For some years now Google and the other main search engines have recognised the ‘nofollow’ tag as an attribute for hyperlinks between web pages and this is now commonly being used by blogs and other websites that attract user comments. It’s therefore an important consideration for link building campaigns and something that needs to be checked within the source code of any page that offers potential links.

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Links are an essential but often overlooked factor when it comes to online marketing.

Whether your website is just starting out, or even if it has some maturity, it’s well worth regularly reviewing the state of your link health. Having a strong profile of quality, relevant inbound links will do wonders for your visibility, helping you to rank well in search engine results as well as driving traffic directly to your site.

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At the end of 2006, the Open Directory (DMOZ) suffered a major server crash which, combined with insufficient backup data, resulted in new submissions being suspended for at least 6 weeks. The site is now back functioning again but questions are being raised about the future of this directory.

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The number and quality of links pointing to a website is a key factor that search engines take into account when ranking websites. It is challenging for business websites to build these inbound links, and in the past many have looked to submitting to ‘directory’ type websites, or building reciprocal links with others.

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As the use of search engines becomes more common, they are increasingly taking the role of online ‘Yellow Pages’ directories, helping users find local products or services. If your business targets a specific town or region, how can you make sure that your site is found in these results through natural or PPC listings? Also, how can you minimise the amount of paid traffic to your website from people who are in the wrong location?

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Most of you are probably aware that inbound links to a website can generate extra visitors. However, relevant inbound links from other popular websites are also an important factor used by major search engines to determine a site’s position in their results lists.

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So which search tools dominate the market and attract most searches?

Of course Google is usually quoted by people as the search tool of choice.
Indeed, this engine has established a very strong position in the last few years
as the main players have consolidated together, so that today search is focused
through a small number of sites.

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