Trusted Links
The Dom Perignon of backlinks - at Tesco Value prices!
What are trusted links?
A trusted link is an incoming link from a site which is considered a “trusted” source. These can be government (.gov) or
education (.edu) sites or can even be sites which have been around for a long time and high a high pagerank value – like the
BBC. Whilst pagerank alone does not necessarily directly affect a site’s position on the search engine results page (SERP) the amount of backlinks from a trusted source will do.
Why are trusted links better than any other link?
Search engines – specifically Google – take into account the pagerank of the referring website and passes on the pagerank, This is called the “bleeding effect” and is roughly determined by:
- Pagerank of the referring site
- The number of outbound links on the referring page
- The "trust" rating of the referring site.
The trust rating (according to Google) is based on the registration and creation dates of the website as well as consistent content. Trust ratings are also directly affected by the site’s own trusted backlinks.
Primarily this means that spending time obtaining a link from a site which has no pagerank or does not register on the search engines becomes a waste of time (unless that site delivers targeted content to your niche market and the link is not used for SEO).
Below is an example of how Google weights backlinks in terms of bleeding pagerank:
- Site 1 – Pagerank of 5 but has 50 links on the page bleeds: 0.0012 PR
- Site 2 – Pagerank of 5 but has 10 links on the page bleeds: 0.430 PR
- Site 3 – Pagerank of 5 but has only 2 links on the page bleeds: 0.776 PR
This bleeding effect is greatly heightened by having backlinks from a more “trusted” source. Google seems to add extra weight to various top level domain types (TLDs) – for instance a link from a .org site weighs slightly higher, whereas a link from a .edu or .gov site is significantly higher. Below is the same weighting example but based on backlinks from a .gov or .edu site:
- Site 1 – Pagerank of 5 but has 50 links on the page bleeds: 0.4352 PR
- Site 2 – Pagerank of 5 but has 10 links on the page bleeds: 0.88721 PR
- Site 3 – Pagerank of 5 but has only 2 links on the page bleeds: 1.176 PR
This shows the importance of obtaining backlinks from not just a high pagerank site but also from a trusted source.
How can I get more trusted links?
The easiest way to get backlinks from trusted sources is to ask for them. Work out any affiliations you have with accredited bodies or any partnerships/friends/clients that would have a higher trust site. Examples of these are Chambers of Commerce websites, council sites, local colleges or universities etc. The worst they can say is no!
Serious trusted link building services
Serious Ideas offer the following trusted link building services
- Trusted link site research
- Competitor link analysis
- Co Citation
- Analysis of existing links
Let us help you build Serious amounts of trusted links
Phone: (+44) 01932 835850
Top Tip
Find trusted sites which link to your competitors and contact them to see if they would add your link to the same space – this would also help your
co citation!
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