NOT ONLY DOES CONTENT SYNDICATION CREATE IN-BOUND LINKS, IT'S ALSO A TRUST BUILDER WITH SITE VISITORS.Content Syndication:
A Links-Building Strategy That Actually Works
Do a little Google research and you’ll quickly discover that there are a million e-books, seminars and webinars about building links to your site. If your site isn’t plugged into the grid – a stand-alone – you’re all but ignored by search engines because your site has no context. Search engine spiders can’t determine your site’s taxonomy – the categorization of the site into a class or group based on the site’s topicality.
Search engines look for links to and from your site. If you have a lot of reciprocal links (link exchanges), you score some points but you’re not knocking ‘em dead. Spiders know a link exchange when they encounter one so a reciprocal link has less value than a non-reciprocal link – an in-bound link without an outbound link connecting back.
The Value of the Non-Reciprocal Site Link
Spiders crawl a site and assess what they find based on top-secret formulae called algorithms. These algorithms are complex weightings of various site components. So, for example, content that changes often (green content) is a plus built into the search engine algorithm. Thus, a site that provides fresh, informational content scores higher than one that’s as stale as last week’s doughnuts. Spam – useless gibberish created just to attract search engines – loses you points in the SEO Sweepstakes, too.
Now, there are plenty of search engine optimization (SEO) pros willing to take your money to show you how to improve or optimize your site so that it moves up in the search engine rankings. Less face it, if your site is entombed on page 68 of Google’s SERPs you won’t generate much organic (search engine driven) traffic.
One thing that spiders look for in assessing the quality or usefulness of a site is the number of non-reciprocal links connected to that site. Why? Because it’s an indicator of quality and utility. That’s why other site owners are recommending that their site visitors click off and go to your site. Quite a feather in your cap, eh? Collect enough non-reciprocal links and search engines may come to “see” you as an authority site. This coveted designation moves you right to the top of search engine results pages.
Bottom line: spiders use links as a measurement in site assessment. The more quality non-reciprocal, inbound links there are, the higher the site ranks (page rank or PR).
Content Creates Links
Good, fresh content is a highly-prized commodity on the world wide web because search engine spiders like to see up-to-date, relevant information for their users. Spiders take snapshots of each website they visit. It’s called the cache view on SERPs. When a spider crawls a site, it compares the cache with the current content. If nothing has changed, your content will ultimately be considered stale and, as a result, you’ll fall in the SERPs.
Every site needs new content and one way they get it is through article syndication.
Web Article Syndication
If you’re an expert on the subject of your web site, you can develop non-reciprocal in-bound links through article syndication. It’s perhaps the least expensive, most effective means of improving your site’s search engine ranking.
There are sites like goarticles.com and ezine.com that syndicate content within a wide variety of categories. This content (articles) is posted by the author and is free for the taking by any web site for display.
The way you benefit? Part of the deal is that any site that uses your article must provide a link back to your site. At the end of an article on antique watches you’ll see an author’s box that says something like:
Author John Smith is an authority on antique watches and offers free
appraisals at johnsmithantiques.com
That’s a non-reciprocal link which is given more value than a simple link exchange.
The Benefits of Web Content Syndication
The most obvious benefit, from the SEO perspective, is that every site that picks up John Smith’s antique watch article must provide a non-reciprocal, in-bound link to Mr. Smith’s website. So, if Smith’s article is picked up and used by a couple of dozen web sites, he’ll end up with a number of inbound links from a single article.
Now, if Smith then writes an article on antique sideboards, posts it on goarticles.com or some other content syndicator and gets picked up by more sites, the number of non-reciprocal inbound links continues to grow.
Onceagain, these inbound links are considered more valuable by search engine spiders than plain link exchanges. The fact that a site has linked to you without a reciprocal link is an indicator that your site is worth visiting, at least according to the referring site owner. In addition, you’re becoming a recognized authority on the topic pf your site. A two-fer!
Some Precautions
Perhaps the most important precaution is to limit the number of sites that post one of your articles. One thing spiders don’t like is duplicate content so if your article currently appears on 20 different sites, you’ll get credit for the in-bound links but the value of those links will be diminished because of that duplicate content. It’s all over the web!
Make sure you track the sites that are picking up your articles. Just Google your name or the title of the article to see what pops up. Visit each site to make sure that the promised link back to your site is there. Also make sure that your content isn’t being used for illegal or unscrupulous purposes. You write a piece on options investing and all of a sudden it’s being used as a “testimonial” by some sleazy scam artists selling options contracts to little old ladies. You have the right to request the removal of your article and most sites will comply. If they don’t, notify the syndicator who may deny additional content to the offending site.
What If I Can’t Write?
This is one links-building strategy that works. There’s enough cyber world evidence to prove that. However, if you can’t string words together to create a useful, informational article, find someone who can.
Your spouse, neighbor, even your kid might have a hidden writer just waiting for the chance to blossom. Or, you can find SEO copywriters on sites like guru.com and elance.com. Some of these professional writers (be careful who you choose) know how to craft an article that’ll get picked up by lots of sites that are topically related to your site. Keep track of how many sites run the piece at one time so you don’t overexpose it. You can find that information on the syndicator’s site.
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