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Increase Search Engine Rank With Link Popularity
by Larisa Thomason
Many webmasters who were thankful to
leave concerns about "being popular" behind in high school are now learning that
popularity is still important. Link popularity, that is. Led by Google, many search
engines include your link popularity score in the algorithms they use to determine your
site's rank. Learn how link popularity can affect your site's search engine ranking - and
what you can do to improve it. Link Popularity and Link Importance Quite simply, your link
popularity score is the total number of external sites that link to yours. Link importance
is closely related to link popularity, but with a twist. It looks at the type of external
link and assigns higher scores to high quality links. Link importance helps filter out the
spammers who set up dozens of free sites and then link their bogus sites to the main Web
site. Spamming is such a problem that some search engines don't count free Web sites at
all in their link popularity scores. Some of the more complex search engine algorithms
combine link popularity with link importance and use it to assign a weighted link
popularity score. The weighted score looks at two things: the number of sites linked and
the relative importance of those sites. For instance, if CNN links to your site, that
single link might count a lot more than 20 links from your friends' personal Web pages.
Check Your Link Popularity Score Your link popularity score is a relatively objective
measurement and you can check that with several search engines. However, there's no single
way to predict what your weighted link popularity score is because each search engine uses
a different algorithm to determine it. NetMechanic made checking link popularity easier
when we recently added a Link Popularity measurement to the Page Primer results section of
our Search Engine Power Pack tool. Remember that numbers will vary between search engines
because they all query from different databases. How Does It Affect Your Rank? Your link
popularity score alone won't determine your rank, but search engines increasingly use it
to score pages because they consider it a sign of a high quality site. As Google
co-founder Sergey Brin explains: "external approval raises a page's ranking."
That makes sense if you think about it: one site won't link to another site for no reason,
so a site with a lot of external links must contain valuable content. All search engines
use different algorithms to rank sites, but most of the major ones consider link
popularity in some form. Google uses link popularity almost exclusively to rank sites.
Google also recently partnered with Yahoo to provide secondary results for Yahoo's Web
directory, so a high ranking in Google may help you in Yahoo as well. (To see secondary
results in Yahoo, enter your search term, then click on the Web Pages selection on the top
toolbar.) Most other major search engines also factor popularity into their algorithms.
Lots of links to your site can also improve your search engine ranking by keeping you in
the search engines. As more sites link to you, the odds increase that search engine
spiders will encounter your site regularly and be less likely to drop it from their
databases. Improving Your Link Popularity The downside of link popularity as a ranking
tool is that it penalizes new sites. Even if you have a terrific site stuffed with
valuable content, it still takes time to publicize your site and collect links. Don't wait
for other webmasters to find you! Instead, search the Internet to find sites related to
yours and compile a list of sites likely to be interested in linking to your site. For
instance, a local land conservation group might put together a list like this: state and
local hunting organizations; other environmental groups in the area; as well as city and
county informational Web site pages. Now spend some time networking: · Email the
webmaster of each site and briefly explain how a link to your site could benefit their
visitors. Make this a personal appeal; don't send a general form letter because that is
likely to be deleted at once. · Offer to trade links: include a link to them on your site
first and include the appropriate URL in your message. · Suggest the section of their
site where a link to yours would be appropriate. · Make it easy for them to link to you
by including the necessary HTML code in your email. Link Exchange Services While you
network, consider registering with a link exchange service to quickly generate more links
pointing to your site. Their operation is simple. You register your site with the service
and the service adds you to the links page that other members place on their Web sites.
Some services promise to add as many as 500 links pointing to your Web site within 30
days. Most link exchange services are free, but almost all impose some restrictions on
their members. The most common are: · You must display a specific icon on your home page
that points to the links page on your site. · You must upload the updated links page to
your site periodically (usually every 30 days) or be dropped from the service. · You have
to agree to submit your site (including the links page) to search engines on a regular
basis. Before you register with a service, carefully study its rules and regulations to
make sure your site is eligible (some don't accept adult sites, for instance). Also check
to make sure that the links are relevant to your site content. Some search engines are
beginning to penalize so-called "link farms" that don't add any value to a site.
In The Meantime Both networking and link exchange can take time to show benefits. While
you wait, focus on optimizing your page for search engines. Most still rely mainly on your
HTML code and page content to rank your site. Common techniques like TITLE and META tags
make your site attractive to the search engine algorithms and help boost your ranking even
before you get many external links.
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