Do links to Blog articles help that much?

[ATMOSMarketing56]

So here's my question/scenario.. When it comes to link-building, I'm noticing a trend that goes like this:

If you have a website like www.insurancelondonontario.com and you want to rank highly for the target phrase 'insurance london ontario', you need to get links with that anchor-text pointing to the index page, which is the page you want to rank for that keyword.

But what I'm noticing, is that a lot of link builders use a strategy where they create a good piece of content.. like "10 Ways to Decrease your Car Insurance Premiums" within the blog, and then build links to that article since it's easier as it's a good piece of content.

My question is.. how much can this really help you to rank for 'insurance london ontario' if all your doing is building links to that blog article, and not the main page? I know it helps the overall domain authority, but is it enough to get you ranking for your goal phrase, or is it just a supporting method?

[EGOL]

• Do you still have good success by just doing content?

Yes.  We have a few niche retail sites and an info site that are all competitive in their niches.

• How much content do you usually need to produce before you start seeing good rankings for shorter-tail keywords?

It is not about quantity.  It is all about quality.  When  we put up content it is usually the best page on the web for the keyword that we are targeting.  We post it onto the site, it usually does not rank very well at first, but a year or so later many of the pages that we have made are at the top of Google.   Some are not.   Put up the pages and don't worry about them.  If they are good their rankings usually rise.

• Would this same strategy work in a local setting (ex. 'insurance London, Ontario')? or is it mainly for global/national sites, where location of visitors is irrelevant?

If I was going after local terms I would be using local search optimization methods.   Most of the queries that we are going after have nothing to do with a local service or product.

• How do you promote the content that you've created?

Post everything that you do on your homepage.  Send it to everybody who knows you (and has opted in).  We have a couple of blogs that each get several posts per day.  All of those posts automatically displayed on relevant pages across out site.  They go out to twitter and FB.... we also have email and RSS feed subscribers.  We use addthis buttons all over the site to make it very easy for visitors to share.

A few times per year we have a topic that we are excited about and will submit it to sites like reddit, digg, slashdot.  That usually doesn't work - but when it does the traffic is great.

• Finally, do you work on multiple sites, or just for one company?

I only work on my own sites.

[ATMOSMarketing56]

Thanks for those analogies, they helped. I guess the answer, like almost every other SEO answer is... 'it depends'. That's interesting that you say you don't do link building though. Now I have a few questions about that

• Do you still have good success by just doing content?

• How much content do you usually need to produce before you start seeing good rankings for shorter-tail keywords?

• Would this same strategy work in a local setting (ex. 'insurance London, Ontario')? or is it mainly for global/national sites, where location of visitors is irrelevant?

• How do you promote the content that you've created?

• Finally, do you work on multiple sites, or just for one company? You seem to be quite respected on moz, yet I can't find out a damn thing about you haha. (feel free to PM if you don't want it splattered all over the public forum)

Appreciate the help!

[EGOL]

My question is.. how much can this really help you to rank for 'insurance london ontario' if all your doing is building links to that blog article, and not the main page?

Using Wikipedia as an example.... When they place a new page on their site it will often rank well in competitive SERPs based almost totally on links that hit other parts of their website.  Domain level factors such as authority and trust make these new pages rank well.

I know it helps the overall domain authority, but is it enough to get you ranking for your goal phrase, or is it just a supporting method?

Is it enough to get you ranking?   This method is like trying to sink a boat, but instead of dropping bombs that will blast a hole in the boat you instead drop bombs beside the boat hoping to splash enough water in to sink it.  Not very effective by itself.

However, I think that it is a good supporting method because every one of those links helps and a website that has 100% of the links pointed to its homepage will not look like as fine of a resource as a website that has a diversity of domains linking to pages all over the site.

This is the method that I am using on one of my sites.  I don't do link building.  Instead, I simply produce content that slowly accumulates links and causes the entire site to slowly rise in the rankings.  It's not a fast way to get your homepage ranking but I am slowly saturating the SERPs for all of the minor queries.  The long-term results work well.