Online Link Values – What’s Important?

Writing by Nick Stamoulis Tweet

Wiep Knol borrowed an idea from SEOmoz and asked several search engine optimization experts to participate in an online symposium to discuss what influences link value. It’s an interesting read.

According to Wiep’s scorecard, the following 10 factors are the most important where link value is concerned:

1. Robots.txt excluded page (DF) – 4.75
2. Anchor text – 4.56
3. Link is on penalized page (DF) – 4.50
4. Page authority (in inbound links) – 4.38
5. Domain authority (in quality of backlinks) – 4.38
6. Amount of outbound links on page – 4.25
7. Total amount of links on page – 4.06
8. Age of domain – 4.06
9. Relevant authority (in rankings on relevant keywords) – 3.94
10. Javascript link (DF) – 3.88

I don’t see any surprises on this list. I think most SEOs and internet marketers would agree that anchor text is one of the most important influences on the value of an inbound link. The robots.txt exclusion is also a big influence, but if you rely on that completely then I think you’ll be disappointed in the long run.

What I didn’t see on the link value factors is any discussion on whether or not a link comes from the same domain (an internal link) vs. whether or not it is an offsite link. That would be an interesting discussion. Nevertheless, the Wiep Knol’s link symposium is a good read, but you have to take it all with a grain of salt. As Ralph Tegtmeier says:

“Link building research is indeed very important. However, an isolationist approach that views links as, well: isolated factors (no matter how many influencing variables you may slap on) is always problematic in terms of fundamental methodology and the results garnered thereby. Search results ranking and, by inference, SEO is a highly complex process governed by a multitude of interrelated non-linear factors more akin to chaos mathematics and fuzzy logic than to linear “Newtonian” or “Aristotelian” models of thought. Thus, any such research should be taken with a very big grain of salt.”

Link value, like so many other things search engine optimization, is relative. Any attempt to objectify the criteria and apply them across the board is a waste of time.