A high Search Engine Ranking is the goal of every webmaster, however, the Engines are now using algorithms that are designed to do one thing efficiently. Give the searcher the relevant information they are seeking.

Who decides what's relevant? The search engines of course. How do they decide which sites are relevant and which are not? If I knew that, I would be in Forbes Magazine under B for billionaire! Don't worry though, there are some highly acclaimed scholars who swear it's easy to figure out.

The word on the street is, a relevant site is one that meets and satisfies the searcher's inquiry enough where they can safely discontinue their search. Your site becomes relevant when other trusted sites in that niche give you a vote of confidence by linking to you.

They do this because your website contains the information you say it does and is well optimized.

With that said, there are a few tried and true principles that we need to do when optimizing our website. The first of which, and the one that I always tell people to concentrate on is getting quality, 1 way links pointing to your website. Google et al love one way links!

The more quality links you can get pointing to your website, the higher you will rank, period.

While there are many black hat tricks and tactics that you can do for short term gain, I would suggest NOT spending your time on those things. I would focus my entire effort on figuring out how to get other websites to link to yours without you linking back to them. That is the biggest key to ranking well in Google, Yahoo, and MSN.

The search engines now, highly favor, websites that have large numbers of quality, one way links pointing to them. A one way link is viewed much as a vote of confidence for your website.

Because this is the case, it's absolutely critical that we consistently try to get other websites to link to us, WITHOUT us linking back to them, otherwise known as reciprocal linking.

Yes, reciprocal linking is becoming less and less valuable. Submitting your website to free directories is an excellent way to get, quality, 1 way links pointing to your websites.

Here's a little known secret, many of the website directories online have a high page rank (PR), and have been online for several years, making them trusted sites by Google. A trusted site is less likely to be spammy.

GOOD versus BAD LINKS

These are the two most important criteria for determining what a good link is, as compared to a bad link. These two criteria are:

1. The age of the website linking to you
2. The Page Rank of the website giving you the i way link. 

With that said, many of these web directories have BOTH a high Page Rank AND are old websites, giving them more authority and trustrank in the search engines.

Obtaining links from these sites can create a win-win opportunity for you, enhance your Link Popularity and at the same time be given some credibility by trusted sites.

Learning about 1 way links was the easy part. Getting them is easier said that done. One of the easiest known ways we know to get quality, one way links is by finding website directories and then submitting your webpage url to them. However, be aware, this can be a very tedious albiet rewarding process.

You do have a few choices here. You can either submit your website to these directories manually, something I consider a huge waste of time, you can pay someone to do it for you, this tto me is a huge waste of money, OR you can use one of the website directory submission programs out there.

The best program for the money that we've found is located here "Get 1-Way Links now".This application was created by renouned internet marketing expert, Brad Callen and it will allow you to submit your website to over 1700 website directories and growing.

Just imagine the incredible amount of time this would save you if it was done manually! You simply enter your website details into the software once, and then select the directory you would like to submit to. The software will then, automatically fill in all of the submission criteria for each directory and allow you to quickly submit your site.

Not only does this save you time in submitting your site, but it also saves you a huge amount of time just locating the free directories online!

I highly suggest grabbing a directory submission program if you decide to take advantage of one of the easist ways to get quality, 1 way links to your website. It's free, (except for the small cost of the application) and best of all it overdelivers.

Get 1-Way Links now!

I Saved The Good News For Last!

There are two versions of the software. The first version is the Free Version. You are limited to approximately 350 directories.

The Paid Version has no limit on the number of directories you can submit to. Presently it's at over 1700 and is still growing.

You now have no excuse!

All the best,

M. Lucienne, webmaster, Toucanwebhosting.com