Is there perhaps mileage in chasing just those links that don't improve your Google ranking?
Think about it for a second. They are probably easier to get, less competitive as other webmasters aren't chasing them, and likely to be a lot cheaper to acquire per link in terms of cash or time spent.
There's always forum posting and blog commenting to increase people's awareness of your site(s). But it must be done properly. There are too many idiots around who seem to spend all day posting "I like your blog" or some other rubbish. Thank goodness for Akismet, but even so one of my blogs is a monster spam magnet.
Returning visitors are a good way to keep building traffic, but how did most of them get there in the first place? Yeah, Google again. Love it or hate it, we have to accept the supreme power of Google.
What kind of links did you have in mind? Very interesting theory and something I agree with if you can get the right links.Originally Posted by Clinton
Is there perhaps mileage in chasing just those links that don't improve your Google ranking?
Think about it for a second. They are probably easier to get, less competitive as other webmasters aren't chasing them, and likely to be a lot cheaper to acquire per link in terms of cash or time spent.
Whether we like it or not, Google is going to be the main traffic source for *most* decent sites (IMO). If you're getting referrals traffic, that most likely comes via the big G too. Who here would prefer to spend money on an "above the line" campaign than on SEO?
Luke, I believe most people are mistaken on this. Decent sites have many sources of traffic and from my experience they don't get the "bulk" of their traffic from Google. Most of them don't any way (there are some exceptions). Large sites I've done DD on have all had well under 50%, some less than 20% from Google. Smaller sites and newer sites tend to be disproportionately reliant on Google.Whether we like it or not, Google is going to be the main traffic source for *most* decent sites (IMO).
Social sites like Facebook, forums like Webmasterworld and Sitepoint have loyal traffic. Brand names like compaq and Nokia get direct typeins. I could go on. I would be willing to wager that even Flippa doesn't get the bulk of their traffic from Google. Decent sites have regular visitors, people who follow them, posters, direct type-in traffic, bookmarks and even what they see coming from Google is sometimes either people typing the brand name in the address bar or those who already know what site they want and are using Google to find the most relevant page on the site (i.e. if they didn't get that page in SERPs they'd go directly to the site and use internal search).
Luke, according to the stats released by Nielsen for U.S. search results in July, Google has a 64.2% share of the search market, and search volume has been declining quite a bit over the last year, presumably giving up ground to Twitter, Facebook, and the like. I would be willing to venture that Google represents less than 50% of all referring traffic across the web, which means that the sites relying on Google for most of their traffic are unusual.
I realize that Google might be larger than any other individual source, but I'd rather have several sources of traffic to my sites, rather than trying to please a single source that is constantly changing the rules. I think decent sites have content or services that are talked about across the web, which means that they get plenty of traffic from forums, blogs, and other places that have linked back to the decent site, instead of putting all their eggs in the Google SEO basket and trying to convince themselves that it's normal and acceptable.
What do you mean by an "above the line" campaign? If you are referring to a normal advertising campaign, then I have no issue spending money on PPC, banner, or CPA ads as long as they have a good ROI, and the same goes for SEO. The issue with SEO is that you have to spend money for months and hope that it works at that point, while "above the line" campaigns are easily tracked immediately.
LOL. Well said, Clinton!
Good question. The best place to start would be Google's guidelines. Read them carefully ... and do the oppositeWhat kind of links did you have in mind? Very interesting theory and something I agree with if you can get the right links.
OK, it's not as simple as that. I'm open to suggestions. The easy option would be to go for tons of nofollows. But that could backfire when Google eventually recognises that nofollow was a bad idea in the first place and changes completely how they treat them. Don't be surprised if they just scrap it altogether and treat all links as equal once they've achieved their objective re getting webmasters into the habit of disclosing paid links (the ulterior objective all along). When that happens your tons of nofollows could propel you to the top of the SERPs. Ouch!
Any other suggestions?
Well, the kind of content I create is predominantly linkbaity anyway which naturally attracts nofollow links from digg, stumbleupon, delicious and so on. I also do videos for YouTube, vimeo and the like too. All these are links that apparently don't hold any weight, but they do bring in traffic from a plethora of sources.Good question. The best place to start would be Google's guidelines. Read them carefully ... and do the opposite
OK, it's not as simple as that. I'm open to suggestions. The easy option would be to go for tons of nofollows. But that could backfire when Google eventually recognises that nofollow was a bad idea in the first place and changes completely how they treat them. Don't be surprised if they just scrap it altogether and treat all links as equal once they've achieved their objective re getting webmasters into the habit of disclosing paid links (the ulterior objective all along). When that happens your tons of nofollows could propel you to the top of the SERPs. Ouch!
Any other suggestions?
Oh, and I always build an email list just in case the brown stuff hits the fan.
Those are great suggestions. I'd also think about link exchanges ...but with a twist. If others are chasing links, would it be worth giving them public links in exchange for mentions in their newsletter, getting them to tweet etc? What else could we ask for - in exchange for links we give them - that won't feature on Google's radar?
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