Backlinks are links in content which lead back to a point of sale. They’re very effective- Provided your content is of value. Too many internet “experts” seem to think that net users are looking for links, not information. One of the biggest, and stupidest, myths of all time regarding internet marketing is that SEO is some sort of trick. It’s not. It’s about people being able to find what they’re looking for, and what they need is information first, hyperlinks second. Do you read things online to look at links? Of course not. Why would you? Content is the issue for users, 100% of the time.

Backlinks and content basics

There’s one fundamental rule about backlinks and content on any site- Backlinks need to be part of content. They must have value to the user in context with the information being provided. The most important use of links of any kind is as references. They’re economic, they provide useful materials, and they also save a lot of verbiage for information providers.

So backlinks are actually very functional. They’re built into information materials on a quite legitimate basis in terms of their information, and do their jobs as references very efficiently. The user gets access to more information, so they’re an economic way of adding value to the content.

SEO and backlinks

In the SEO context, backlinks must also be relevant keywords. That’s their search value, and this value needs to be targeted properly.

For example:

An article is about new fridges. The backlink is a white goods wholesaler with a lot of the latest products, so it leads directly to useful “see for yourself” information for the user. So far so good, but there’s a further qualifier- The keywords. Imagine using “fridges” as a keyword. Useless or worse. You’d get millions of hits on a search, rank back about 90 millionth on Google, and nobody would ever know the article existed.

The SEO version needs to be “energy saver fridges” or something similar to add both relevance and a connection to reader interests. That’s the real function of search engine optimization and equally to the point, relevant to the article, which is about consumer benefits of new fridge technology.

Backlinks and search engines

This is also, for the record, why real SEO works and SEO gimmicks don’t. If you’ve seen those useless search results which lead straight to a mass of links to anything and everything, you’ll remember how thrilled you were to find a lot of utterly useless information and perhaps one or two links of any value to you. A colossal waste of time, and more to the point, more work for the person doing the searching.

Real SEO doesn’t work like that. It uses the backlinks as markers for search engines. The search engines are searching for relevance, not just link factories and that relevance comes from content. Google has made it clear it’s going for quality search results, and according to recent news, does about 500 changes to its algorithms per year. Gimmicks don’t last. They can’t, and nor can their rankings.

If you want results, sales and higher rankings, use backlinks and high value content. Forget the fads and stick to what works.