Building links for your site is a very effective way of improving your search engine ranking. When it goes wrong, however, it can result in no improvements whatsoever, even though you have spent such a long time building those links.
Here, we will look at the reasons why the links you have built may not be having the desired effect you were looking for.
Lack Of Trust
If you have used a link to a source that is considered to be untrustworthy, then that will hurt your search engine ranking. It might create the impression that you haven’t done your research properly, regardless of whether or not that is the case. It could be that the site you have used is considered to be a promotional page or potentially a page that has too many advertisements or spam. To avoid this, you need to make sure that all the sources you use are considered to be trustworthy and independent from influences such as sponsorship.
Lack Of Authority
It could simply be that the site you have linked to does not have a lot of online authority. While there was a time when Google would increase your ranking as long as your sources were relevant, now they take into account the authority of your source as well. This is why you need to make sure that any sites you find that you want to use as source material is considered to be a site of high authority. Try running some Google searches of keywords related to your source and see how high they rank. If they are on the first page of results, then it’s a good bet that you have a site that has a good solid reputation.
The Location Of Links
Many people falsely believe that having the links of their pages is all they need in order to improve their search engine ranking. This may have been the case in the past, but Google has now clamped down on their link location rules. Many sites simply decide to list their links in a sidebar, almost like a subscription feed. This is something that has been spotted by Google as simple manipulation rather than source gathering to back up an argument. So when you do find links, it’s important that they go into the body of the content. Preferably, they will go somewhere where it feels natural for the hyperlink to appear. This is generally when you are discussing the topic that is directly in the source material.
People Bounce Back
If visitors to your source are quickly leaving for whatever reason, then that will harm your search engine ranking as well. It could be for many reasons, but the main causes of a high bounce rate are a slow loading speed and a difficulty in site navigation. If the source you are using has either of these problems or indeed any others that can cause a high bounce rate, then you should probably refrain from using it. Otherwise, it can reflect badly on your site and damage your ranking.
Failure To Meet Expectations
If you are linking to a site that you are claiming has all the additional information your visitors need, the last thing those visitors want is to find something that doesn’t help them at all. It could be that it contains information that has nothing to do with what you are discussing, or that it simply is not as comprehensive as they were expecting. In any case, don’t try and make a source seem like more than what it is. If it only gave you a snippet of information, then make sure people know that’s what you used it for. Otherwise, people might start to think that you are untrustworthy, and you’re just linking for the sake of it. They might even think that you have been paid to say that a source is comprehensive when it isn’t. That is certainly something that can seriously damage your ranking.
Issues Accessing The Source
One of the worst things that can happen with your source links is that people click on them and then get nothing but an error message in response. Fortunately, this is something that you will be able to spot rather easily, so it’s not something you have to worry about during the content writing stage. It only really becomes a problem when your content and links have been live for a few weeks or months. If the site has closed down or the page has simply moved, an error message will appear and you could be completely unaware of it. This is why it is important to audit the links on your site to make sure that they are all working and are all delivering what you want them to deliver.
