It has been widely known and believed for several years that search engines look for links and trace them to their destinations. Furthermore, these pathways through information are used by the search engines to determine the relevance and value of the information you provide on your website. If the links lead to information that does not relate to your field, you lose rank in search results. Also, if links on other websites that are not relevant to your field lead to your website, you also lose in ranking. Links in or out should always be useful and relevant. Better still, those destinations should share important key words and phrases.
So, how does one acquire cross links from other websites leading to yours? Well, you have to offer them information or a reason to link to you, then make them aware of that fact. Listing yourselves in lots of small time directories is not very helpful. Those directories usually do not have a context that is relevant to your website, rather they are quite general in nature, and they are benefiting a lot form your listing, but you don’t get much in return. Instead, you want to be an expert in your field, publishing a lot of good information that others want to use for reference in the form of links.
On your own website, you will want to do the same. Write about your field in a blog post and include links to references you have found elsewhere on the web that support your information. Outgoing cross links are a kind of bibliographical reference system that also improves your search ranking.
Website design and marketing is an ongoing process. Your website designer can help you over time build a better Blog, but it is your job to keep the momentum going. As you improve your ranking strength, so do your competitors, if they are smart. This means you have to keep improving to stay ahead. One of the strongest ways to do this is to keep on referring to other well written resources with links. Then try to get others to do the same for you.
