[Dave Earley]

I looked for my previous post of, "Is Content Really King?", and remembered that it was posted in the old forum section. These are the responses to my previous question:

Ken Troyer said: "Yeah, this ruffle some feathers...but NO content is not king.

One way links are king.

I tested this by not posting to my blog for about 6 months...and did NO article marketing whatsoever...and I remained on page one of Google.

BUT...

I had a one way linking strategy that I was using. Just links, nothing else.

Fun stuff,
Ken"

GT said: "Hey, Dave, thanks for the thread. It should produce some very interesting discussion.

And thanks, Ken, for the insight into one-way links. As one of our PIPS Power Group mentors (and founder), I value your input on all issues and appreciate the testing you have done to determine the value of various methods of marketing.

I'm just starting to work on my backlinks focus, now, (being coached by PPG training ).

Even though content is no longer king, I think it still ranks up there with the royalty of marketing strategies.

As you have pointed out, you had a linking strategy in place before shelving your content focus for the six months. I would caution fellow PIPSters to make sure their linking strategy is firmly in place before diminishing their focus on regularly updated content.

GT "

Allen Lundy said: "The saying "Content is King" is partially correct. "UNIQUE Content" should be the new keyphrase.

The more fresh and unique content you produce and distribute the more one way backlinks you will generate over time.

Anybody can put up a website and put articles on it. The problem with that is most people use the same articles and promote the same products in the articles. Nothing unique about that.

Take an hour a week and write 2 or 3 articles on your favorite product or niche, submit them to article directories with good traffic stats and over a period of time your articles will be noticed by the search engines and indexed, providing you quality back links.

For me, unique fresh content is king.

Allen"

Runner said: "Hi Dave!

What a smart question!

Content is very important because in everything we do
online, we must have content: PPC, description texts on SE result pages, articles, blogs,forum posts, webpages, text ads, banners etc.

To be effective that content must be useful and interesting for the reader.

But if your idea was to compare, which one is more important
the site content or the backlinks, I wouldn`t separate them.
Both are needed.

The big amount of related backlinks from authority sites
will drive lots of traffic, but a good content ( a unique one )
will convert that traffic better.

So content is still king, if it is personal and unique
and can stand out from the crowd by offering something more or
better than the competing sites.

Juhani Tontti"

I can't help but notice that people are always declaring something to be king.

I would like to suggest to you that content is not king, unique content is not king, design is not king, backlinks are not king, SEO is not king, free bonuses are not king, and meeting a need is not king.

After all, with the exception of backlinks where would any one of those things get you if no one were to see them? Likewise, where would backlinks get you if you had nothing to offer? Ah, now you see it!

We need at least content along with backlinks to begin making progress, and then add the others on top of that and a successful website we should have.

So if you need to put something in the position of king, I would say that the person doing all of the work is king.

Now, time to get back to work, I have a kingdom to run, you know.

Dave

[Stephen Meyer]

You should take a look at some of th top authors at ezine articles. Their links do not point to a content page per say. They point to a lead capture page. Lots of people make money off from simply sending people to a capture form.

Ken Troyer has it right, backlinks are king and you can get them without ever writing an article and you can make money without a content filled website. Get the links and get the money.

[Dave Earley]

So you clicked on their backlinks because you knew they were popular authors, Steve?

Dave

[Stephen Meyer]

No, I clicked on some author links because someone said i should take a look at some of th top authors at ezine articles.

I'm not sure what my reasons are for clicking author links has to do with the topic? :confused:

[Dave Earley]

I would suggest that the title brings most people to the article, and the article brings most people to the resource, and the resource brings people wherever. Therefore, backlinks...not magnets.

Dave

[Kym Robinson]

There is some graet info and debate in this thread!
I know that backlinks and unique content are king - so.......just call me a fence sitter in this debate!.....lol
Interesting about your theory Ken - but If you proved it with your experiment - it is even more interesting!
I'll be looking further into this info.
Thanks for the thread Dave!
Kym

[Jason Fulton]

I would like to be KING for the day , if thats not possible i see backlinks as the next best thing

[tplahav]

I believe both content and backlinks are important, backlinks to build the page popularity and PR and the content for magnetizing people. I don't think you can do without it, unless you have a killer for a title or the name.
If they don't know your name they won't click, so you need to give them a good reason to do it.

Tanny

[Jeff Schuman]

When it comes to article marketing volume of articles is king. You have to change your thinking and increase the number of articles you are getting online. I have been guilty of thinking way too small when it comes to writing and submitting articles.

There are people who put 10 articles a day into just EZA. Their only goal is to drive traffic to a landing page, capture contact information for future follow, and then redirect them to a web page where they can access a bonus.

Once they have this person in the system their whole goal is to follow up and turn the subscribers into paying customers and repeat customers. This isn't really new, but the idea that you can submit that many articles a day and use them to drive traffic definitely changes the outlook on how to do it in my opinion.

EZA is the best place to do this because of the traffic they get everyday, but there certainly are many other directories you could focus on depending on your niche.

[Matt Helphrey]

Writing articles and sending them to a lead capture page is a great strategy. But just one strategy that we should be implementing.

Writing and producing great and unique content is another strategy we should be implementing. If you offer great content, you will see more repeat visitors. Afterall, that is how word of mouth is spread.

One way back links is how we will rank higher in the search engines and receive more free traffic.

I think Dave hit the nail on the head here. We ultimately are the master of our own success. There are so many methods that seem to be working for each person. Finding a strategy to implement each one should bring you the most optimal results.

Great post by the way.

Cheers,
Matt

[Dave Earley]

Originally Posted by tplahav

If they don't know your name they won't click, so you need to give them a good reason to do it.
Tanny

This is true! We could have hundreds of views in EZA and only a handful of clicks, so the resource needs to be extra appealing. In EZA the only thing we have going for us is the resource because they don't give out backlinks there. :-(

* By backlink I meant a "dofollow"

Dave

[Stephen Meyer]

Dave, what do you mean by EZA does not give out backlinks? The Author box links are DoFollow so I'm curious?

[Dave Earley]

Well, Bart the Bear knows better than me so here is what he says in his blog, "Social Bookmarking - The Effects on Article Submission":

"Many of these article directories, including the mighty Ezine Articles, are using the html link attribute "nofollow" meaning that they do not give away any link "juice". Their links are worthless."

Yes they have a resource box, but if they add rel="nofollow" to the end of your link, then you don't get credit in the search engines.

Dave

[Stephen Meyer]

Dave, you can look at the page source for any of your articles at EZA and you will not find rel="nofollow" on any links. You can also use "SEO For FireFox" and you will see they are not nofollow tags. Not sure where your friend got his information but it is not correct.

As a matter of fact in the TOS for EZA you may not publish any articles from their site if you use the rel="nofollow" tag. It is against their policy.

[Dave Earley]

Impressive. I will find out, Steve...

Dave