So this is where I try to give you a basic understanding of the fundamentals of link building for your website, more so as many of you are inundated with link requests I will give you the litmus test of a good link.

First things first, a link is a selection of text on a page that in the underlying html is surrounded by an anchor tag. 

The anchor tag contains a couple of important elements including an href attribute that tells the browser what to open and a target that tells the browser where to open it such as the existing window or a new window. The important thing to understand here is that the href attribute is where the address of your web page will be referenced - not in the text that is visible to the user.

This should make clear that there is a separation between linking text and the actual address that the link will lead to. Many website owners get confused about this because of the fact that many site page editors, email composition clients etc will automatically hyperlink a website url when it is entered, never understanding that this is just a convenience feature and not the method with which links are created.

Typically most editors have the ability to manually create links as well, the usual process is to enter your link text, select it and click the link button (usually looks like a chain link) and then enter the website address and select the target (if this option is presented). The link can also have a title attribute but many editors don't present this option, use it if you have the option.

html code example of an anchor tag - <a href="/Your Site URL Here" target="_blank" title="A short related bit of text">This is your link text</a>

So now it should be pretty straight forward I hope... The link text should contain the exact key phrase or a variation there of that you want your site to be indexed for - now don't make every link the same mix it up a bit or the search engines could penalize you.

It does not stop there, ideally the URL will contain keywords preferably in the Domain name, however if you are deep linking (linking to pages within your site) it would be ideal if your pages contained relevant keywords in the individual page URL's

Whether or not the site linking to yours uses parent or _blank as the target doesn't matter so much to you, however when creating links to their site (in reciprocal strategies) it is preferable to use the _blank option in order to keep your page present, opening the link in a new blank window.

The other elements to consider have nothing to do with the actual link but have to do with the context with which the link is coming from.

The first element to consider and specify if the opportunity exists is the surrounding text, often when links are submitted to you they include a surrounding paragraph, the link text along with the link URL. The point is to strengthen the context and the authority of the link source.

The second element to consider is the link source itself, this means visit the site, find out what the site is contextually about, our general guideline is accept and request link exchanges with sites that are related to your industry or your region, either or it does not require both, but build a variety of link exchanges with a number of sites that are from both categories.

The next thing to look at is the page itself, how many link are on it, the less there are and the more prominent the page is the better.

If the site contains any material that is questionable refrain from exchanging links with it, this includes copyright infringed materials, adult content, hate content etc.

This should give you a grasp of what to look for when entering the arena of link building for your website.

I hope you found it useful, if you need any assistance feel free to email us, and remember our current clients are welcome to call us directly when they require assistance.