Buying
Textlinks: The Latest SEO Craze
By Veronica
Dubak
With
search engine algorithms changing seemingly daily, the quest to
rank high in the search engines and stay there is proving to be
quite the challenge for most webmasters. One of the more recent
popular ways of achieving this is through buying text links on
websites that have high PR’s (page ranks) on Google and that also
rank well in the other major search engines. Is buying text link
placement worth it?
Purpose
The primary purpose of buying a text link on a website that ranks
better in search engines than yours is to receive a backlink to
your site, without having to reciprocate a link back (as this
dilutes the quality of a link). This backlink counts as a “vote”
for your website and especially if coming from a site that is
credible to the search engines, helps your site establish credibility
as well. For example, a website has been online for three years
and currently has a PR of 7. Your site is three months old and
has a PR of 2. The 3 year old website places a link to your site
from their homepage. As this site has history and is therefore
established, this “vote” from a PR 7 website holds a lot of value.
Compare this to a site linking to yours that is only a year old
and holds a PR of 1 – it makes sense that you would want links
coming from older sites that have high PRs. The higher the number
and the better the quality of backlinks your website receives,
generally the higher your rank on the SERPs (search engine results
page).
Not
only are text links great for search engine purposes, but if placed
well, can actually drive traffic to your site. And whose website
nowadays couldn’t use more traffic? Enough said.
Those
are the benefits behind purchasing text links. But what are the
disadvantages?
1)
Cost – it’s not uncommon to pay $100 monthly for a 3 word textlink
on a PR 6 website. If you do choose to go this route, choose your
text carefully and budget wisely.
2)
Relevancy to search engines – if you’re running a homemade toys
website and have a popular online pharmacy website linking to
yours, this won’t be as relevant as say having Mattel® linking
to you. Remember that search engines are becoming more and more
sophisticated and they can tell whether two sites have complimentary,
competitive, or completely unrelated website content.
3)
Limited link length - rarely are you given the option of selecting
more than three words when purchasing links. You may have difficulty
coming up with only three keywords relevant to your website, so
this can often prove to be a difficult task.
4)
Page is already populated with other text links – online auction
sites that have sellers auctioning off website text links are
notorious for selling textlinks on websites that already have
50 more on the same page. Look for sites that limit the number
of textlinks sold.
5)
Search engine spam – your site linked on every single page of
a 3000 page website using the same keywords and url can be considered
spam to a search engine. If you choose to purchase multiple text
links on multiple websites, make sure your linking text varies.
The
lesson is to be simply cautious. Using a textlink broker to find
relevant and complimentary websites to buy links from can prove
to be highly beneficial – just do your research first. Would a
$100 monthly textlink investment be better spent on a pay-per-click
(PPC) campaign, or will the long term benefits of buying a text
link outweigh a temporary influx in visitors? Return on investment
is key – whichever route will yield you the highest ROI should
be your ultimate determining factor.
Veronica
Dubak is an SEO expert, internet entrepreneur, and the owner of
the successful free
online paid surveys directory, SurveyBounty.com. With a comprehensive
listing of market research companies classified by region, and
background information on the online survey industry, SurveyBounty.com
is the legitimate source for online survey information.
Article
Source: http://EzineArticles.com/
