Understanding Domain Trust and Authority
Thanks for the encouraging emails I got from my last post, “Creative Link Building, Real Estate 101“. One of the questions that kept coming up was, “how do you determine domain authority / trust?” To answer this question, SEOmoz has a great video about domain trust and authority. In the video Rand explains that trust can be determined by,
“Who links to you and who you link to.”
This is an important concept towards establishing trust for your real estate website.
Linking out to trusted sites can be a difficult idea to understand. The reaction I get from most agents when I first recommend this concept is, “why would I send people away from my site once I get them there?” Well, if you link to sites with good, relevant content, those same people will come back to you because they trust you. And establishing trust with your site visitors is the premise behind getting leads from your website.
So what’s a trusted site? Sites that don’t link to other sites with spam, to name a few:
- Your Local MLS,
- Newspapers
- Schools & Universities
- Government sites
- Realtor Associations
- Non Profits
Rand goes on to explain that authority can be determined by your linking structure. A natural linking structure is going to bring the most authority to your domain. So what’s a natural linking structure?
- One that grows over time, matching the growth of your real estate business.
- And one that links to pages across your entire website (opposed to links built to only your home page).
As an agent or brokerage, you cannot expect to get a bunch of links to your website, rank high in the search engines, and “just” start doing business on the web. Ranking in the SERPs is a reflection of your business’ popularity within your target market and is something that will grow over time.
I hope I was able to answer your questions, and in the future I encourage you to leave your questions in the comments of the post.
Bob
Posted at 15:09h, 25 AprilDude, you really need to stop trying to play the role of SE expert as you either a)don’t understand the concept you are talking about, or b) aren’t following your own advice.
The way you are linking out to these ‘trusted’ sites on your own site accomplishes nothing as those links have been no-followed. The whole point of the no follow is to let Google know that you aren’t vouching for the site, so your links to those sites are pointless.
Funny though that all the links to your own network are all do follow.
Drew, totally disappointed that you let this guy mislead agents with wrong advice the way he is doing.
Justin Britt
Posted at 09:55h, 27 AprilDoing some experimenting with nofollow. All the nofollow tags to authority sites have been removed.
Dont Flame Me
Posted at 19:01h, 27 AprilJustin is spot on with what he says about SEO. Linking out to relevant websites IS a good practice. Doesnt matter is its do-follow or not.
Ignore the trolls Justin.
TR Williams
Posted at 21:46h, 27 AprilHey Bob, I actually find Justin’s advice refreshing and insightful. It is my personal belief that the reason you are so disrespectful and condescending towards him is because your friend Jeff Manson site adrhi’s got hit with a 40+ penalty and has had to unwind his questionable link strategy. For many of us ‘watchers’ it has been about time.
I find your statement of “Drew, totally disappointed that you let this guy mislead agents with wrong advice the way he is doing.”, so very amusing especially since it is my belief that the only reason you are making these statements is because you are acting as a proxy for JM and trying to to use innuendo and slander to try and get Justin’s site banned the way adrhi’s site was.
Durf Werzel
Posted at 00:25h, 28 AprilBob’s a JM proxy? You mean like the same way you are for Justin? (Or are you Justin?) And just for the record, Justin has been doing an awful lot of “unwinding” as well. You all are a bunch of spammers. And all of you will feel the pain.
Bob
Posted at 08:14h, 28 AprilAs the text above the box says, I speak MY mind, and I have never been a shill for anyone else. I have been at this online marketing gig for a whole lot longer than Justin and have seen many agents get hurt for overly aggressive and sometimes just blatantly stupid tactics.
Jeff knows that I think he has been aggressive in his approach to link building. He also knew the risk and was willing to take it. Now he deals with it and moves on. The difference is that if you asked him about linking, like any SEO who had a real clue, he would tell you the risks involved. Justin hasn’t done that. Instead, he looks for ways to justify his position and tactics, which are just as bad as the aggressive linking Jeff was doing.
I knew many of the agents who saw their AA and REW sites torched for reciprocal and 3 way linking. I saw what losing their rankings did to their business. It’s a shame that Drew is giving a platform to someone who continues to proffer wrong advice that has potentially very negative consequences.
@Dont Flame Me – linking out to sites should be natural. Linking to authority sites just for the sake of linking to them doesn’t accomplish anything, and adding a no follow was just ignorant, not an experiment. If you are going to experiment, then use a control site, because with a site like HawaiiLife, there is no way to accurately interpret anything from that exercise.
@TR – who needs innuendo when Google has spams reports? I know other agents in Hawaii who don’t like either of those two sites and have been filing spam reports on both for a while. The only real surprise here is that Jeff lasted as long as he did. The only real question now is how long will HL go before they get hit as well.
TR Williams
Posted at 10:03h, 28 AprilYea, Bob you are correct who needs innuendos and flaming to try and get a particular SEs attention. The point being that ever since adrhi went down in flames, the personal attaches on justin and his site have been numerous and relentless. In my opinion it sure looks like ‘sour grapes’ to me.
As for your concern about unsuspecting realtors — and please correct me if I am wrong — where were you speaking out about adrhi’s spoofed sub-domain when JM was offering them as reciprocal link exchange? (And that IP address sure did change quickly when the penalty arrived)
Understanding the risks vs the rewards, I guess you could rationalize that as an explanation, but some would call it stupidity or just plane recklessness. Without getting into someone’s head, the only way one could come to a conclusion would be to look into the personal history and ask if this type of ‘recklessness activity was pervasive through the persons life.
Drew Meyers
Posted at 10:03h, 28 AprilThis comment thread is getting too personal. Keep the conversation about the TOPIC, not the PEOPLE. Anything further that is personal in nature will be deleted.
Jeff Manson
Posted at 17:46h, 28 AprilNot sure why TR Williams (Justin) or who ever you are pulled me into this conversation?? Maybe to kick someone when they are down?? I think I should make a comment since you did mention me.
Yes, I did get penalized for doing a lot of aggressive linking in the same manner Justin has been defending in the two previous posts and the one here on Inman News
. It was big mistake and I am paying for it in a big way.
I have been advised that I should undo as much as I can and am following that advice. So, I have been contacting webmasters by phone & email to remove our links that were link exchanges, that I bought advertising from plus and multi page exchanges. (all the same things my competitors have been doing) In all I think we have had close to 10,000 links removed. We have also submitted all what we have done to rectify it in a re-inclusion request. One can only hope that they will have mercy on someone that has repented in there ways and is trying to do there best to correct the problem.
My advice would be to get links that make sense and stay within the search engines guidelines. Doing a link exchange from multiple city pages with targeted keyword targeted text to and from another site is running the risk of getting torched like I did. So I would definitely not recommend it!
Some of what Justin says in this post is good, but I would not have had no follows on sites that are suppose to be Authority sites (there for the user) and a pure links to partners like car rentals and stuff like that. It looks like spam whether it is or not.
It kind of feels good in a sick way to get rid of a lot of those filthy links.
Hopefully you can learn from my mistakes and not follow the same path. I wish you all the best.
Drew thanks for letting us all share!!
Mack McMillan
Posted at 15:31h, 07 MaySorry to hear about you troubles Jeff and thank you for your insight on your linking issues. I would not have found this post had it not been for a friend pointing out a forum thread flaming you in REW. Now there is the pot calling the kettle black!
You are a smart guy Jeff and I am sure you will overcome this.
Bob makes some interesting posts about RE Agents following the lead of successful site owners. All too often bad practices are emulated and although they may be tolerated by Google today, they may cause a penalty or even a banning tomorrow. And for Agents depending on their websites for income this could be financially devastating.
Although it is somewhat taboo to discuss in most circles, my biggest pet peeve on backlink schemes for real estate websites has been these Home Page Linking networks you see on many Top Ten sites in major markets. Many new Agents are copying this strategy and although Google and Matt Cutts are aware of this scam it is currently ignored by them for some unknown reason. Eventually it could well be their undoing since it is most definitely a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
It is becoming increasingly difficult to balance between good linking practices and spamming and my hat is off to anyone that is striking that balance successfully. For those like Jeff that are viewed as a SEO Guru one day and fallen the next, let Jeff’s words serve as both a warning and inspiration. Learn from your mistakes, pick yourself up, dust yourself off and get to work on reversing any damage.
Bob
Posted at 19:46h, 27 JuneIt is important to note the difference between banned and penalized. Jeff’s site was penalized, not banned.
mdea
Posted at 04:32h, 21 SeptemberI feel that beyond the domain trust rank and authority, there's a third factor that is taking more and more value nowadays, it's truly the behavior of your visitors. We talk a lot about the importance and the way the search engines like the social media sites, well who drive those sites if not human visitors?
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