Can Any Inbound Linking Hurt My Ranking?

One of the largest myths on search engine optimization is whether or not inbound links can hurt your ranking. Whether because people misunderstand what an inbound link is or what role it plays in ranking a website, this will always be one of those myths that, no matter how hard anyone tries, no one will ever be able to dispel the truth of. The simple answer is no. Inbound links cannot harm your search engine ranking.

We can be pretty sure of this answer because if inbound links did have the potential to harm your ranking, it would give any underhanded competitor the perfect opportunity to work against their competitors’ sites. Just think of a scenario where your competition would be able to link to your site continuously from spam, low-quality pages, thereby damaging your credibility and visibility in search results. This would then create a very unequal ground to play. That is why, for instance, Google does not penalize sites for inbound links. Instead, Google focuses on the quality and relevance of the inbound links. But outbound links can harm your ranking. If you link to sites using some sort of underhanded or dubious SEO technique, you risk punishment. This can include blacklisting by Google, which would greatly complicate your SEO. So, by all means, link out only to reputable, trusted sites. Just research the links properly before establishing them because they’ll only exist if they support what you believe in.

Nevertheless, after a decade or so in the internet industry, we have noticed a sad trend that most websites are created without any design intent or purpose. This will be an e-business failure to build an excellent online identity. Your website is not only a lot of pages, rather it’s directly a reflection of your brand. If it looks amateur or unrewarding, visitors to your website may believe products or services from your end are similar. On the other hand, extreme use of bright effects and highly complex designs can make a website take ages to load. Few customers are very patient when websites take too long to load, but all are not,  many will close their browser window in frustration. According to various studies, this problem is the real cause of losing billions of dollars annually on e-commerce sites. Loss of potential customers is a sort of cost associated with a slow-loading page. Therefore, there is a need for a balance between design and performance. Content is the king of attraction and retention of visitors to your site. Whatever visitor comes to your website is looking for something specific, whether it be information, a product, or even a service. If they cannot find what they are looking for quickly, they will leave and go elsewhere. To keep visitors interested and engaged, you must have fine, relevant content that deals with the needs of the visitor.

Content should also not only be informative but engaging. It should show your passion for your business as well as your competence within your field. Such authenticity leads to a trusting audience and makes them crave.

Moreover, when building a great website, there are also common design mistakes you should avoid. One huge mistake is simply using your website’s name as anchor text. Change it to relevant keywords for better SEO. This increases the chance that search engines will quickly understand what your site is all about and will get you in front of any potential customers. Another mistake is keyword saturation with too many words in the anchor text. Google also assigns value to every word used in the anchor text, and many filler words can dilute your targeted keywords. Choose a few preferred words and let those elevate your rankings, but don’t go overboard by using too many keywords to load up your anchor text.

Another critical factor is loading speed. From the discussion earlier, it was pointed out how slow-loading sites cost a lot in terms of revenue. It has been reported that e-commerce sites lose billions yearly because customers click away from such sites due to lagging pages. Ensure your website loads as quickly as possible by minimizing the number of graphics and other inactive content elements that may cause the site to lag. Lastly, don’t forget the power of META tags. Adding proper META tags to every page of your site makes the search engine better able to understand your content. A surprising eighty percent of all visitors to websites come through eight major search engines. Thus, optimizing your pages with proper META tags can be a great step toward increasing the chances of getting more visitors to your site.

However, color choice greatly depends on the overall user experience. Your text must be readable over the background and your site has to be consistent in the colors used on each page. Other colors associate with other moods-bright colors such as yellow and orange are bound to set a cheerful mood, while blues and purples are sure to have a soothing effect. Select colors that would best help you set the desired mood for your visitors. Another vital aspect of web design is navigation. It should be easily and intuitively navigated to take the user directly to the point where they are going. Position navigation links consistently, either on the top, bottom, or side of the page. Graphic buttons tend to increase the number of graphics used, hence decreasing the loading speed of the page. If you have many links, it’s often better to use text links for faster navigation.

Lastly, it is very important to keep your visitors interested and give them useful content that compliments your website to create a quality e-book. Therefore, if you can share your knowledge and passion in an e-book designed well, then definitely more visitors shall be attracted to you, and this will help you emerge as an authority in the field where you have expertise. If you are focused on sales, home-based business, or something else, then writing for your expertise will help your visitors besides building a reputation for your brand.

So, you need to invest in an elaborately designed, content-rich website for the success of your e-business. The money you spend on improvements to your website will turn into sales and more visitors eventually. Ensure your website reflects your brand’s values and professionalism. A good website will keep the difference between your online presence and put you in good stead with all the other electronic businesses.