Is Link Building Still Important for Search Engine Optimization?

There have been a number of articles and blog posts written recently about whether ‘SEO is dying’ and whether ‘link building is dead’. As Google’s main algorithms have always come down to the volume and quality links pointing to sites as a signal in which to help rank them for certain keywords, this prospect has caused a bit of worry for those who work in the industry.

However, in this blog post we will argue that link building is still very important for SEO in 2013, and will remain so for a long while yet.

Google still counts links as a signal

And it will do for the foreseeable future! The fact is that Google became such a highly successful search engine because of the linking signals algorithm – i.e. it ordered sites based on the popularity it had gained from elsewhere. Whilst other search engines were focusing on the websites themselves (with some highly spammy sites ranking easily for competitive keywords), Google decided it needed to do something different in order to provide results that its users really wanted. This has always been the case and is the reason that it enjoys as much as 90% of the UK search market share. Therefore, it’s highly unlikely that it will all of a sudden change what has made it so popular overnight.

There are more dangers with some link building techniques

It is true however that since the ‘Penguin’  algorithm (along with its subsequent updates) was first introduced early last year that certain types of link building do come with an increased element of risk. For example, before you could get away with submitting your site to hundreds, if not thousands of directory websites and expect to see an improvement in your rankings with no risk of being penalised. Now however, while this technique can still work, the positive impact is only likely to be temporary, i.e. until you get caught by Google. Many, understandably, do not want to risk their sites being banned from the search engine and therefore do not even entertain the idea of using such off-site techniques.

Try ‘pulling’ techniques rather than ‘pushing’

So what can you do instead? Well, Google’s head of web spam Matt Cutts has always argued that if you create a great website with excellent content, your website will do well in the rankings. And in many cases he has a point – if the content on your site is imaginative enough, it is possible to gain more visitors and a higher level of interest, which in turn will lead to more natural linkage from those genuinely interested in what you have to say, or what you are selling on your website. SEO link building perhaps isn’t ‘dead’ then, but it’s fair to say that the way we do it may need to change.