Why You Should Care About Backlinks

links
I ran into a cool backlink checker Web tool (or see the tool below) and thought I’d share it. Every time a web site has a link to your site, that is called a backlink (also referred to as an inbound link). Search engines love backlinks because that tells them that someone cares enough about your site to have a link.

I was blown away when I saw the over 1,200 links coming into jesseluna.com!

Why Check Backlinks?
  1. To keep track of the number of inbound links. As your site grows and you reach out to Web communities and comment on sites, this number will grow. But you won’t know that unless you measure.
  2. Because using the old “Link:< domain-name >” trick in Google doesn’t really work to show you all the Web pages that are linking back to you.
  3. Because backlinks are a key factor in deciding how much “Google Juice” your site has. If you are being linked to from a site with high authority (think NY Times) then Google and other search engines will reward you with a better search results position.
  4. So you can compare your backlink numbers to other similar but larger sites. This helps you keep concrete numbers in mind as you ask “how is my site doing?”
  5. Mostly importantly, now you can work backlink data into conversations with Web geeks at cocktail parties.
How Do I Increase My Backlinks Number?

The best ways to improve the number of people linking to your site are:

  1. Write awesome content that is link-worthy.
  2. Build relationships with other sites/blogs and leave thoughtful comments, making sure to add your Web site address in the “Enter URL” comment text boxes. If the Comment form doesn’t have a space for your site URL then you should check the site’s commenting policy to see if it’s OK to leave a Web address in the Comment text.
  3. Once you have a relationship with a blog site, suggest doing reciprocal links. In the early Web 1.0 days, linking to a site was a key way to reach out to new sites owners and was very common. Today, linking to other sites is much more strategic, especially for business sites.

Important Note: Not all inbound links carry weight.

Important Note Part Deaux: Google’s Webmaster Tools also include a Backlink checker tool. The feature is called “Links To Your Site” on the Tools site. However, I found that the iWebtool.com tool found many more backlinks.

How NOT To Create Backlinks

* DO NOT buy into spammy backlink sites or products.
* DO NOT leave comments on blogs for the sheer purpose of getting backlinks.
The Web is a beautiful place, don’t litter it with meaningless links.

Ready to Check Your Backlinks?

Here’s the tool. Enter your domain and a window will pop up and go to iWebtool.com.

Your domain:



(eg. www.jesseluna.com)

Was this post useful? Do you have any other thoughts on site backlinks? I appreciate your taking the time to visit this blog and to contribute to the conversation.

Remember, every time you leave a thoughtful Comment you get a backlink to your site!

Photo Credit: Nicocrisafulli on Flickr license

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Email
Print