Is Trading Links Beneficial?

If you own a web site, you may get offers from other sites to trade links. This is essentially a link swap, where you put a link to their site somewhere on your page and they will put a link to your site on their page.

Building links around the web pointing to your site can be helpful in the search engine rankings and getting links on other pages can get new visitors coming to your site, but is there a downside? Well, it kind of depends.

Link trading can be beneficial to you. It is most beneficial if the site you are getting your link on is a reputable site that relates to your industry. If you do some research and figure out that the site is a good site to "advertise" on, then there are a couple of other things to consider.

Be picky about where they are going to put this link. If it is on the bottom of a page that does not have anything to do with you, then it will not be helpful at all, to the visitors or the search engines. If you will be on a page that is rarely visited, then it will not help. If you will be in a long list of other links or if there are already too many links on the page, then it may not help you either. Search engines and users are looking for links that are extremely relevant to the content on the page. So, make sure that you approve of the context and content that your link will be associated with.

If you do decide that this is a good site, they are going to relevantly use your link and it would actually be an "honor", so to speak, to be on this page and site, then there is the other side of things to consider before you jump into it. You will need to put a link for the other site on your page. Is linking to them going to look unnatural with your content? Would the link look relevant to your visitors? Would you be willing for your visitors to leave your page when they click on this link?

Linking to other sites is tricky. Sometimes you do want to be associated with other sites, or you want to give someone else credit for some information that you are using on your site. But, you have to be willing to lose your visitors when they stumble upon this link. Sometimes it's not worth it. It just depends on the nature of your site. Plus, you are putting your site's reputation with visitors and search engines in their hands by linking to them from your site.

Consider all of these things before you decide to jump on the link trading bandwagon. If you are just uneasy with the idea but you are still interested in social marketing, which has become very important in the search engines, then contact a search engine marketing company about link building in the social world of the web.

About the Author: Stacy Pessoney is a Project Manager for ArteWorks SEO, one of the top search engine marketing companies in the world. A graduate of the University of Alabama, she implements and manages comprehensive SEO strategies and serve as an organizational liaison among company executives, clients and colleagues.

What Exactly is Social Media? SMO Basics

Social media is a new frontier and many business owners are discovering a need to understand it. If you have found yourself swimming in an ocean of marketing and search engine optimization jargon trying to figure it out, then you will probably benefit from this easy-to-understand tutorial.

Definition: Social media is referred to as "word of mouth" advertising. Although it isn't the actual "mouth" we're talking about, it basically is defined as what people are saying about you online or through mobile and hand-held devices.

What Social Media Does: Social discussions between actual human beings integrate you across boundaries of video, blogs, bookmarking, images, communities, etc. As people talk about you, discuss you, send links to your site or your blog, bookmark you and follow you, you become more and more "popular".

Why is Social Media Important for Search Engine Optimization?: Search engines highly value this popularity because it represents not how much you paid for your advertising, but how much current, quality, information you are providing. For example, if you never updated or provided any new information, then people would soon have nothing to talk about. So, by ranking you based on social media findings, search engines can keep their results fresh and relevant, reflecting the opinions of the users.

What does SEO do for Social Media? : Going through an organic search engine optimization company is a consistent way to keep up with social media demands. They should offer a huge range of services to keep your company in the eye of users that follow blogs and bookmark them, use discussion boards and forums, making you more visible to the internet community.

Why can't I just blog and be done? : Social media is beginning to include podcasts, video, images and mobile or hand-held device communications. SEO companies are evolving as the search engines do to keep you up to date with what's important. You also need your postings and your site to be search engine friendly. SEO's are aware of all the details and do extensive work beyond blogging. Concentration is put into social news, opinions, bookmarking, networking and blogging.

The bottom line is that Social Marketing utilizes the virtual community to make your site more popular with the search engines. If the search engines are weighing it heavily, then you should too. Your reputation can take a long time to build, so getting started with a competent search engine marketing company early in the game can help you to become more and more popular over time.

About the Author: Stacy Pessoney is a Project Manager for ArteWorks SEO, one of the top search engine marketing companies in the world. A graduate of the University of Alabama, she implements and manages comprehensive SEO strategies and serve as an organizational liaison among company executives, clients and colleagues.