Question regarding Inbound link quality in Google

[felisha]

Hello guys! I am new to this forum and i would appreciate your help. I just started reading about SEO and i have this question in mind..

What do you think currently are the top characteristics of quality inbound link for Google ranking improvement?

Hope you can help me understand more 'bout this issue.

[Jazajay]

relavant and one way

[felisha]

any other? well aside from that... i just need to know more. thaks for that Jazajay.

[Jazajay]

I wouldn't class it as top but age of domain, page and the link

[AussieWebmaster]

relevancy is the biggest factor

[jewboy]

authority of the domain is also important - ie. cnn.com vs. mylocalnewschannel.com . also position of the link on the page is another biggie not mentioned.

[AussieWebmaster]

good catch mate... link potion is very often overlooked.... those footer links are definitely not premium placement

[felisha]

I think the term "relevancy" has a huge range.. So can i ask what a relevant site covers? i'm confused. a relevant link comes from a relevant site but how can you say that a site is relevant?

Please do explain.

[AussieWebmaster]

Originally Posted by felisha

I think the term "relevancy" has a huge range.. So can i ask what a relevant site covers? i'm confused. a relevant link comes from a relevant site but how can you say that a site is relevant?

Please do explain.

If you have a site about financial services and you have a link from a sports site it has no relevancy. But from another financial site - even one that is broader than your specific niche - will be relevant.

[Qurratulain]

I think, relevancy and placement matter most, then comes the number of OBLs on that particular page, where you're linked!

[felisha]

Originally Posted by AussieWebmaster

If you have a site about financial services and you have a link from a sports site it has no relevancy. But from another financial site - even one that is broader than your specific niche - will be relevant.

So that means that the theme or topic of your site and the site where your link is on must be related. thanks for that.

how about the anchor text of the link, does that matter?

[Jazajay]

Yeah it does very much it is a way to tell the Search Engine's about that page/your keywords.
For example it is unlikely that a page with the anchor text "The best car mechanics in Birmingham" would be a page selling cakes in Texas in the Search Engines eyes. So they use the anchor text car mechanics in Birmingham as a way to sort out the rankings.

edit: Google uses "The Random surfer" as 1 way of sorting the results. IE: a site with lots of links with that keyword in the anchor text will have a higher chance of being found by someone who is looking for that keyword/page. Also a site with few links but links back from BIG sites again will be found quickly if a surfer was just going around the net randomly.

It also shouldn't be the same for every link back to that page but should be related.
For example if you sell sport drinks
you could have 1 link back to your sport drinks page saying "for all your sport drinks needs...".
then a another
"the best sport drink company around".
or just
"sport refreshments"

The key here is that you have the word sport in 3 times in 3 differnt links and also one has a variant of your keyword that surfers may search for as well.

Again it all depends on your keywords you are trying to hit. But don't just have all the anchor text as sport drinks as that looks spammy and unnatural.

Also relevance if you sell cakes getting a link from a site that sells cookies, depending on the site set up/content, may be relevant. Getting a link back from a page that mentions the word cookie once possible wouldn't be.

[felisha]

wow,thats better. i have read that links can be one-way, two-way. i have understood bout that already, but how about three-way links? can you explain that to me... is that kind of link can help your site's ranking?

[Jazajay]

Sort of linking in to page position from Jewboy surrounding text
IE: which looks better in the SE eyes

the best sport drink providers (dead link)
Or

"The latest statistics from the world of Rugby states that 53% of people think that Jaza is just amazing. While 33% think that they should drink sport drinks before during and after the game to live! A good sport drink provider we recommend is the best sport drink provider ltd (dead link)
They offer good sport drinks for this sport and we all know we need to drink at least a few times of a day so why not make it a sport drink you can relate to this sport. For all you atlhettes in this sport out there...."

Ok I know the copy's not great but it is surrounded by your keywords, which is also what you want.

[Jazajay]

Ok now this is going to be where I take a logical guess and Beu/ Aussie etc... will pop around and ruin my day. I'm not a spammer but what I think of a 3 way link is this -

You have 3 sites, site A links to site B, site B links to site C and site C links back to site A.

Could this be detrimental to your rankings?
Well it depends. Linking like this would be found naturally but if all 3 sites are on the same C-block then it could matter and you could be penalized.

The other way it could hurt you is if all your links are like that. Again looks spammy and a manipulation of the results.

[felisha]

thats spamming already... but is that the explanation of the three-way link? im sori but i did't get the point.

[Jazajay]

Ok I was slightly out
this is what SEO book.com's definition is

"Some webmasters own multiple sites and try to build up one of their specific sites by offering link exchanges from their other sites. In doing this they add a link to you on their other site and get you to link to the main site they are trying to build up."

Heres the link
You will probably find the Information there more beneficial. I do my link building myself and tend to ignore the we can get you 1000 one way links....all for absolutely nothing except your soul, emails I get.

Sorry for the slightly off post.

Edit: Also the sites that I have come across that want me to do that (now I know the official name) tend to have very little inbound links / content on the site where you would get the link from, bring in the random surfer theory. I tend to smile and leave. I cant see how this is beneficial to you to be honest. the person doing the 3 way link maybe if they don't get penalized for trying to manipulate rankings.

I should really learn to search for terms I don't know. But then you have to have the dumbass who sets the precedence that you have to be smarter than I suppose and I don't want to take that away from any one.

Jaza

[felisha]

thanks. that can help me much in optimizing my not yet registered site i think. well, im still planning. but still im open to other answers regarding the title of this thread.

[Jazajay]

thanks. that can help me much in optimizing....

That's alright any opportunity to make me seem like a dumb ass is welcome by everyone else here at SEW.

[AussieWebmaster]

hey jazajay - I like the reference to random surfer - not too many people use that reference when developing methods