Link building is one of the most important facets of search engine optimization for any website, including for window and door manufacturers and dealers. Even wonderfully designed websites—those that are jam-packed with informative content and relevant keywords, lots of images and videos, and wisely chosen headlines, meta descriptions and meta tags—are missing a foundational aspect of SEO if they don’t link to other relevant sites and if no other relative sites link to them. This issue can be devastating to local search rankings and seriously depress both website traffic and conversions.
Sites that have great credibility rank well with Google and other major search engines. One major way they determine credibility is by your link network. If other sites don’t want to link to your site, how credible can it be? And if your site doesn’t link to anyone else, i.e. manufacturers, wholesalers, service organizations or other relevant entities, how can you prove the position you hold in the window and door industry?
Link building is a necessity, even though some unsavory webmasters have abused it by artificially inflating link networks through paid services.Over time, such practices have exposed a lot of myths about link building that permeate the online marketing industry. I’d like to clear a few of them up.
Myth: You should only accept links from sites with a higher domain authority than your own.
Reality: Domain authority is a general ranking of how well a particular site ranks. It’s a useful metric and you certainly should try to build links to sites with a high authority. But, that doesn’t mean you should avoid sites that rank a bit lower. That said, don’t link to (or accept links from) low-authority, spammy sites.
Myth: You should not accept links from directories.
Reality: This is another case of throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Directory links got a bad rap because of unethical “black-hat” SEO agents who created low-quality, paid link directories that existed purely to artificially pump SEO. Avoid those, but if there’s a high-quality directory or resource list that’s highly relevant to windows and doors, feel free to use that link.
Myth: You shouldn’t solicit links.
Reality: There’s nothing wrong with directly asking a related site to link to yours. The problem is that unethical operators have pulled all sorts of scams to demand inbound links, and Google has (properly) penalized those sites. Feel free to politely ask for links and offer to link–bank in return.
Myth: You shouldn’t have too many outbound links.
Reality: Way back in the day, your SEO could be hurt if you had a bad ratio of outbound links to inbound links. This isn’t true anymore, but the myth perseveres. Yes, you should always try to get relevant, high-authority sites to link to you, but there’s nothing wrong with linking out.
Welton Hong is the founder and internet marketing director of Ring Ring Marketing, an Internet marketing firm that specializes in window and door businesses. Contact him at welton@ringringmarketing.com or 888/383-2848.