Basic SEO Concepts Expanded

Read “Basic SEO Concepts” First.

The popularity factor is based on backlinks and social presence. Backlinks are created when other websites link to you. They are difficult to obtain naturally when you’re just starting out or are in a small niche. At this point you hit a sort of catch 22. You can’t gain natural backlinks because nobody knows about your site and nobody knows about your site because you have no backlinks or rankings.

The above scenario is doing what’s called white hat SEO. There’s white hat and black hat, two different SEO schools of thought. White hat SEO says you shouldn’t tamper or try to manipulate rankings. Why? Well because it’s against Google’s terms and conditions.

The method SEO’s use to manipulate rankings is artificially creating backlinks. The harsh reality is that in most niches you just can’t rank naturally for anything. You can’t gain enough natural backlinks to compete with everyone else. Why?

Again, because most niches are too small and the truth is MOST websites artificially boost their rankings by manufacturing backlinks anyway. It’s gotten to the point now where if you want to compete, you have two choices. One, you can write amazing content, build a superb website, guest post on relevant blogs, run some ads and promote your site via social networks.

…In the hope that one day your site will be noticed and gain enough natural backlinks from people who like your stuff and decide to link to it pushing it to the top of Google. That would be ideal, but hardly feasible for most sites and niches.

Option two is to build your site, write great content, do the whole social media & community building thing, but create your own backlinks to quickly boost rankings. Most webmasters use option two. Actually most webmasters build a crappy site, write crappy content, barely touch social media and straight out manipulate their rankings by blasting thousands of links at their site.

If you’re not too careful you can easily land yourself with a penalty. Google dish out “Google penalties” to websites they think have been manipulating rankings. So if you artificially build your links in such a way that’s unnatural; you’re gonna get a penalty.

Which is exactly what countless webmasters have done in recent years and are crying about to this day. The answer?

The answer is to use relevancy and popularity to your advantage. Build an excellent site and write content that is worthy of being popular, worthy of being shared. Then artificially boost your popularity to some degree.

There are several white hat link building strategies that are perfectly effective for boosting SEO rankings. But first concentrate on building a tribe. A tribe of people who will share your content on their favorite social networks. The easiest way to build real popularity which in turn will lead to higher search engine rankings is to build a tribe of people who love and share your content.

Make it easy for your visitors to share your content. The only problem with social SEO is that most niches aren’t social. If you run a website that sells lawn mowers, the strategy barely applies. For one you can’t write about your lawn mowers every week in a blog post. Even if you did, hardly anyone would want to subscribe to the posts, let alone share them.

So the social thing works best in social niches, where communities form. If you’re in an unsocial niche; you can always artificially boost social media presence with some cash. Apart from propping up your social presence, focus on the backlinks side.

The old traditional side of SEO. Build links in the following ways:

• Submit Articles To Article Directories (Write articles about your niche, submit them to directories like EzineArticles.com and ArticleBase.com – they allow you to link back to your site with your desired anchor text in an author resource box)
• Write Guest Posts For Related Websites And Blogs (Find blogs and websites related to yours, ask them if you can write a guest blog post or article for their site, in return ask for a link back to your website in the content)
• Submit Your Site To High Quality Web Directories (Web directories are like online yellow pages, you simply submit your site’s title, description and URL to them in return for a backlink)
• Submit A Press Release Once A Month (Press releases are powerful for driving traffic, popularity and boosting rankings)
• Setup Public Profiles On Popular Sites Linking Back To Your Own (Big sites that allow user registrations will allow their members to link to their own sites in their public profiles)
• Build High Value Web2.0 Properties (Web2.0′s like blogger.com, hubpages.com, squidoo.com and others allow you to create sites on the end of theirs or on sub domains. Allowing you to link back to your own sites within the content you post

The above link building strategies are dead simple and still very effective in this post-penguin SEO world where manipulation is harshly punished. Ultimately you should devise an SEO strategy that’ll build real website popularity in the long run. Constant unnatural artificial link building is a fools game.

In Prosperity,

David Wood

P.S. Leave me your thoughts, comments and questions below.

Comments

Comments

Jessica L., July 15, 2024, 14:35

Thanks for this detailed explanation of SEO concepts. It really helped me understand the basics and how to get started with optimizing my website. The expanded strategies you mentioned make a lot of sense, especially the part about balancing white hat and black hat techniques.

Michael B., July 15, 2024, 15:10

SEO can be quite overwhelming, but breaking it down into these fundamental concepts makes it a lot more manageable. I especially appreciate the practical tips on building backlinks and social presence. Great post!

Emily R., July 15, 2024, 16:45

I appreciate the straightforward approach to explaining SEO. It’s easy to get lost in all the technical jargon, but this post made it much clearer for me. The examples of white hat strategies are particularly useful.

Paul C., July 15, 2024, 17:30

This is exactly what I needed. I’ve been struggling with SEO for my blog, and now I have a clear starting point. The section on building a tribe is very insightful and something I will definitely work on. Thank you!

Linda K., July 15, 2024, 18:20

Great overview of SEO basics. It’s amazing how focusing on just 20% of the factors can yield 80% of the results. The detailed list of link-building strategies is very helpful. Very insightful!

Tom H., July 15, 2024, 19:05

Thanks for simplifying SEO concepts. I now feel more confident in applying these strategies to my website. The idea of using SYNND to boost social presence is something I hadn’t considered before.

Alice M., July 15, 2024, 19:50

Very useful information! I liked how you emphasized the importance of relevancy and popularity in search engine results. The tips on avoiding penalties while building backlinks are crucial. Keep up the good work!

David W., July 15, 2024, 20:10

I have been looking for a simple guide to SEO, and this post is perfect. Thanks for sharing your knowledge and making it accessible to everyone. The balance between white hat and black hat techniques is very enlightening.