15 ways to build links to your website and get higher search engine rankings

There are two elements to getting high website rankings on Google:

1. Onsite SEO…what you do to your website; this includes putting keywords in the right places and having good content
2. Offsite SEO… this is primarily having links back (backlinks) to your website. Think of your website as a popularity contest… the more votes (backlinks) your website has, the more popular it is in Google’s eyes. To add to this not all backlinks are equal… a link from the BBC would be worth considerably more than a link from a local business directory for example

The 15 tips below provide some ways you can build and elicit backlinks to your website from other websites and start moving up the search engines:

1. Create good content. Going back to basics…the reason search engines place a high emphasis on links is because they want the most relevant webpage to appear for the keyword someone is searching for. The more people that like a website or article the more links it will get, so create great content and links will come naturally
2. Syndicate articles on websites like EzineArticles and Squidoo. Post the article up there with a link back to your website
3. Put your website in business directories, there are thousands
4. Trade links with other websites…where it’s relevant
5. Write testimonials for your suppliers that have links back to your website
6. Social bookmark your content on websites like Digg and Stumble Upon
7. Launch an affiliate programme
8. Provide relevant comments on other people’s blogs
9. Answer questions on websites like Yahoo Answers or Quora
10. If you have products submit them to review sites
11. Buy sponsored links on websites
12. Become a sponsor of a charity or contest
13. Run a competition and promote it through PR
14. Create a tool which is useful and gets linked too, a mortgage calculator for example
15. Comment on discussion forums with your link as a signature (has to be valuable content)

There are many other ways however this is a good starting place. Don’t have the time to do this? You may be interested in one of our link building campaigns. Contact Xander Marketing for more information.