Trading links essentially consists of approaching someone and asking them to exchange links with you, so both websites benefit. It’s really pretty simple: “Link to me and I’ll link to you.” However there are scenarios where you can end up with very little or no benefit, and even worse, you could get penalized by Google for trading links. Here is what you need to know:
1. Trading Links Will Boost Traffic, Not Page Rank.
If you’re trading links you’re creating a reciprocal link instead of a one-way link. The major search engines including Google are not stupid, they know this is an arranged agreement and because of this they will not put a whole lot of weight on those type of links. This means you get little to no benefit as far as your search engine rankings or page rank go.
Traffic on the other hand is a different story. As long as you’re exchanging links with someone within your niche or someone with a complimentary or supplementary product or service you can get traffic back to your site. The key is to create high quality, relevant links. For example: A boat shop can link to a fishing shop or a wedding photographer can link to a food catering company or a DJ service, and vice versa. However it makes no sense if you own a website with fishing supplies, and a wedding photographer is linking back to you – there is no benefit in this type of link.
2. Create Quality, Relevant Links.
Creating quality links that are related to your website or service will bring traffic that converts. So if you’re goal is to sell something or have people sign up, etc you’re that much more likely to achieve that goal with relevant traffic. With the example above, I doubt someone shopping for a wedding photographer is going to be interested in clicking a link to your fishing supplies website.
Irrelevant links, links to “spammy” websites and poor quality websites can potentially get you penalized by search engines like Google.
3. Do Not Buy Text Links.
There are many websites that will sell text links that lead back to your site. Some of these services offer hundreds of links for under $100, while others charge hundreds of dollars for just a few links, and still others charge a monthly fee. Does it work? Yes, but only if you really know what you’re doing. It’s pretty risky, so I suggest you stay away from buying links and focus on getting natural links instead. If you get caught, it can get your website banned from Google.
4. Use Good Anchor Text.
Make sure the links from other websites leading back to your site use good anchor text. In the example on the right, “wedding photographer” text is great for a link if you are a wedding photographer. “Click here” is not descriptive enough and as far as the search engine is concerned it could lead to something completely unrelated. You should also utilize deep linking, that means don’t only link to your main homepage (www.YourSite.com), but also to specific pages (www.YourSite.com/FreeQuote). Google puts significant weight on anchor text links, especially when coming from quality websites with good page rank – so use ’em!
5. Strive For One Way Links
These are the most valuable links, especially when used with good anchor text. They carry a lot of weight when it comes to increasing your search engine rankings. As the picture up top demonstrates, a one way link is just that, only goes from one site to the other and not vice versa. So how do you get them? Many of those links come from the wide community of bloggers that will link back to your site – creating a one way link. For anyone to naturally link back to your site however, you need to provide good quality, fresh content that’s appealing and interesting to your visitors.
This should leave you with a good idea of the Do’s and Don’ts when it comes to links and link trading. If you have any questions just post them in the comments below.
Anchor text are also great for inner linking for keyword Relevance. Ask the giver of links to use anchor text back to you if all possible.
Laser
You’re right, anchor text is very important, never use “click here” for anchor text, that has no value… Thanks for contributing!