficult to get. Sites with high PageRank are keen to retain it, and don't want it flowing out to all and sundry (that includes the likes of you and I). One way they do this is via the 'nofollow' attribute.

Nofollow Links:

Despite the somewhat clumsy name, search engines do follow 'nofollow' links. What they don't do, is credit the target page with link juice.

It's worth keeping that in mind when pursuing some of the backlink tactics outlined below.

How do you tell if a site 'nofollows' a link? They may say so. If they don't, you'll have to inspect the source code of the page and search for the nofollow attribute. In Firefox you can view the source code by pressing Ctrl U. In Internet Explorer, click the 'View' menu and select 'Source'.

Here's what an anchor tag with the nofollow attribute looks like...

<a href="http://asureimage.com" rel="nofollow">lead generation</a>

It's worth baring in mind that a link from a site with high PageRank may be worth having even if they add the nofollow attribute (i.e. simply for the targeted visitors they'll send you, or because they're a prestigious site and might favour your link with an endorsement).

See this article for more information: Page Quality Factors for Link Building

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