The web is made up of links and so it is no surprise that links count so much in search engine rankings. The text used for links (anchor text) is critical for you and for those that you link to. For a short period this website ranked in the top ten websites for “catheter fetish” and this is why.
Links are the string of the web
Before there were search engines, links were the critical navigation channels of the web. Reciprocal linking (I link to you, you link to me) was very much the norm. Web-rings were another means of linking related topics together. A web-ring in general is a collection of websites from around the Internet joined together in a circular structure. Though they still exist today, they are much less popular.
Search engine ratings
Search engines especially Google took those links and treated them much like votes for the websites that they linked to. To match that link to a query, anchor text was used along with other information such as context etc.
Even today, anchor text has a powerful influence on the ranking for queries in the search engines. With this blog, I noticed traffic coming from various “interesting” websites and also from the search engines for the term “catheter fetish”.
Catheter fetish
When I saw the search term, I had this vision of people in an ER holding out their arms yelling “stick me, stick me”. Of course those of you who apparently are more … shall we say…”worldly” than I am probably know what this is immediately. If you are as naive as I was, you can search for the term but do not expect it to be pleasant. You have been warned.
I searched the blog to make sure that no such terms had slipped into the site secretly and sure enough, the website was clean. I then searched in Google for “catheter fetish” and found I was ranking in the top 10 for this search term.
By tracing back the visitors, I found a website that had linked using “catheter fetish” as anchor text. Do not ask me why! Apparently this website carried enough authority in this area for Google to take notice and decide to put PredictiveDomaining.com front and center.
Thankfully the link was removed and the blog no longer ranks for this term. It is a great illustration of the power of anchor text.
Click here
The most common mistake made with links is to put a link with the words “click here”. This is of course a great way to rank high for all those people who are searching for “click here”!
Even worse, many people will send out link requests to other websites and not provide them with any sort of code to cut and paste. The experienced webmaster will create a proper link but many others will end up putting text with a “click here” link.
The practice of sending link requests is material for a different post but for Pete’s sake, avoid the “click here” trap.
Varied anchor text
If link after link to your website contains the same anchor text, it will help you rank for this term but you are missing out on so much traffic for other search terms. Always encourage variation in the anchor text of links.
How? Well you can be blatant about it and provide link code on a separate page. One common trick is to provide a range of graphics or buttons with different anchor text and encourage people to use those.
You may not always have control over the anchor text used to link to you but exercise whatever control you can to optimize your rankings. And always choose good anchor text for any links you provide to other websites.
Now I am waiting to see if I will yet again rank for “catheter fetish” because of this post!
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Superb and simple explanation.
If you want a sample link building tool, you can check on Yahoo’s Site Explorer (https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/).
Hi Ismael,
Am familiar with site explorer to explore links without and to your website. But how is this a sample link building tool? Am interested to hear more about what you mean.
thanks
Well, you could use Yahoo Site Explorer to spy on your competitors on where they are getting links. From that, you could contact those sites that are relevant to the site that you are building link for.
To be honest, I don’t have that much experience with link building in my seo career as the sites that I am entrusted to do seo for has natural links by way of building relationships and licensing our content.
I tried the link building by emailing but you really have to work extra hard to be noticed. But yahoo site explorer would do for link spying and analysis of similar sites.
Hope this info helps you Barry
Ismael,
Ahh ok, yes I am familiar with this competitive intelligence use. I dont think it helps all that much. It may help you understand the hurdle you have in ranking higher than the competition but its not all about the rankings. Getting the customer and converting them is the key because that is where the money is. Ranking high in a search engine brings traffic but it is very risky to base a business on this traffic alone.
This is material for a post rather than comment extensively here. Thanks for bringing it up.
You’re spot on Barry. You should not base your success in ranking alone but on conversion. Ranking helps but it’s nothing if you don’t earn from it or convert.
Also, I’m glad I was able to contribute ideas and stroke your creative mind into posting another topic.
I love your posts. I gain so much insights from your articles plus the fact that you write well. Keep it up Barry
Ismael,
Glad you are finding them useful. It makes the effort on my part worthwhile
You’ll be pleased to hear that I found your blog by searching for ‘catheter fetish’.