How to Manage Link Trades

A link exchange campaign has to be managed very intelligently!

Managing a 6 week to 6 month campaign is not a simple job to complete. If you don't have the time or patience to apply your full attention to exchanging and managing links, then an alternate solution may involve contracting out this portion of your web marketing campaign.

For more information on this subject please see my article on Reciprocal Linking.

Build a Link Exchange Directory or Page

Create a link exchange page for your web site. If you exchange links often, consider links categorization or a directory/resources page. Keep in mind that if there is categorization, that separate page for each sub-categor should be created. Huge links pages with hundreds of non-categorized links are very annoying to web surfers, even if they are theme related. Any category can have a sub-category, and you should do that. There is also a poor chance that search engines will NOT index a page with hundreds of links and no content, because that page looks like a FFA page! Good categorized directories will not only create more relevant unique pages, but will also attract link partners to your site wishing to be placed in your unique categorized directory.

Make sure you place a link from your HOME page to your links pages or directory home. If you do not place a link to your directory, your links pages will never get indexed and no one will want to be placed within a directory that's being hidden from a search engine spider. In essence, you wouldn't be providing a quality referral to your link partners and thus you will find it very hard to acquire good links back to your site in re turn.

Try to obtain more incoming links than outgoing by creating a second site and use it as a reference to your services and create a directory for reciprocal link trading. From this site offer valuable one way links to link partners in exchange for the link partners link to your main site. Direct one way links are believed to be more valuable than reciprocal link and you should try to obtain as many incoming links as apposed to out going links.

A great software application tool to make this job so much easier is provided by 123LinksManager. 123Linksmanger helps you identify unethical link partners that are hiding your links on their pages, validates links daily for reciprocation, has the ability to manage multiple domains and directories at once, manage one way, two way and three way link opportunities and more.

Please view my article on How To Create One Way Non Reciprocal Links for more information.

Index Your Web site!

Most webmasters will not even entertain a link exchange request if your site is not even indexed within the major search engines. Even though you need link exchanges to boost your listing within a search engine, try to reciprocate some links before submitting your site and then after your indexed start your reciprocal link campaign.

Point Quality Links to Your Home Page

Since search engines will rank your optimized pages based on the number of quality links pointing to those pages, make sure you require/point all quality links to your home page. To avoid any backlash or any misconception that you may be trying to set-up a Free for All or Link Farm from the search engine algorithms point all the other links not related to your site to separate pages you wish to optimize.

Lessen the Burden of Exchange

Provide your link exchange information in a very clear manner. Some webmasters are providing the HTML code to be included for the link and this will lessen the burden of fixing broken links. You need to provide at least your URL, link text (key-phrases should be included) and a short description of your web site. We do not recommend exchanging a small image or banner, since text links are more valuable than graphical links. If you do decide to provide an image for linking, make sure to provide the "alt" text for that image! An email address for a link exchange is a necessity. If you are actively exchanging links, then it will be a good idea to have a special email address just for this purpose.

Research the Web site Thoroughly

Research the web site you're exchanging links with. If that site is using a third party service for link exchange management, make sure you're getting back a link from the site you're exchanging links with and not a link from the Web sites third-party service. Third party non-relevant site links are not very valuable, and because the third-party web site is managing the link services of hundreds of different web sites, a search engine may look at the managing service as a link farm. You're basically exchanging a link for a web site that's not reciprocating in good faith and is providing a link to somebody else's web site that is not a quality related web site link. To verify, just visit their links page, and watch for an URL change/redirect in the address bar of your browser. If their URL does not begin with their domain name then they are using a third party service for links management, which means the link you are exchanging for is not going to rate high with a search engine's rating system. Most webmasters will avoid trading links with sites that do not host their own links page within their web site, but on third-party sites or services. The link from the third party that you are receiving in exchange might still generate direct traffic for your web site, but not provide an acceptable boost for a search engine's algorithm ranking. If you need a better understanding of the above, try a closer look on how search engine Page-Rank algorithms works.

The Value of One Way Third Party Links

One way third party links are very valuable in obtaining one way linking as long as the third party site has a theme related to your industry. Don't trade links with a third party site that reciprocates links for real-estate agents when your industry is in the arts and crafts. As long as you are exchanging links with relevant sites third party links are very beneficial. Some webmasters agree that one day; third party links will weigh even greater than reciprocal links, which may become obsolete in the near future! Better to get as many as you can today, because tomorrow when the big search engines decide to make another large adjustment to their algorithms you won't be left in the dust entirely and fall clear off the face of any relevant search results. Please see my article on one way linking for more information.

Visit Other Link Exchange Networks

It's a good idea to visit some Link Exchange networks and chat forums dedicated to links trade and/or link popularity. A great deal can be learned from individuals involved daily in direct web link exchange. Too much information is not enough, having knowledge is power, information makes you stronger and experience is invaluable.