Link Mixology: The 12 Kinds Of Links Your Site Needs
Are you familiar with “Link Mixology”?
How about the 12 kinds of links you must be getting to your site?
While even *I’ve* been guilty of saying, “A link is a link is a link,” that’s a bit oversimplified.
While more links is better then less links, having certain kinds of links outweigh and are more valuable than others.
Links from “authority sites” for example, pass more “link juice” on to your site than, say, links from unestablished sites.
And also important is the “link mixology” – that is, the distribution of different kinds of links from different kinds of sites to your own site.
Like, if you have ONLY social bookmarking sites linking to your site, that’s really obvious to the search engines, and can get you banned. It looks fake – because it is fake.
The search engines are sophisticated enough to detect that kind of manipulation.
Normal sites have a good “link mixology” – they have incoming links from different types of sites.
We never want our site to have all it’s links, or a great majority of it’s links, coming from one “kind” of site. Instead, mix it up. Your sites link mixology will look more natural and you’ll gain by increased ranking in the search engines when you do.
Here are the 12 kinds of sites you should be getting links from:
- Internal Links: These are links from yourself, to yourself. Linking to your own relevant content, or sitewide links like “Home.” In some blogs, like this one, you’ll see links below each post to related articles. You’ll see links to category and archive pages. These are all internal links.
- Directories: Directories list websites, usually under different categories of interest. The classic is DMOZ, but there are a lot of others out there you submit your URL to and get a link from.
- Press Releases: Press release submission and distribution services, like PRWeb, allow you to submit a press release (gotta come up with something newsworthy to say, but even the launch of your site is sufficient). That press release will be distributed to syndication services and republished – with your link.
- Article Directories: Getting a link from article directories is as simple as penning an article and submitting it. Usually your link will be in the “About the Author” bio box. There are hundreds, probably thousands, of article directories out there for you to submit to.
- RSS/Blog Syndication: Submitting your blogs RSS feed to syndication services will usually not only give you a link, but each time you publish a new blog post that individual article will get a link.
- Blog Comments: Easy enough – leave a comment on relevant blogs in your niche to get these kinds of links. Don’t be a jerk though, use your name and say something relevant and interesting.
- Videos: Sites like YouTube, and the many others, often allow you to link to your site either in your video’s description or on your profile page. Some let you do both.
- Forums: Forums usually center around a particular topic, so they’re great in being very relevant links. You can link in your profile and/or signature line at most forums.
- .edu Links: From educational sites – colleges, local school districts, etc.
- .gov links: Like .edu links these links usually carry a lot of weight, but it can be tough to get the government to link to your site!
- Social Bookmarking: Social bookmarking services allow people to collect their favorite links in one place. If you bookmark your own stuff (there are services that help you do this automatically also) you get a link from the service. Even better if you produce content your readers love and bookmark themselves to refer back to.
- Social Media sites: Kind of a catch-all here, but this can refer to places like Twitter and Facebook, where people network with each other, to places like Squidoo and Hubpages, where you can place your content on a page on their site and link out to your site.
There’s are other places and ways to get links, like buying text links, trading links with another site owner or participating in a link exchange service.
But the ones above are typically what you’ll work on as an internet marketer because they are under your control, that is, you can go out there and get them yourself without spending cash or begging other webmasters.
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Super valuable post, Michelle! I’ve been observing forum signature (anchor text) links carrying massive mounts of weight, more than many of the above listed. Maybe it’s always been that way, though.
Which links, in your opinion, are bringing the most link juice at the moment?
What happened to software links!
Very helpful Michelle, identifies 4 holes in my current range. Many thanks.
Hi Michelle
Excellent Post! Building links from various sources is definitely the way to go… And doing it consistently over time is smart too. We should also point out what not to do too…
I suggest you DO NOT build a bunch of links all at once, like you can do with some automated software, especially if the links are from just one of the twelve sources of links you mentioned above. While it might not get you banned from the search engines it may set off a red flag and you could have your site manually reviewed. Of course if this is something that happend naturally you have nothing to worry about. But get caught “manipulating” your links and you could suffer a drop in the search engine rankings or even getted banned.
Speaking of getting links from authority sites… here’s a little tip I’d like to share…
If you have a gmail account you can get yourself a powerful authority link from Google itself. You see, anyone with a GMail account gets a Google Profile Page (I have one at http://www.google.com/profiles/IMEricBonnici While some of the links are nofollow, it seems you can add a link in the about me section that is do follow… link that to your site using your keyphrase as anchor text and you get super link juice.
And another way to get really good link juice from Google is if people subscribe to your RSS/Blog feed using Google Reader.. and then they click the share option on the posts they like. Their profile page will show a link that says my shared items… which links to a page on Google listing blog posts the person liked and wants to share… and there’s how you get another powerful juicy link… right from Google itself…
With Google Wave around the corner there’s going to be some exciting ways to get powerful link juice from the king of authority sites Google… (shameless plug – I’m putting together a free report on all this and hope to release it early in the new year)
Well sorry for rambling on… your post was outstanding and got me excited.
All the best and will keep an eye out for more of your great info
Sincerely,
Eric Bonnici
Just saved this page in my delicious account for future reference, for when I’m ready to really grow my traffic… thereby proving your point! thanks Michelle!
Quick note… just stumbled this post.
Anyone else who wants to do this can go here and do so.
Hey Michelle,
Great post! I love your list. One I would add is co-citation links.
Take Care,
~Brett
This is a great reference article. Thanks Michelle. I have noticed that pdf articles that are part of a Web site seem to pull a lot of attention from Google. The articles themselves get indexed and often rank above the Web site’s main pages. I am still experimenting with this discovery and have yet to see anyone make mention of this.
Linkedin profiles are also often at the top of the search listings when one Googles by individual name – with links to your own sites included. If you are bold enough to write a bio of yourself in Wikipedia you can include links there as well, but it helps to have garnered some recognition.
Always good to see it in front of your face. Thanks for posting this and keeping it simple
You tha masta…
Hi Michelle
I have tried a number of your suggestions and they do work but also take time. But, it’s worth the effort when your site starts doing well.
Stephen Kastner has 2 ideas that can be improved. On LinkedIn you have the option to list 3 websites. List all three, but always choose the category “Other” for these links. You will get to put in your own keyword instead of the standard “My Company” and “My Blog”
Wiki editors are big on removing any link that they consider spam. I wrote a couple dozen Wiki pages and followed a certain format for all pages. One page was marked as spam and removed. I checked and the site met all the required guidelines, so I re-submitted. Long story short, a more senior wiki author did not like the writer in question and did not want to give him a Wiki page.
Still with me? OK, after you create a page for someone else you can include a list of people that influenced your subject and a list of people that have been influenced by your subject. After I create a wiki page I send a link to the subject with a note – if they like the page could they submit me as a person influenced by them.
Ethical? Who knows. The good thing is that once Wiki has approved an article, if the subject of the article goes in to clean up certain facts, and they list themselves as the subject of the post, small things like “influenced by…” are usually allowed to pass.
I just went back and checked 2 of my posts, and they are still there. This may seem odd, but I don’t ask to have my name included in the influenced by… section, but a friend.
If you think you merit a Wiki page, let me know, my pages get approved – if you are at all worthwhile.
Hi Michelle.
Just saved this page in delicious, because this is a great reference article.
Thank’s a lot
Michelle – any tips or tactics for getting .edu links? I’ve seen their value, but they can be really difficult to acquire (just like .govs).
Nice list Michelle! Dont forget software directories someone told me those are pretty good too.
What services do you recommend using for submissions? Right now we do most of this in-house using paid software and our own proprietary scripts.
Thanks Michelle,
Your posts are always informative and will start using some of your invaluable suggestions.
Charles
Some good points there. I am not sure that search engines actually look for you to have all 12 kinds of links. Do you have any proof of that?
When you constantly link to one of your sites from a blog, shouldn’t there be some ‘rel=”nofollow”‘-tag in the head-HTML or do you need to use ‘rel=”nofollow”‘ and ‘rel=”follow”‘ in every link?
(I ask because I heard that SEs disregard a link from one source if that same source gives the same link a certain number of times.)
Great reminders! I’m guilty of social bookmarking as a primary link building strategy. Reminds me to get back to articles, tweeting etc.
Thanks for the tips! A free social bookmarking tool that somewhat speeds up that process is socialmarker. (I’m not plugging it, just wanted to share a resource I found.) It’s not automated, but at least it lines up the sites for you.