What is the most important thing to know when it comes to building links? I would say that currently, bloggers and everyone else who cares for SEO efforts are at the end of a learning phase: quantity < quality. It used to cost $10 for a bunch of links, and to the top results you went. Learn why it’s important to have links from relevant, and what are the real secrets to quality backlinks.

Read More: Top 6 Social Networking Sites That Will be Important in 2014

Tim from SEOWizz has a really interesting piece that talks about the future of SEO, especially in the year 2014. I was able to learn one new thing I hadn’t known before, about “return to search”. Which essentially means that every time someone goes to your page and doesn’t find it interesting, the next best page will be promoted above you. It’s still work in progress, but was interesting to learn and find out about.

The Secret to Quality Backlinks

Ask yourself these questions and really think about the answers. We are not living in the past anymore, and the quality of content you product does matter. Big brands can afford to throw millions at their marketing projects, I don’t believe that you do, make every word count and it will eventually work out.

Are Your Links Relevant?

Truly relevant? Extra attention is being put on the relevancy of links, and how often do the same links appear under the relevant threshold. Don’t just think that Google scans one page, sees a link there and goes to the next page, without accounting for that link… All those small details about sites add-up and later make the first two pages of Google results.

Avoid getting involved in shady guest blogging schemes, its easy to get your eyes blinded by the appealing relevant content, always do checks for backlinks, make sure the links to that site offering guest blogging spots are in fact relevant themselves.

Does Google Remember It?

The website you are trying to get a link from, does Google even know that such a website exists? Often webmasters fall for the trap of trying to get links from websites that have been linked on internet marketing forums. These links are not only bad, but they either have been or are being used by many people and there is barely going to be any relevancy in that mix.

Start by checking if the site is indexed in Google, then move on to checking the amount of pages indexed and when was the last time the site was indexed at all. I have noticed that there is a bit of an influx of sites that have been left for dead a year or two ago, and now are being used to build links…

I don’t believe there is much point in doing something like that, as Google now considers fresh content updates a must have.

One of a Kind Content

Alright, now we know that relevant backlinks are important, and the website that links to you should be updated on regular basis for maximum return of link juice.

Because it is becoming increasingly hard to promote content, generate links and overall come through as a professional blogger, you have to remember that the only way you will get noticed at all is by having content that people want to share and talk about.

Try and narrow down your topic of choice, keeping only the most important topics you will want to blog about. This will make it easier to create content that will be of interest to people. Big news outlets, lists sites, they can afford to write content about 100 different niches at a time, you should be focusing on developing and increasing your knowledge in what you know well.

I will be talking a lot more about content types in the coming months, content marketing is officially a thing now and there is going to be a lot to learn and understand before we can start mastering it.

Exact Match Anchor Text != Good

Before I wrap this thing up, I just want to remind you that exact match anchor text is a complete no-go and overall a bad idea. The secret to quality backlinks is not the amount of times you can get a link that has the anchor text of “diet pills”, rather “diet pills for men over 30”.

Long-tail keywords are also increasing in popularity and is a good way to invest in long-term traffic.

There isn’t much else I was going to mention, I think these 4 excellent tips for quality backlinks are enough to understand the current situation in the World of SEO, for people who are still learning and are tight on the budget :)