Back Linking Question

Chris_Tax

New Member
If I leave a back link for my Manta directory listing, will it help to move up that listing?

Thanks, in advance,

Chris
 

Iconiplex

New Member
So since you'll keep getting getting completely uninformative replies like those above (a common theme on this forum, in the SEO section, which I'm sure you've seen based on your post history):

Notion: Backlinks Don't Matter
Something I think the above users are having trouble differentiating between and communicating effectively is the importance of quality backlinks versus spam backlinks. The notion has been put forth that any backlink you place manually is spam, and therefore these will never help your SEO. However, the idea is also implied that letting your website grow naturally by providing relevant content and having people link to your site naturally will help it.

I'm sure you'll notice that both these scenarios include backlinks, whereas one situation is seen as "positive" and the other "negative," yet the only information ever communicated from these scenarios is essentially that backlinks are horrible, spammy, and do not make a difference.

I'd like to challenge the idea that any manually-placed backlink is spam. If I put my link on my own YouTube video, a site which I do not own, then that is a manual backlink. If I put my homepage URL in my profile of this forum that I do not own, it is a manual backlink. According to the notion that any manually-placed backlink is spam, then my YouTube and forum profile backlinks are spam and suddenly have no quality.

It has been said that any link that does not drive quality traffic to your website is unimportant and useless, whereas you will find numerous objective case studies of quality backlinks (that do not drive traffic) benefitting rankings (which I will get into momentarily, since apparently rankings also do not matter).

If I have a YouTube account that has 0 views, 0 subscribers, and only 1 video, then any link I place there is not going to drive traffic, making it, according to these people, a low-quality, spammy link. Whereas, if I were to have a popular YouTube channel, I'm suddenly driving traffic with my link and suddenly this link is high-quality.

This is under the notion that the only purpose of a backlink is to drive traffic, yet some of the very people like those above who speak out against backlinks also have discussed the weight various backlinks have on a website's ranking, a notion that negates the very idea they put forth that no backlink matters in terms of ranking.

Google does not have a moral compass that says, "oh, he placed this backlink on an unpopular YouTube channel manually, so we shan't grant him rankings." If you have a link from YouTube, you'll have a link from an authoritative domain with a low outbound-link count that is supported with relevant content (your video). Granted, this link will increase in weight over time as the importance and popularity of your channel grows, but it was never spam in the first place and will help rankings (though depending on search volume, you would likely need more than one backlink from one domain to have any effect).

To be fair, there are indicators that help Google identify the site that is linking to you as spammy, and this could in turn make your website look spammy, but not the link itself. Whether you placed the link yourself or someone else, it has the potential to be a quality link, dependent on various factors on the page that houses the link.

But, their notion that SEO != backlinking is true. However, backlinking ∈ SEO is true.

Notion: "SEO Companies" Do Not Bring Real Traffic
The idea has been put forth that SEO companies bring fake traffic in the form of Russian bots. Suffice to say, if someone believes that every company is inflating your stats with fake traffic, then they do not have a diverse enough knowledge in the field to know how various companies operate.

If the company you hired is driving fake traffic to your site, you have purchased bulk traffic, not SEO. Or, if you are organically receiving traffic from Russian IPs, you have targeted some very strange keywords.

Other than that, an SEO company who is striving to bring real traffic will either fail in this regard and not bring any new traffic, or they will bring relevant traffic from your locale from users searching for your keywords.

If the traffic does not convert, this is either an issue with keyword research or on-page conversion (which would be completely irrelevant to off-site SEO), but the fact of the matter is that your traffic source and whether they are real (or at least from your area, peruse your site in the manner a human would, etc.) can be verified merely with Google Analytics or even a heatmap tool if you wanted to verify that the visitors were actually interacting with your site rather than pinging it for a moment with a bot.

Notion: Rankings Don't Matter
The only reason someone would say rankings don't matter is if they are completely oblivious as to how to do proper keyword research. The first step to acquiring converting traffic is to target proper keywords. You can pull these strategies from any advertising book that doesn't even touch on SEO so you can be sure you're not being "clouded" by "SEO guru speak."

For example, if I sell waterbeds (don't know who in their right mind would still buy a waterbed, but this is an example), and if I'm targeting the keyword "most comfortable waterbed," then that traffic will likely never convert because that is merely a research keyword. It doesn't indicate someone who is looking to buy, only someone who is interested in learning about waterbeds.

However, if I merely target the keyword "buy a waterbed," then that keyword clearly communicates to me that the visitor is ready to purchase a waterbed and I have the opportunity to convert them on my website if my site appears at the top of the rankings.

One would be asinine to think that ranking well for a keyword is not beneficial when a Google search's sole purpose is to send traffic to a website.

Now, "buy a waterbed" is a bad keyword because it has a low search volume, and who wants to buy a waterbed these days anyway? - but the keyword "buy mattress" has 1300 monthly searches for its exact/phrase match version, meaning every month 1300 people ready to buy a mattress are searching this keyword looking for a website that will sell it to them. If I can get 400 of those to my website, have a decent percent convert, I will make a nice amount of money considering the price of mattresses.

Notion: You Can Change Your Own Rankings/They Are Not What Everyone Else Sees
This is partially true based on personalized search results, however the users here take it to an extreme. "If you want to appear on the top of the search results, then visit your website several times. Bam. You're at the top of the search results, even though no one else will see you there." This is quite a true claim, yet quite an idiotic way to illustrate a point.

Personalized search is only relevant when a user consistently visits several websites in a niche several times. For example, if a user has never visited an e-commerce waterbed store, then when the user searches "buy a waterbed," how are those search results organized? By Google's ranking algorithm. The idea that Google decides what ranks is even set forth by some of the naysayers like the ones above, yet they also say that you can manipulate your own search results and no one's search results are ever alike, which are two conflicting ideas.

If the user has never visited an e-commerce waterbed store, then the idea of personalized search results is completely irrelevant when they search for "buy a waterbed." The sites with the best SEO, most relevant content, or are otherwise deemed worthy by Google will appear at the top of the search results.

On a similar note, they also say the more you check your rankings, the higher your own website will be. This only highlights their lack of knowledge as far as how to check your own rankings. If you use anything that can be connected to your Google account where your search history, Webmaster Tools, Analytics, etc. info is available, then you are checking your rankings incorrectly.

You should completely detach yourself from your Google account when checking rankings so you can see how the average user will see your rankings. Of course rankings have been proven to change negligibly depending on browser, location, etc. but doing a virgin search will give you a very accurate snapshot as to what your real rankings are. The correct way to check a ranking would be to log out of all Google accounts, clear your cache/cookies, use a different browser, a new proxy, etc. It's even better to use a computer that's not on your network, such as a VPS or even a library computer if you want to do a quick check and don't need software to do it.

------------------------------

So I was mostly trying to come up with some rebuttals to the asinine claims that run rampant in this forum, many of which have been directed at you (and those users, I'm sure, will provide some rebuttal to my statements, but do keep in mind the simple logic my information is derived from), but to more specifically answer your question:
Without knowing what keywords you're targeting, the location (assuming it's a Manta listing for a local business, since most are), etc. then not much can be said about your specific listing. However, backlinks to any page can be beneficial if done correctly, with quality backlinks directed to the page (disregarding the fact that according to various moral standards, a manual backlink is "always spam" and "always low-quality," despite the fact they are proven to help with varying degrees after each Google update).

Will a single backlink improve your listing rank? Probably not. You should also make sure your Manta listing is optimized with correct text, photos, videos, keywords, etc. before worrying about how backlinks will affect it.
 
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bermuda

New Member
Your question seems a bit vague because you have not specified what kind of link, just where, with which anchor text, on what pages, whether or not they are related to your website? These issues can all have roles to play when evaluating overall values of the links. Some kinds of links may not help that much with web positions on search engines, but they could help drive a lot of quality traffic towards your website, such kinds of links can be very useful, even if they are not even crawled by search engines, like the ad types which are usually created through JavaScript.
 

Webmaster

New Member
I've been using paidforumposting.com and must say that their forum posting and blog commenting services are very helpful to build quality backlinks to your sites. I'm getting more and more traffic now. Hope their professional writers will help you, dudes.
 

PowerPlantPat

New Member
I was under the impression that creating backlinks on credible sites was still a good thing. Although they might not always convert, they do help with page rank... Why completely abandon it?
 

chrishirst

Well-Known Member
Staff member
I was under the impression that creating backlinks on credible sites was still a good thing. Although they might not always convert, they do help with page rank... Why completely abandon it?

Because you are wrong!

That hasn't been the case since 1999, sure the anchor text of links does boost rankings for that particular word or phrase, BUT the kind of links that you can get yourself, on "relevant" sites or not DON'T help that much and in recent times will actually 'hurt' your site URLs more than they might help.
 

PowerPlantPat

New Member
that much? So... do they help or not? And how can it hurt a site's URL? And if anchor text is still a viable option my question still stands, Why COMPLETELY abandon it?
 

chrishirst

Well-Known Member
Staff member
Because getting rankings for one or two words is NOT SEO!

Only the dumbarse "experts" who think it is still 1999 are stupid enough to think that 'rankings" are all that matters, links are the only way to get 'rankings' and ALL traffic has to come from Google results.

You have a choice, you can learn what SEO is for this millenium .... or you can carry on and party like it's 1999!


http://webmaster-talk.eu/articles/7-website-marketing-and-search/26-links-the-secret-life-of
 

RDB

New Member
Do some actual research. Both keyword and competitor analysis. Rankings are only useful if they can convert. If the rankings don't convert. Then there is no point.
 
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