These days, age and content presently play the most important roles in effective search engine optimization. Gone are the day one could simply stuff META tags with relevant keywords and hope for the best. As search engines have become more savvy in collecting fresh data around the Internet, it is no longer necessary to continually submit sites to search engines, so what else is left for the SEO to do to insure high rankings?

Search engines like a site with age - the longer a site is establish, the more trusted the content is deemed to be. Sites with relevant, fresh content are well-liked - the more a site has to contribute, the more attention it will receive. Yet, with these two factors is a third procedure that has always existed and has never gone out of style. A site's link popularity is equally important.

Link popularity refers not only to the number of outbound links connected to your website, but to the number of related websites that link back to yours as an important resource. The more relevant sites linking back to yours, naturally, increases your site's popularity in that particular subject in the eyes of search engines. Search engines give precedence to such websites, deeming them as authoritative sources. Therefore, it is important when building your website that you seek out relevant sources that may be interesting in linking back. The owner of a website about a particular baseball team, for example, may seek sites related to the baseball team, individual players on that team, the town where the team is based, and sites related to baseball or sports in general.

Building Link Popularity

In the matter of finding websites for potential linking relationships, sometimes it is as simple as an Internet search. However, one must be careful not to go overboard in achieving inbound linkage. Be selective of sites to contact, and establish a friendly relationship with the webmaster that does not appear overtly demanding or intrusive. If you are able to assist other sites by linking back to them, make an offer to do so. As you look for quality websites for linking, be sure that the outbound links on your website are also quality, as the quality of an outside site that links to yours also may determine your site's value in search.

Link Farms and Lists

Oftentimes in your search for potential link partners you will find websites with special "link directories" through which anybody can submit a site for inclusion. Look closely and you may find such sites have adopted a special code from a webmaster's resource site to build this directory. You may find hundreds, even thousands, of sites linked, but how many are actually relevant to the parent site?

Such directories are known as "link farms," and are often the target of spam and/or adult websites seeking to boost their own link popularity. To have a quality site associated with such a directory can be detrimental to your site's value in search, therefore it is strongly recommended to avoid these directories. It is better to have ten links from quality, trusted websites than 1000 links from spam sites, regardless of the page ranks bestowed upon them by Google or other search engines.

As thousands of new websites are launched daily, learn to sift the wheat from the chaff as you build your online relationship, and find relevant quality sites with whom you can building linking relationships. Link building is an ongoing process in SEO, and ultimately a beneficial one for all parties involved.

Kathryn Lively is an Internet specialist with CINIVA Systems (http://www.ciniva.com), a Virginia Beach website design and hosting company.