Is traffic useful without links?
-
We have many articles on our sites that bring in a large volume of traffic but bring no links.
As an example we wrote an article about the hottest cities in the world. The article brings in over 1000 hits a month on Google and people spend an average of 4 minutes on the page and never return and never link to it.
The article also doesn't bring in business because the company sell Air Conditioning.
From an SEO point of view should we focus any time at all on writing articles that are useful for the internet community that bring in traffic but don't bring in many (any) links?
-
I had a big laugh with your May 2011 entry. These are definately shareable/viral, especially in the hvac community (hvac-talk.com and other forums). You really do need to add share buttons all over the page.
Being a local air conditioner service business, I can sympathize with how dull our content can be. I too get traffic from all over but few links or shares. You should be miles ahead because of your humor (my posts tend to be pedantic). I wouldn't mind sending a link your way in a future blog post.
-
Really appreciate your comments.
-
I would make a temperature chart of the year for lots of big cities, showing on them the "air conditioning season". Post these on your website but more important give them to other air conditioning businesses to post on their website (with their branding and a linkback to you). These would be locked .pdf documents that you produce.
-
Like the EGOL humour plus agree with EGOL 100% here. 100 hits and getting Facebook like is pretty good reward. I assume that you are linking within your site as well to keep people on the site.
And to answer your question you should always try and write articles that are useful to the Internet community but also to you. Socialize the pages as suggested but if you can write this quality on cities I am sure that you can also write it on Air Conditioners.
-
My reactions to this are.....
You are successful.
Slap adsense on those pages to make a little money.
Examine the quality of those pages to determine if they are likable linkable tweetable. How could you change them to make them more sharable?
Maybe your best talents are not in air conditioning? Would your time be better spent writing a website about fun topics?
-
Turn up the heat with the social buttons maybe have set at top and set at bottom, play around with it, have some text pointing to the share buttons 'share with your friends', you get the point.
-
It's funny you mention that, I just noticed that it has brought in 20+ facebook likes / tweet, so maybe not so useless.
-
Put some social tools around the content and try to get visitors to share the article, this will generate social signals which in turn effect SEO.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Disavowing Links
I need some advice... I've noticed our link profile has increased with many comments links --- something I certainly have not pursued manually. I'm new to disavowing links. However, before I go ahead and disavow them, I'd like to ask how harmful these links are and would you recommend this is something I can do myself (relatively novice SEO) or if you'd recommend someone who could do this for a reasonable cost. In one instance, the link from this comment thread is with the anchor text, "porn"... Certainly not something we want to rank for, haha! I look forward to your advice
Link Building | | LukeBTDT0 -
Why are bit.ly and ow.ly links showing up as Inbound Links?
Hello! I noticed this question was asked a while back (around 2013 i think), but I still don't quite understand why I'm seeing these shortened URLs come up as Inbound Links? Can someone please explain? Thanks,
Link Building | | txwildcard
Carlos0 -
Links from sites with iffy link profiles?
So the site http://www.cadenas.de/ appears to have good decent scores from the various Moz ranks, but when I check out the site in OSE there are a lot of really sketchy links that jump out, online pharmacy/drug type links. I should also add that the negative links are seemingly going to a weird blog deep in the site and only appear when I select all links to the root domain in OSE. Everything about the site appears very legitimate except for the link profile which has me nervous. Would you guys pursue a link from this site?
Link Building | | CJ50 -
Are Directory links relevant?
What are everyone's thoughts on directory links now a days? I'm talking about the old tried and true ones, like Yahoo directory and DMOZ? We had previously been on a couple and removed the links, thinking it was hurting us. But we've been falling in rankings for a while now, and I'm trying to think of some ways to bring us back up (even if they're small). Do you think it would be worth it to be added back in? Anyone's thoughts on this would be appreciated.
Link Building | | Viewpoints0 -
Removing spam back links (Using GWM and SEOMOZ)
Hi, I have noticed that I have got some unwanted spammy back-links. I want to get rid of them. From what I read on Internet, there are two ways to doing it. Using disavow tool in GWM. Contacting individual webmaster and asking them to remove the mentions or links. I have already added the links in the disavow tool and Google has accepted the request. Is it necessary to ask those webmasters to remove the link as well?
Link Building | | tradestreet0 -
Links from Real Estate Websites Link Page, Do or Don't?
It seems that real estate sites have at times been under heavier scrutiny from the search engines. But real estate agents get networking, which makes acquiring those links a little bit easier. Plus with localization of search, I think real estate sites may give off a good GEO scent. Should SEO's go for links from real estate websites? Does a reciprocal link devalue said links?
Link Building | | Thos0030 -
How to Build Links without content?
Apart from Directory submission Local niche specific directory submission Community engagement Niche specific blog commenting Can I know the other ways of Link Building when we don't have content.
Link Building | | Jaymoo0