Was it our blog posts or link building?

[Pudders]

Hi all,

I have a dilemma...

I am trying to improve our rankings for our little business site after we dropped a couple of weeks back. We were well placed on first page and had been for many years. (10+). So... I decided to do some link building and also wrote a couple of blog posts.

The links were added 2 days ago (5 in total) and are only one way from my end as waiting for web masters to get back to me. The blog posts were written on blogger and added yesterday and have been shared many times (more so than usual).

Over night our rankings for most keyword searches has dramatically improved But wonder which of my additions did the work? I'm guessing the blogger posts as part of the Google family?

I want to remove the 5 links I added as not heard back from the webmasters and don't like having my site giving away one way free links but fear this may drop us again.

Any ideas, thoughts?

Thanks all.

[goodroi]

only one way from my end

So you are linking out to websites and not gaining any inbound links?

Are your improved rankings for your new blog post urls?

Regardless it is smart to develop good links AND good content. Both activities can help rankings.

I wouldn't worry about daily ranking fluctuations. I monitor general traffic trends. I use the time I save by not monitoring rankings each day to improve my sites. There are many different SEO factors and you want to do a good job with as many factors as possible.

[Pudders]

So you are linking out to websites and not gaining any inbound links?

Are your improved rankings for your new blog post urls?

Yes - I always add the links first before contacting the webmasters.. if I don't hear back from them with a reciprocal link they get removed within 4 days. I feel it's courteous to add the link first and then contact them.

My blog is linked to my main business site and it's my main site that has pushed up over night. Not the blog posts.

Google is my shop window.. if I'm not seen on the first page - people won't see us. It's a niche area also so rankings are important to us.

[netmeg]

Google is my shop window.. if I'm not seen on the first page - people won't see us. It's a niche area also so rankings are important to us.

Ok, but it's a good idea to have a plan B and even a plan C, just because you don't control Google, and if something goes south, you don't want to be out of business.

Me, I link out to anything that's useful for my users, whether they link back to me or not. Seems to work.

[Pudders]

Me, I link out to anything that's useful for my users, whether they link back to me or not. Seems to work.

Interesting.... but obviously no gain to your site if they don't link back. Surely it's more beneficial to have them link back.

I'm just concerned that I will have too many one way links with no gain and Google will demote the site.

[EditorialGuy]

I'm just concerned that I will have too many one way links with no gain and Google will demote the site.

It seems to me that you're engaged in a pretty obvious (and easily detected) pattern of link-building. Your links aren't "freely given editorial links," they're link exchanges: You link to site B, and if site B doesn't link back, your link to site B disappears after a few days. And when you do get links, those links aren't "freely given editorial links," either: They're just reciprocal links, and as such they're probably being discounted by Google.

[netmeg]

Interesting.... but obviously no gain to your site if they don't link back. Surely it's more beneficial to have them link back.

No, it's more beneficial for me to provide resources for my users than worry about whether the resources link back to me. (Plus my business model and content is useful enough that I get plenty of freely given links, even from .gov sites) I'm afraid your SEO thinking sounds more like 2007 or earlier than what we're doing in 2015. Build for the users, not for Google.

[Pudders]

Thanks netmeg.. appreciate your comments and will take on board. ...Now, wheres my hover-board!