How to Improve your Online Profile (Part 2 of 4)

How To Improve Your Online Profile (Part 2 of 4)

By

Sohaib Azam

“The golden rule for every business [person] is this: Put yourself in your customer’s place.”

-Orison Swett Marden, inspirational author

Building Links

            The idea behind building links is that you should be able to have other websites post your URL on their site so that it will direct traffic to your site. This is called an inbound link. This way, if prospective customers visit the other websites, they may see the link, click on it, and visit your site. It will also help raise your ranking in search engine searches. But building links is a complex process in which the builder must account for certain factors. These factors will be the discussion of this article.

Factor #1: Finding a Relevant Site

            When you want an inbound link, you must make sure the website is one that is relevant to your business. For example, if you run a birthday party booking business, it would not make sense to have your link posted on a law firm website for two key reasons. First of all, law firms and birthday parties are two separate concepts that do not interlock. Second, you fail to hit your target audience as birthday party booking would mostly target younger children whereas law firms would target adults. It is very important to have your link posted on a site that relates to the business you are running as well as a site hits your target audience. Thus, some good examples of website types for having your booking business’s link on would be a daycare business, kids camp, or party supplies store.

Factor #2: Finding a Site Ranked On The Top Pages Of a Search

            As important as relevance is, it is just as important to find a site that is ranked among the top of a search engine search. Common sense would dictate that an inbound link from higher ranking sites like Amazon or eBay would give your site a higher ranking in a search. But, it is difficult and unrealistic to expect such big businesses to grant you an inbound link to your site. A more realistic approach would be to look at the top few pages of a search and look for small to medium sized businesses related to yours and try for an inbound link there.

Factor #3: Building a Relationship With The Owner Of The Business

            So you’ve found your site and want to get an inbound link. There’s still a matter of talking to the owner of that business . The owner probably receives several e-mails pertaining to a request for an inbound link with most of these requests getting either rejected or ignored. It will be your task to try and stand out in terms of your request and also build a relationship with the owner of that business. This requires perseverance and patience. Be ready to have many of your requests turned down and be ready to spend a good amount of time building a solid relationship with the owners of the businesses before you get your inbound links.

            On a final note, when you do get your inbound link, make sure that you ask the owner to use anchor text, or having the URL hidden in a set of key words or terms relevant to your business to be hyperlinked, like in the example above.