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After Long Hiatus, I'm Ready to Return to IM

by mikenin
6 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi, I'm Mike,

After having a decent amount of success with some SEO marketing in a niche which I feel I just stumbled upon at the right time, my Google ranking was destroyed by an update to their algorithm about two and a half years ago. They really cracked down on sites with links from blog networks, such as Build My Rank. I had earned upwards of $25k on my site, but don't feel too badly for me. I had, and still do have, a good salary at a 9-5. I'm happy to discuss the niche, and the site if anyone is interested, but I won't get into it here and now. What I am interested in is getting back into the IM world. My past sites and efforts are gone, and I have no interest in going back to them. I want to start from scratch. What I need help with, is knowing how things have changed. I know there are probably hundreds of threads on this topic, but I am interested in hearing what the current SEO tactics are. What is the situation with backlinks? Can sites be sabotaged by sending links their way, much like was feared when google made the update? What kinds of links does google value now? I have read that Pagerank is a thing of the past, at least as far as we can use it as any sort of a metric in evaluating a sites value. And lastly, what services are people using to evaluate the competition at the top of the SERPs? I need to know what links they have, etc. Sorry for the long post, but I would really appreciate some input from some of the well established SEOers out there. Mike Anthony? Yukon? Anyone else? Thank you.
#hiatus #long #ready #return
  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    If you once had a site that earned $25K, why not go back to the proven niche/traffic?

    Nothing has really changed over the last couple of years as far as backlinks, spam links are still obvious & should only be used as temporary links/domains.

    BMR killed itself by advertising to the public/masses.
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    • Profile picture of the author mikenin
      Thanks for the response Yukon. So I have a couple of reasons for not going back to the niche I was in. For one, my websites are gone. I didn't even renew the domains. For the second, and more important reason, that niche is sketchy at best. I simply do not feel comfortable promoting it anymore.
      So you're saying that backlinking is just as important as ever, but spammy links will eventually get you in trouble with google. Sounds about right. So how do people get links these days? Do you have to contact website owners directly? Obviously getting organic links would be best, but that seems like a far fetched concept for anyone just starting out.
      I want to apologize again for this thread. I know this has all been gone over a million times before. After being burned by google once, I'm ready to do things the "right" way in their eyes. Also I plan to diversify so as not to put all of my online eggs in the Google basket, but anyway, Thanks again.
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      Hey!!

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      • Profile picture of the author yukon
        Banned
        Originally Posted by mikenin View Post

        Thanks for the response Yukon. So I have a couple of reasons for not going back to the niche I was in. For one, my websites are gone. I didn't even renew the domains. For the second, and more important reason, that niche is sketchy at best. I simply do not feel comfortable promoting it anymore.
        So you're saying that backlinking is just as important as ever, but spammy links will eventually get you in trouble with google. Sounds about right. So how do people get links these days? Do you have to contact website owners directly? Obviously getting organic links would be best, but that seems like a far fetched concept for anyone just starting out.
        I want to apologize again for this thread. I know this has all been gone over a million times before. After being burned by google once, I'm ready to do things the "right" way in their eyes. Also I plan to diversify so as not to put all of my online eggs in the Google basket, but anyway, Thanks again.
        Personally I think it's easier to be in niches that attract organic links.

        Example, If I was selling woodworking plans I would have a bunch of pages offering basic woodworking plans for free (traffic lure) while selling premium woodworking plans.

        This way traffic will help build organic links while you can tweak your own self built links as needed (same niche feeder sites, etc..).
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  • Profile picture of the author FranksToys
    The big difference is that links can and will cause problems if you don't build them the right way. Your site probably suffered from a manual penalty as thousands of others did because of BuildMyRank. There's nothing much different these days other than the typical spam your way to the top doesn't work as well as it used to.

    Paid links still work and will work for a long time but it's playing with fire. Choosing the wrong link provider or building over optimized profiles can and will kill your rankings at some point. The key is balance. These days a smaller number of links go a long ways so there's no need to go out and buy as many links as possible.

    Essentially it's all about a balanced link profile.
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    "The highest glory of the American Revolution was this - that it connected, in one indissoluble bond, the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity."
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  • Profile picture of the author Oziboomer
    Research you market and analyse primary and secondary keywords from Google Keyword tool.
    Set up your site structure to build powerful silos around targeted keywords.
    You can analyse competitor links with Ahrefs or SEO Spyglass or a number of other options.
    Add quality content to your site and have external authority links going out.
    Embed some relevant video content from Youtube and Vimeo on your pages.
    Build internal links to support the various silos.
    Set up your own social back linking profiles and post updates with good anchor text diverse links back to your posts. Set up Youtube and post some videos with CTA to drive traffic to your landing pages.
    If you have money to invest then buy some expired domains with good authority and set up a small private PBN to link to your posts.
    Pay Google for a some adwords traffic.
    Utilize Google Webmaster tools to identify opportunities where you can improve.
    Add more content to fill in the gaps.
    You can buy back links but if you are a genuine business you can acquire quality links by using various methods. For example I sponsor some schools and university projects usually by means of donation of time or materials and then they will usually add a back link to their sites, newsletters etc.
    The other thing is to join organisations like the local chamber of commerce who will usually provide member listings with back link.
    There are numerous sites you can get citations from. I've found some to be more valuable than others for example I modified a product we sell into a different market to make it food grade safe and then approached a specialist hospitality supplier directory and got my site listed. This brings not only clients but when I check the quality of the link and traffic it was worth the effort to get included.
    Things like that are what works for things I'm doing online.
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    • Profile picture of the author nik0
      Banned
      Focus on links that can be removed when the need arises.

      We all know it's near impossible to only do whitehat SEO so private blog networks are the way to go, whether Google frowns up on it or not.
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