What are back links?

What are back links?
A back link is just a link from one website to another.By installing special HTML code we can what’s called “hyperlink” some text so that when someone clicks on that text they are taken to another website.

If there link is to another website then we would call that an external link as we are moving from one site to another.However you can also have links from one page of a website to another page within the same site.This would be called an internal link and make it easier for a visitor to navigate around your site.

Internal linking is also good for search engine optimisation as it makes it easier for the Google spiders to navigate around your site and see what it is about.

Back linking is also used by Google to gauge the importance of your site.The more one way links you have coming to your site from other sites then Google will give you a higher ranking.I should qualify that by saying your site will get a high ranking if sites with a high page rank link to your site.

Page rank is a system devised by Google to show how it views any one website.The ranking runs from zero to ten,ten being the best.If you can get a website with a page rank of five or more to link to you that will give your site more kudos than 50 sites linking to you which only have a ranking of one.

So look for sites the compliment yours and have a high page rank.Then contact the owners of those sites and ask them to link to you.

Ignore link farms which exist just to get high page rank and have no real authority with Google.Google will just ignore  these sites and give you no higher ranking.

You should strive to build an authority site of yourself and as traffic grows other sites with high page ranking will want to link to yours.

As important as page rank is whether a link to your site is a do follow or no follow link.If the link is a do follow then by linking to a site you are in essence giving that site a vote and so it will be pushed up the Google rankings.

However you may not wish to give the site you are linking to a vote  if for example you were telling your readers about a bad website,in that case you can make the link no follow so the site does not get your vote.

You can waste a lot of time in securing back links from other website only to discover the links are nofollow and will not make any difference to your page rank or whether you get on page one of Google.

So please ensure you check this point out on any website before you go asking for back links.

There are browser add ons which will tell you instantly if a hyperlink is do follow or no follow.

If you use Fire Fox the  use this one Search Status which will also tell you a sites Alexa ranking and Google Page rank to name but a few.

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Yours in mastery

Andrew Collinson