After many months of research, many training and courses, trying to figure out how SEO works I come up with a ‘plan’. The system that will apply on small niche sites and medium sized. I learned a lot of new concepts and found out a lot of contradictions in various teachings. Because I just started a week ago to apply them on my sites, they are not yet tested or proven. But because many people are using them, I believe most of them can bring some great results in getting free backlinks.

All methods can be applied with no costs attached, only what you need is time. Here are 8 ways to get free backlinks to your site, ordered by the most effective:

1. Articles Submission – It’s one of the oldest marketing ways to gain free traffic and also backlinks to your site. There are literally hundreds if not thousands of free article directories where you can submit your content. Under each article there is a resource box where you can include 1-3 links to your sites (number depends on the directory’s rules). What I found out studing Google algorithm is that relevant backlinks are much stronger than irrelevant backlinks.
   If you can combine:
   - high page rank site
   - content on the page relevant to your site
   - backlink with your targeted keyword in anchor
   - relevant words near backlink
   - backlink on the very top of the page
   - secret Google sauce ; )
   You can receive insanely powerful backlink, from authority site that is in your niche with all the other atributes listed. Although it’s pretty hard to achieve them all it’s definitely possible to get a lot of them using article marketing.
   You should always write your articles relevant to the content that is on your website. This will immediately create trust in Google’s eyes, especially if the article directory is an authority website (high PR, lots of updates). That’s why backlinks from articles can be deadly effective if you do it right.
   Couple of problems:
   - you need to write unique content in each of your article – it will cost you time or money if you outsource
   - spinning your articles is just a temporary thing that will work to the moment when Google algorithm become smarter (if it doesn’t happen already). It can be still a very effective method to submit your article to many article directories although every marketer will tell your otherwise. There is never ending dispute about this.
   - duplicated content – you can still get quality backlinks submitting the same article to many article directories, although you can’t expect the same results as with a unique content
   - submitting your article to 100s of directories – it helps your site being noticed by Google, create good link popularity (number of backlinks coming to your website) and it can create more opportunities for other people to pick up your content on their site. It will give you some natural backlinks growth that is the best way to build links. Although if you want someone to pick up your article, it needs to be a really good one. That’s the problem with spinned articles, they may not be the best quality and less people may syndicate your article on their site. Decision is up to you.
   So is it worth it?
   I believe it’s definitely worth it. It’s a quite slow way to build links but very powerful, proven to work for years for many people.
2. Directory Submission – I think it’s a pretty good idea to submit your new website to directories to get noticed by Google and get some extra boost on start. You can try some free directories, I use Directory Submitter 3.0 by Hash Software where I can add my websites to over 1,500 free directories. Most of them don’t require a reciprocal links that is a good thing.
   The best way is to start with the paid directories. They will give you really good backlinks and instant advantage.
   Couple of good paid directories:
   - Yahoo Directory ($299 per year)
   - Best of the Web ($69.95 per year or $199.95 lifetime)
   - Business.com ($199 first year, $149 to renew)
   - Dmoz (Free)
   - JoeAnt ($39.99 review fee)
   - GoGuides.org ($69.95 review fee)
   - Microsoft bCentral
   - Gimpsy ($40 review fee)
   - Starting Point ($99 per year)
   - V7N Directory ($49.95 review fee)
   - Umdum ($40 / $100) 22.RubberStamped ($29.95)
   - Aviva Directory ($49.95 / $74.95 per year)
   - Webotopia ($10 / $30)
   - Webxperience ($10 / $30)
   - Uncover the Net ($59 / $199 per year)
   - Jayde (Free)
   - Elib (50 Euro / 150 Euro)
   - Skaffe ($44.99)
   - Web World ($25)
   If you don’t have any money to spend, at least submit your site to DMOZ. It may take them months to review your site but it’s worth it.
   Word of caution! Stay away from the auto-directory submitters that can blast your link to tens of thousands of directories. It may be fast and cost-effective but the results are really weak. The reason of it is because most of these directories are spammed every day. Once it happens the authority of the site goes down in Google’s eyes. What it means for you is that the backlink you are getting from this directory becomes lower and lower quality. Some people say it can even harm your site rankings if you have a lot of backlinks from ‘a bad neighborhood’.
3. Angela & Paul Links – This method exploits social sites where you can set up a simple profile for free and leave your link there. The trick is that many of these social sites have public view profile page and dofollow links. It creates an opportunity for any link builder. In addition a lot of these sites are extremely popular with high PR. Angela & Paul links are updated every month with new ones. Angela links consist of 30 sites, Paul 50+. You can get Angela links here and Paul links here. Learn how to automate Angela links here. Learn how to outsource it here.
   This method can be considered blackhat. If you think about it you just spam all the social sites with an empty profile and a link. You don’t contribute to the community and if admins can detect you can get removed quickly. From my experience it’s not always the case, that’s why it’s a quite effective technique for link building.
   How to not get deleted:
   - upload a picture in your profile
   - use a real name
   - to be safe, add a link to your profile after 1,2 weeks
   - don’t try to spam 10s or 100s of links in your profile, try 1-2 per profile
   - use different emails
   The main problem I faced with this technique is getting your links indexed. To make it happen faster social bookmark all your public view profile pages using onlywire or ping.fm.
4. Mininet – Here is a small diagram demonstrating how it works:
   The basic idea is to create bunch of pages on social sites that allow you to post some content. You can post there your articles, videos, rss feeds, images and other. The main key is to create these green pages with relevant content that is in your page – page you link to. Another good idea is to link to your subpage, for example mydomain.com/cooking-frenzy.
   Another concept is called link-wheel and it looks like this:
   The only difference here is that you link each social site to another one. It creates a ‘wheel’ and can pass some nice link juice (strong backlink).
   If you want to go bigger, you can add another layer:
   It becomes a bit more complicated. The second layer is blue. You use the same concept of linking  each blue site to another as before. The only difference is that you also connect layer 1 green sites with blue ones. It creates pretty powerful backlinks with different high PR domains.
   List of the top social sites you can use for mininet:
   http://www.Squidoo.com
   http://www.HubPages.com
   http://www.WetPaint.com
   http://www.Weebly.com
   http://www.Wordpress.com
   http://www.Zimbio.com
   http://www.Blogger.com
   http://www.Vox.com
   http://www.Blog.com
   http://www.LiveJournal.com
   The only problem I see in this method is that it can be risky. You are basically manipulating with these sites to get nice PR passed through links. In perfect world the users that liked your content should make squidoo lenses about it and link to you. I don’t know how long this linking strategy will work, what I only know is that it’s working quite well for many people right now.
   Should you use same content, unique content or spinned content on each of these sites? It’s hard to say what’s worth to do the most. Unique content will definitely bring you higher in rankings, thus increasing backlink value. Although if you will use duplicated content, it will be still a valuable backlink with relevant content nearby.
   
5. Video Submission – Videos are trendy online and Google list them well. Also there are a lot of high PR video sharing sites where you can syndicate your video, thus getting even more backlinks. It created a new opportunity for free traffic and backlinks.
   To get a lot of backlinks you can use video distribution services like Tubemogul (free) or TrafficGeyser (paid). These will help you to distribute your content to dozens of top video sites like YouTube, Metacafe, Yahoo Videos, Myspace Videos and others.
   You can include your link in video description. On YouTube to make link clickable remember to include http:// at the very beginning. Some video sites are not allowing clickable links but it still has a value.
   To make simple videos you can use Animoto (awesome photo slideshows), Jing (to record your screen and voice) and your webcam.
6. Social Bookmarking – Social bookmarking sites are these where people can share their favorites websites with their friends. Pretty simple concept and a new opportunity to get some free links. You can create an account in each dofollow social bookmaking site, check the list here, and bookmark your sites, articles, videos, literally anything. It will help your page to get indexed faster, drive some free traffic and get some nice links. Remember not to overuse it!
7. Blog Commenting, Yahoo Answers – Both methods are very similar. In blog commenting you are going to different blogs in your niche and commenting the posts. Once you are commenting, in author name you can put the main keyword of your website and in website field your site address. Some blogs have dofollow for comments some nofollow, remember to check it before. This method is very easy to implement and in order to search blogs in your niche just search in google ‘niche’ blog or use google blog search. Remember to post quality comments, long enough with some content in it. Spammy comments will get deleted instantly by the blog owner.
   Yahoo Answers is a website where people ask questions and others answer. In the answer you can include the link. That’s where you can get your backlink. Look for main keywords in yahoo answers and identify questions related to your site. When you are answering remember to provide a quality information that can actually help someone in something.
8. Topical Directories/Yahoo Site Explorer – Topical directories are directories in your niche. There are many directories focusing just on one niche. These can give you much better link because it’s more relevant. You can find such directories by googling:
   - ‘niche’ submit your site
   - ‘niche’ add url
   - ‘niche’ links
   - ‘niche’ revuews
   - allintitle:’niche’ submit your site
   Some of them may require a link back, look for ones where you can get one-way backlink. That’s the best backlink you can get. If there is no submission form  just send an email in request to add your site.
   Yahoo Site Explorer can tell you how many backlinks are coming to any website. What you can do is to spy the competition. Pick 5 top sites for your main keyword term in Google and check their backlinks. Search for patterns. Look for sites where you can get some free backlinks. Top sites in yahoo site explorer are ordered by the most quality ones.

That’s about it. You can find here some killer and free ways to get backlinks. One of the most crucial things though is to build links naturally and consistently. It won’t help only in Google search results but also in Yahoo and MSN that have simpler algorithms. Let me know if you have any suggestions and more ways to get free backlinks. Apply these techniques right now and you will see top ranks on Google for your main keywords!

        

This entry was posted on Friday, November 27th, 2009 at 2:33 pm and is filed under internet marketing strategies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.