About Text Links

LINK STRATEGIES AND THE SEARCH ENGINES

Currently, the three most popular and significant search engines are Yahoo, MSN and Google. Each has notable differences and some similarities with regard to the methods and algorithms they use to rank websites. Google is the most popular search engine and currently accounts for approximately 80% of all web searches. What sets Google apart from its competitors? Simply put, PageRank.

Google founder, Larry Page, developed PageRank to determine a site’s popularity and/or importance based upon the quantity and quality of inbound links (also called back links) pointing to a page. This differed significantly from the method traditionally used to rank sites, which primarily relied upon the location and frequency of keywords on a page. For example, a person interested in “business” would enter that keyword into a search engine. Similar to a librarian, search engines need more information to determine what the user is really interested in… that is, does the user want information about a particular company, investment strategy or employment opportunity?

Unlike librarians, search engines can neither ask questions, nor rely upon past judgment. Instead, search engines use keyword analysis to determine the most relevant websites. The location and frequency of keywords, both in the page title and location on the page determined the relevancy of websites with regard to the user search. These were the most important factors that search engines traditionally considered when ranking websites.

Google developed PageRank as a method to consider other factors when ranking websites. Google determined the web community should have some say as to the popularity of a given site. Thus, Google developed PageRank to analyze the quantity and quality of back links to produce search results.

In addition, Google analyzes links to determine if they are naturally occurring. That is, some websites use manipulation schemes to artificially inflate the number of back links in order to increase their visibility and search rank. These websites risk being penalized by Google. The penalties can be severe, such as a sudden and dramatic change in the search rank of a website. Also, new websites are often handicapped by Google’s “sandbox effect”. In an attempt to enforce the importance of natural links, Google apparently lowers the position of new domains in search engine results, regardless of the website’s PageRank.

Google has not officially verified the existence of a “sandbox effect”, as they generally do not release much information about their methodologies and search algorithms. However, based upon empirical evidence, it is probable that such a penalty is affecting the search positions of new websites. Many analysts believe the reason behind this type of restraint is to prevent web developers from constantly creating new domains with the purpose of linking them together in order to create mini networks. It is generally considered unnatural for websites to attain top search ranks immediately. As with many types of business, success is generally achieved over time, after contacts and content have been developed.

The flip side is very few websites optimized for top keywords attain high search ranks without some amount of manipulation. It is estimated that only 5% of sites optimized for popular keywords, can achieve high search rank through strictly natural means. Strategies for effective link buying are outlined below.

Google’s PageRank

Specifically, Google considers the quantity, quality and anchor text of back links when determining PageRank, whereas Yahoo and MSN rely heavily upon the quantity of a site’s back links when ranking pages. This is the primary difference between the main search engines. In essence, the search engine companies have determined the web community should vote upon popular and important websites by linking to them. Therefore, the quantity and quality of votes are important factors search engines consider when ranking websites.

The descriptive text (anchor text) used to link to other sites is another ingredient of the PageRank algorithm. Search engines associate a website with the anchor text of incoming links. The founders of Google defined PageRank as the chance that a random surfer will find a particular website. The chances of finding the website are influenced by what other sites say about a particular site’s content. Therefore, the text a site uses to describe another site (anchor text) influences the outcome of a particular search. Recently, Google has placed increased emphasis on the importance of links from relevant websites that use varied anchor text.

Google is constantly updating their methodology, their primary concern being the number of naturally occurring links. This is a crucial concept to consider when determining which text links to purchase.