Links are an important component in an online marketing campaign. Websites usually need a significant number of quality links to perform well in organic search rankings. Once upon a time, high-quality links were plentiful. But with the growth of the web, and an ever-increasing number of competing websites, garnering link love and attention is a time-consuming and tedious process.

There are 4 different types of links that web designers can work to obtain…

1. One-Way Links

A one-way link is a hyperlink from one website to another. For example, Website A links to Website B.

Undeniably, these are the best kind of links for a website to have, albeit the most difficult type of link to obtain. A website will usually need to contain unique and compelling content in order for another website to link to it without any payment or reciprocal returning link, but beware of non-trusted web sites that will link to you. You only want trusted and well ranked web sites to link to you.

2. Reciprocal Links

Reciprocal links are when two websites exchange links. For example, Website A links to Website B; and Website B links to Website A.

The value of reciprocal links is questionable, as you are essentially ‘trading’ links. Some search engines track the link patterns, and consider reciprocal links as “exchanges”. Many web designers believe that search engines place a lower value on reciprocal links than for one-way links, which is why their value is questionable.

3. Paid Links

Paid links are just that: links that are purchased. For example, Website A gives $ to Website B; then Website B links to Website A.

Compensatory links range from purchased text links to pay-per-click links, where a webmaster pays for clicks that are generated from the link. The upside to paid links is that they are not difficult to obtain if you are willing to pay. You can also control the rate in which the links increase, and how long the paid links last. The downside is that major search engines discourage webmasters from purchasing text links outright (most search engines accept pay-per-click links). In fact, if a search engine suspects that a website is trying to “buy” their way to the top of their organic rankings by manipulating the number of websites linking to a web page, they may ban the website from the search engine.

4. Network Links (3-Way)

Network links are links that are triangulated. For example, Website A links to Website B; Website B links to Website C; and Website C links to Website A.

Network links are an expansion of link exchanges, and generally make it more difficult for a search engine to discern the link patterns. As a result, search engines may assess the value of network links as one-way links rather than the reciprocal links that they really are. Excessive use of network links can be more easily identified by search engines.

Most web designers incorporate all the link types into their linking strategy.

Source : Marta Strickland (paraphrased)
I have Bold-ed the semantic information in this post

What the Semantic Web — or Web 3.0 — Can Do for Marketers
Whatever You Call It, Get Ready for Greater Relevance

It’s been nearly 10 years since Tim Berners-Lee, who is credited with inventing the worldwide web, expressed his vision of a “semantic web,” in which all web data — and the meaning of that data — could be read by machines. Since then, much of the slow-moving progress toward this smarter and more powerful web has been courtesy of academics and data librarians.

Semantic web is just one of a few things often referred to as Web 3.0 — others include topics like data portability or mobile web. But I think entrepreneur Nova Spivack offered the most useful definition by simply calling it the third decade of the web (2010 to 2020) and referring to the technology trends that will hit maturity during that time. Most importantly, the next generation of the web will bring us out of information overload and be more relevant and meaningful.

Semantics refers to the meaning behind data. Right now, computers are good at sending data back and forth but not great at discerning the meaning of that data. Semantic web aims to change that. Perhaps it’s best explained in describing what marketers can hope to gain from it.

Improving Ads
Has your contextual advertising turned into a contextual nightmare? Current contextual advertising depends heavily on keywords. Sure, it seems safe to buy a word like “feet” — until your ad comes up right next to a story about severed feet. What if there were a technology that could analyze what is really being said on the page?

By using natural language processing and artificial intelligence, semantic advertising solutions, like Peer39, can look at the structure of a sentence and interpret word meaning and sentiment. Semantic text analysis relies on synonyms and relationships between concepts, rather than rudimentary keyword scanning. Identifying sentiment is becoming invaluable for advertising on user-generated sites such as blogs, where you wouldn’t want to place ads on a negative post.

Online advertising has another obstacle to overcome: information overload. We live in a world where information evolves at an alarming rate and, let’s face it, consumers trust each other far more than they trust advertising messaging. So how do we dynamically pull smarter and more relevant content into ads?

That’s where the efforts like Dapper MashupAds come into play. In addition to pulling from a brand site database, the dynamically generated ads can scan social content sites like Yelp and Flickr for the newest (positive) reviews and photos of your restaurant. It’s the power of your brand message only promoted by your consumers.

Improving Measurement
One of the toughest marketing challenges of recent times has been in measuring the success of social media. How do you measure the success of a human conversation? We can measure reach (visits, views, clicks, downloads). We can also measure exposure or buzz (what people are saying about our brand). But it’s inside those walled gardens that everything interesting is happening: How strong is the community? Are members active? Are we changing their minds? Changing their actions?

It’s the tough nut of the new marketing conversation, but Web 3.0 might be the key to cracking it.

Semantic technology is able to pull together connections between words and phrases. How often is concept “X” said in the same breath as concept “Y”? Measurement tools will be moving away from the tag cloud, and we’ll be able to immerse ourselves in the trends of the real conversation, not just the keyword of the day.

Next, there is the dilemma of message velocity; i.e., how far is my message traveling and how fast? Sure, that’s an easy thing to do when you are measuring a viral video or widget but what about a conversation? Semantic technology builds on meaning, not keywords. And so it doesn’t matter if your followers say, “The new Batman movie is going to be awesome” or “You have to see the ‘Dark Knight’ trailer”; semantic buzz tools will tie the conversation together.

Sentiment analysis is an increasingly popular tool in the marketer toolbox. And its next generation will look at the entirety of a comment or an article, from whom it came and to whom it was directed. It will use natural language processing and analysis of meaningful relationships to distinguish the “good” comments from “bad.”

And what about building a community of loyal enthusiasts? What about creating a relationship with your customers? Companies like Chat Mine measure the connections between members of the community and between people and concepts. By looking at both friending and popular dialogue, it can tell you if your brand brought a community together in passionate conversation.

When O’Reilly coined the term Web 2.0, the marketing world divided into skeptics and enthusiasts. And a wave of start-ups began rolling out under the 2.0 moniker. It’s only wise to fear the same for semantic web or Web 3.0. As nightmares of books and white papers race through your mind, it’s important to separate the reality from the hype.

The successful technologist won’t approach the marketer with buzzwords. He won’t throw out phrases like “dynamic ontologies” or “semantic triples.” Because good semantic technology is like movie editing — you aren’t supposed to notice it’s there but it fundamentally changes the experience. So when someone approaches you about a “smarter” semantic solution, make sure they can answer this:

How will this make my ads more relevant and my metrics more meaningful?

Strengthen. Empower. Amplify.

We are living in transformative times. Social media influences mind decisions…there is more persistence of information…now opinions are out in the world on an exponential scale. Leveraging those opinions and gaining loyalty for your brand or small business, when done positively, will surely boost sales and business potential.

Respond out loud (blog) if your good and it’s worthy of sharing, people will look at it and do the marketing for you. It can change your web design’s emotional outlook and hopefully that of your potential customers. Things that people can relate to, especially if they are honest and real; become viral. This means that if people are compelled by your content, then they will be compelled to share your content, resulting in free marketing for you.

This already is conventional and is today’s public relations in today’s marketplace.
Make sure people know your integral value !

Strengthen, empower, amplify refers to :
Trusted relationships through your web design and creative strategy.

Find the people who are already looking for what you are talking about or offering.
In-bound marketing.
In the past marketing was solely placed around TV and radio, newspaper ads and HTML emails— these forms of marketing really hit people over the had with your marketing message. These old school way of marketing are becoming more and more less effective due to TiVO, spam filters, DVR, and customized content becomming overwhelmingly popular and the norm. So we now look toward placing marketing and ads, in places that are already reaching your targeted audience.

Meet people and start conversations. Answer questions and help others, from this trust is gained and a relationship is likely to be formed. Social media is the business networking event of now! In the past at a networking event or a cocktail party your reach is limited…now your reach is much much broader, more authentic and personal, if done properly it is a much more effective conversation with “real people”. Engage genuinely and interact with people, build authentic relationships, add personality, and converse with your audience.

Reasons for blogs:

• Showcase your personality
• Create a feedback cycle
• Build a loyal community
• Create an emotional investment
• Increase your credibility

Be proactive…whatever industry you’re in, start building relationships now in the community because you may need to pitch something in the future. While blogs are now considered mainstream with more businesses using them to get their message out if you don’t have one start today! And don’t forget to engage in customer conversations and respond to negative comments.

What about facebook?

http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php

Create a business page, become a fan of your page to affiliate yourself with the business page. Create an engaging page…no body cares about you or your services except for you…so what do you do? Host events, videos, discussions, articles…things of interest and things that engage people with your content. Leverage the viral nature of things like news feeds and social bookmarking features…..engage your users and fans…that activity becomes published and all their “friends” get to see this, further extending your reach.

A few tips on your business page with facebook:

• Create your ad…add social actions.
• Choose PPC beacuse CTRs are very low on facebook.
• Find the URL then make a “find us on facebook” link
• Create applications that your audience will want to have, and they will pass it on