Most important aspect of link building - link diversity

Getting links to your website is the most important thing you can do to optimize your website. Back links to your website would always have impact on the ranking of your website though the way the back links are built might be penalized.

Components of a back linking strategy

Many SEO professionals do backlinks purely by checking the page rank of a website which did work in the past but now with the Penguin and Panda updates websites are being penalized for unnatural link building.

A strategy has to be developed for back linking to ensure that back link activities are not interpreted by the search engines as spam. Each task has to be well thought and careful analysis is needed to understand its impact.

A good link building strategy should be

• well balanced
•  thoroughly tested
• proper link velocity
• social media back links should be created carefully
• Natural editorial links
• Manual outreach back linking should be used
• Ensure that the links are in good neighbourhoods

Getting links to your site are one of the most important things you can do. As a matter of fact links are absolutely the key to your online success!

Getting quality links in a post Google Panda and Penguin algorithm update world is a time consuming and a tedious process that requires knowledge about how the Internet and search engines work. A good back linking strategy should establish your website in very good search engine ranks and position in the search engine results and is therefore critical for building a strong online presence.

Using Blog directories

What is a blog directory? 

A blog directory is a list of blogs on the Internet which are categorized for easy browsing. Some of the directories also rank different blogs based on different parameters such as traffic, followers and how often the content is updated. Usually blog details are submitted by bloggers. Some of the blog directories verify the submissions made to ensure that spam is not posted on the directory while there are other directories on submission publish the listing. Of course moderated blog directories are more popular that auto approve directories.

Submitting to Blog directories as SEO strategy

Submitting your blog to blog directories helps as far as SEO is concerned as not only do you get backlinks but you will get real visitors from good and reputable directories. The other advantages are

• With sole purpose of exposure and traffic.
• With good reputation and high traffic.
• If paid directory, well and good. Paid fee shouldn’t be refundable, irrespective of listing.
• The paid fee should be for the editorial review, not for the link.
• Max. no. of directories submission should be 5 to 7.
• The directory should have a past history of rejecting submissions.
• Checkout their editorial-policies – Are they obeying Google’s (SEs) guidelines?
• Checkout the sites they are listing – Are they high quality and authoritative?
• Check, whether the directory is penalized by Google. Search for site:domain name.com on the Google Search, and check how many pages are indexed/showing.
•  heck, whether the directory is offering Guaranteed Premium listing for higher fee? If yes, stay away from it.
• If the directory is promoting about  SEO benefit or value of back-links, instead of traffic, then avoid it.

Link Building techniques

Over the last 8 years I have developed a list of strategies and techniques for link building for a website. This is a very broad classifications of activities. The effectiveness of link building techniques is usually different for different industries.

• Directory Submissions
• Article submission 
• Press releases
• Social media profile creation
• Social Bookmarking
• Guest blogging
• Local listing like Google places
• Create link wheels using social websites and web 2.0 sites
• Identify where the competitors are getting inbound links from. Approach those resources to find out if you can get a outbound link from those sites. 
• Add your self to yellow pages and local business listings.
• Participate in forums and discussions and use signature with a link back to the website if possible. 
• Guest blogging on other blogs which are in the relevant industry with link backs to the website. 
• Use http://www.beaucoup.com/ to find vertical engines and directories and get listed in them
• Participate in question and answer websites by answering questions related to your business or website. 
• Paricipate in discussions on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and LinkedIn.
• RSS Submission if possible
• Blog submission if you are running a blog on your website
• Create video content and submit to various video hosting services like Youtube.com and metacafe.com
• Create documents like infographics and PDF documents and submit them to websites like Scribd.com and similar websites. 

Is there a technique that you have used that is not mentioned in the list the please share it by adding comments below.