SEO: is it worth it?

[volatilegx]

I've got a niche site with great search engine rankings across the whole spectrum of search engines.

However, I've come to the conclusion that links just work better. Especially unsolicited links.

Somebody linked to the site I mentioned above from a post at Hypernews.org in June last year and I've been enjoying good chunk of traffic from that one link. So much traffic, in fact, that it outpulls several major search engines.

Oh well, time to rethink some of the strategies I've been using on some of my other sites.

[NFFC]

>Somebody linked to the site

How did they know it was there?

[Macguru]

I see link trading and submission to vortals and trade directories as some service SEO professionals should offer. Those later ressources score for more than 55 % of referrals on one of my niche market sites.

Link trading is the second step after SEO.

[agerhart]

yep....link pop. Quality link pop pays off tremendously.

[TheLynxEffect]

NFFC has a damn fine point. Chances are, the people who made the link found your site from a search engine. If you don't do decent search engine prep, then they wouldn't have found it....no link....less hits!

[agerhart]

absolutely.....but you shouldn't stop there. I think that is the point that they are trying to get across.

[Liane]

At the suggestion of a very wise Brit (whom I thought was nuts when he first suggested it), I turned an old established site of mine into an "information only" site. Nearly half of all my hits come from the link to my business site from the info site!

I am also finding hits from several other sites that are linking to me. They still don't out-produce Google and MSN ... but its getting close!

Links aren't only good for page rank purposes, but if you choose wisely, they actually produce quality traffic.

[volatilegx]

Good point NFFC, I'm not saying to completely neglect SEO, I'm just saying it probably isn't my top priority now that the site is established.

[bufferzone]

Also being active in a forum like webmasterworld and having a site with a related topic/content often will creat quality links to your site (Unless of course you, like me, have chosen to make your site in a language very few people speak (about 5 mill))

[volatilegx]

I do have a site that is related to topics discussed here but I won't link to the site because it might break the rules of this forum... and I like reading/posting here too much to break the rules hehe

[rcjordan]

>like reading/posting here too much to break the rules
>
That's the plan.

I think bufferzone was referring to the profile link.

[bufferzone]

rcjordan<< I was