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In a recent post, I mentioned I built backlinks for this blog and my girlfriend’s blog, www.thatmutt.com. A couple people asked me to explain more about what I did. Despite what many new bloggers believe, traffic isn’t everything. Break down where your traffic is coming from, dissect the numbers, and you’ll see. One visitor coming from a Google search is more likely to stick around, read your article, purchase your product or seek your advise than one random visitor from either Digg or StumbleUpon. I have said before that I would trade 1,000 unique visitors for one commenter / subscriber. In the end, it is the people who get involved that will add the most value to your blog. So here are some ways to build backlinks to your blog and dominate your niche.

1. Comment, comment and comment. I have about 60 blogs that I frequent on a regular basis and leave thoughtful comments when I do. I typically do this every 2-3 days to allow for people to update their blogs with new posts. If they have added more than one new post, I will try and comment on each new post. This builds my network. If you try this, you will find that in time they just might write a post about you or your blog. If people are writing about you and your niche, the search engine looks at that like you just won a gold star. Enough gold stars and you start to rank #1 in searches for your terms. You will have a higher ranking, more search engine traffic and better visitors coming to your blog. Problogger wrote about this yesterday and his blog receives 46% of its traffic from Google (P.S. he gets a lot of traffic).
2. Contests. I know most contests are a lot of work to maintain and it sucks to do them often, but they are a great way to build backlinks. The owner of the Winning the Web contest got a lot more from hosting the contest than any single person who won something. He received 1,000s of backlinks, more RSS readers and a lot of name recognition from hosting one contest. Here it is a month later, and I still know about the contest and where it was, and I never even entered it. The same goes for the contest held at Sense to Save. If you don’t want to take the time to cook up a contest, simply find all the contests you can, and donate something to them. I got about 20 backlinks from donating to the Sense to Save contest from other bloggers re-posting the list of donors ;).
3. Social networking and social linking. Before you start claiming I am a hypocrite, I will elaborate. I use social sites like Digg and StumbleUpon to build in anchor links. An anchor link is a link used in context with the keywords you want your site to rank higher in. For example, if I want my site to come up when people search the term “really expensive watches,” I would put the HTML <ahref=”http://www.joshwhitford.com/”>Really expensive watches</a> in the comments or description of the post I am submitting to the different social networking / bookmarking sites. The text “Really expensive watches” will be linked to my site. My site might never say anything about having “really expensive watches,” but if I get enough of these links out on the Internet, eventually I would rank #1 for the term. Ranking is all about links and link building. A great site to help with this is Social Poster. Other really good programs do this same thing but much faster like BookmarkingDemon. But if you don’t want to pay, then stick to the free ways of gaining backlinks. In a couple of weeks I have gone from page #10 on Google to page #1 for a variety of terms.
4. Get your link and keywords on sites and blogs with good Page Ranking (PR). I have done this a number of ways. I actually have a number of bookmarking folders in my browser that I have labeled PR1, PR2, PR3… and so on. When I come across a blog that has a good page rank, I will bookmark it for later. Then when I have the time, I will go through each folder and see what the source code is for each site and if they have a no follow tag for their comments or not. If you go under “view” and then “source” in your browser, it will open the code for that page as a search engine would see it. If there is a rel=”nofollow”> followed by the name and comment, then I won’t use that site as a method of gaining backlinks. If I like the site and it has good traffic, I should continue to leave intelligent comments (not spam) and gain the trickle traffic from curious people. Remember they are sharing their page rank with you and you should be thankful for that. Leaving worthless comments does you no good. Recently, I commented on Tim Ferriss’s blog about the post I wrote about contacting Warren Buffett. The comment section is a “no follow,” but the links found in the post are normal “follow” links. When he took the information and link from the comment and inserted it into the post I gained a link from a blog with a PR6 (more to this but this is the basic idea).
5. Pay, bribe, barter and swap. I don’t recommend purchasing or advertising the sale of links. The reason against it is simple. If someone wants your spot on the search page and knows you have paid for links, you are one report away from being kicked to the Google curb. If you can barter or swap links either in posts or with things like Entrecard credits, then it is much harder to prove any wrongdoing with Google or other search engines. This is why blogs who take on PayPerPost tend to get taken to the woodshed come time for page rank updates. Google knows when you are promoting sites for money and will punish you for “gaming” their algorithm. This is why John Chow doesn’t even show up on page #1 for his name. It really doesn’t matter for him if he shows up on page #1 because he makes good money selling paid links and ads on his blog. But, if a blog gets most of its traffic from Google and gets sent to page 5, then that could destroy that url’s future for traffic. Tread lightly and research before you act on the Internet.

This by no means is a complete list of ways to gain backlinks or is it the complete ins and outs of SEO. But the more you play, the better you will become. Everything about search ranking and page rank is based on the foundation of good backlinks and anchor text links. The more links you have pointing towards your blog on certain keywords, the higher you will rate for relevancy of those keywords. Nothing is impossible, and if you would like to rank #1 for Business you can, although you might spend 2 years building backlinks to do so.

What does it mean to pay it forward to you? Normally, how I perceive paying it forward is along the same lines as doing a good deed for someone else, because all of us have had a flat tire before. A lot of times, I do things for people that I really don’t know why, whether it is offering a ride or to just lend a hand. Online people do the exact same thing in regard to paying it forward. I happened to come across one such blog and blogger by the name of Vic.

Vic runs the blog bloggerunleashed.com and tells it like it is. A famous saying I hear over and over again as I watch his videos is, “It is what it is.” There is no lying or bull coming from this guy, as he tells it like it is. He is unapologetic in his language and isn’t afraid to leave you hanging while tending to his kids.

The most important aspect that I like about Vic and bloggerunleashed.com is his ability to keep things really simple and
truly encourage you to make money online. He has a great knowledge of SEO (search engine optimization) and working with deep links and backlinks across all types of websites. If you haven’t visited his blog, you must. It is what it is and you can take it or leave it. He is true to his character and will tell it like it is, every time.

Vic is also launching a contest called Mission: Possible. He is going to take 100 bloggers for what will probably be the first-of-its-kind study to offer the same guidance and instruction for the largest competition. He will be setting up 100 sites all at the same and will be giving the same SEO instructions to everyone. The bloggers involved in the competition are not allowed to blog about making money online or about blogging. This contest / group study will be quite interesting to watch and see who can follow instructions the best. At this point I am going to throw my hat into the ring and learn how to
grow natural search engine traffic. I  recommend you do the same if you are interested.

Don’t forget that the winner of the competition will receive a trip to Las Vegas for Blog World Expo for one week, plus $500 and more…

Well, the fine people at The SEOtree have done it again. They just released some new tools for you to increase your networking capability. If you don’t know about The SEOtree, you can find my post on it here.

The whole notion of The SEOtree is to build a network around you in one spot. On the site, you can post your articles and add your page to its directory (your site’s stats will be updated automatically). Then for all of your SEO (search engine optimization) needs, you can click on the forum and ask questions. The site is really starting to grow some legs and start walking. It won’t be long before it will be flooded with traffic.

The reason this up-and-coming site is so successful is due to the creativity of the originator. He saw a need for a one-stop-shop site for SEO enthusiasts and newcomers. In order to help promote the activity on his site, he made it even easier to use by creating buttons, Wordpress plugins and a FireFox toolbar. I have installed both the Wordpress plugin and toolbar.

The secret to building a good network and associated traffic from it is directly related to how much you interact within Internet communities. Everyone knows Stumbleupon, Digg, del.icio.us, reddit and the like are great networking tools. The idea is to accomplish as much networking as possible in the shortest amount of time. The same goes with income sites like Social Poster and all of the FireFox extensions and toolbars. When a site comes out in the first couple weeks with add-ons like FireFox extensions and Wordpress plugins, you can be sure its creator means business and is doing anything possible to encourage the site’s growth.

I said it once and I will say it again, we are going to see some great things come from The SEOtree in the future. I love using the plugins for easy submissions of articles. Don’t forget you can also get a paid link in the directory for Entrecredits. I have seen my authority on Technorati jump to 25 in 3 weeks of blogging, not to mention the Alexa jump to 276,530 in the same time. Building your network is building your road to online success. I wish you all well.

For those of you not familiar with the Seotree, I would encourage you to check it out and give it a try. Essentially, there are four different areas for you to use on the site, which is ultimately a one-stop shop to getting you name and brand out.

First, is the social network area. Like Digg and other article submission sites, you have the ability to submit and vote on articles. The site is new and the chances of you making it to the front of the line are great, so there is no reason to pass on free traffic. Remember that publicity, good or bad, is still publicity.

The second leg of the site offers a directory submission for your blog. The good news for all the Entrecarders out there is the ability to pay with Entrecredits instead of the $5 or $10 submission fee. Either way, I feel the investment is worth it simply because the site is so new, and you are guaranteed to get noticed. Not to mention that the extra link juice helps with your technorati authority. Simply participating in link exchanges and directory submission has given me an authority of 17 in a week. Technorati authority is measured in the number of links and posts that talk or make reference to your blog. The higher the number the better.

The forum is a new addition to the site and is coming to life rapidly. It is loaded with many different categories under different purposes. When you are in need of some SEO friendly faces, this is the page you will be going to. I can quickly imagine this as the place to find the most help and resources in the near future.

Last but not least is the site’s blog. Here you will find all the latest updates and goings on of the site. Ultimately, the site has a nice, warm, inviting feel to it and a simple easy to understand layout. I have high hopes for the success of the site and full confidence the creator has the vision and foresight to carry it through. I would encourage you to take a look and consider joining the SEO community.