Link building is an essential component of the SEO. The more links you have on your site, the better it ranks.
Being placed within top positions in the SERP means that the websites would have extremely good quality and relevant content, that is capable of attracting genuine links from the other sites.
It’s quite daunting to maintain the top rank on a continuous basis and not all websites can cope up with that pressure. While some websites may find it easy and use simple and straightforward link building techniques; others can get deceptive and manipulative.
Thankfully it’s these unethical practices, that Google continuously strives to control. It supports the links that you have genuinely earned rather than ‘captured’ and ranks the websites accordingly.
So What are these Ethical or Unethical Link Building Techniques ?
Ethical or White Hat link building is the natural and safest way of getting links. Though it requires a tremendous amount of creativeness and patience, it still saves you from google penalties that can probably make you disappear for good.
It includes –
Content creation that is unique, authentic, relevant, insightful and up-to-date. Visitors landing on your site should be able to get the desired information. The content usually comprises of articles, blogs, info-graphics, whitepapers, videos or product descriptions and related documents.
Initiating discussions through forum boards. Answering queries and keeping the related community engaged or interested, helps in building trust.
Outreaching the organic way – You could contact the influencers or bloggers. Connect with the targeted audience through social media networking, webinars, personalized emails and so on.
The idea is to create and optimize a quality brand in such a way that it draws and encourages people to click, view and share widely and at the same time – discourages the spammers.
Such sites would always have a competitive edge in seo for a longer run.
Unethical or Black Hat link building is an unnatural and a riskier way of getting links. Yes, it’s a quick, easy and an uncreative process, but unfortunately doesn’t last for long. It eventually gets detected and penalized by the search engines, thereby increasing their elimination probability from the page ranks.
Most of the black hat link building techniques are similar to spamming and google doesn’t like it.
It includes –
Buying or exchanging links with the other sites. Pay a price and get the link, or “I share yours if you share mine” is purely manipulative.
Cloaking – A super risky attempt to fool or confuse the GoogleBot. What you actually want to show the end-user is entirely different from what the bot sees.
Comment spamming – Manually or automated commenting on articles or blogs for link building strategy is nothing but spamming and drowning your own reputation.
Violating google’s guidelines by inserting hidden text or links on other websites. Manipulating the searches by stuffing the pages or titles with keywords that you want to rank for.
Why is Ethical Link Building, a Preferred Practice?
Practising one of the above two techniques is a matter of choice. While one comes with literally zero risk and very likely to never get hit by a penalty; the other would always be on the edge.
Though it may show instant results, the risks associated with the black hat tactic would always be higher and full of uncertainties. The day it backfires or comes under Google’s penalty radar, it will negatively impact the brand, dampen the traffic and may pull you down for good.
So if you are serious about your online business, following the rules or staying within the search engine guidelines is the safest way to succeed in the long term.
The ethical way of link building by providing genuine, useful content, not only adds value and quality to your industry and internet, but also helps in generating a loyal customer base that totally recommends and believes in you.
It is this belief that will automatically push you up the SERP ladder and give you top pageranks!
What practices do you follow for building links ? Share your views with us..