Incoming Links From Other Websites
Create a links page
Once your site is up and running, you may find it useful to create a links page. This is a practice popular in the early stages of the internet for both business and personal websites, although back then it was often called a banner exchange - where each webmaster had a banner (kind of like a car sticker) that bore their sites' logo and linked directly back to their domain - these would then be exchanged and posted on a single page. This practice died out, largely because of personal taste and a need for the design of websites to be accessible and above all, colour co-ordinated.
Nowadays, a link exchange is just as it says - no garish, technicolour banners in someone else's colour scheme to display, just a single link back to their page and a little text explaining what their site's about. Having a link exchange page is good opportunity to network (albeit virtually) with other businesses, and provide extra support for your customers. For example, someone who may have bought something from your Wheels of Steel website may have looked at your links page, and found a site dedicated to roller skating discos. That's not a service that you can provide personally, but that someone in a similar field can.
What websites would be useful to your visitors?
Wheels of Steel might provide links to roller skating discos, roller skating forums, and roller skating t-shirts - all services that the company itself cannot provide, but similar companies can offer. To organise this, you simply email the website owner, politely introduce yourself and ask if you can link to their site and vice versa - you'll find that more often or not they'll agree, and it's the start of a beautiful working relationship. Provide a link to your homepage, or a specific page within your website their website visitors maybe interested in.
Beware however, of accepting link exchange from sites you know nothing about - for a link exchange to work effectively, you should only be displaying links to sites relevant to your business. Use search engines to find the most popular sites that provide services which would compliment yours and email them. Before you email any website owners, check through their website thoroughly - does it all work? Is it easy to navigate? Do their products and services compliment yours? Equally, ensure that the link you'll be sending to them works and sends people directly to the homepage, and that all of your internal links work correctly.
Try and get a link from their home page
If at all possible try and get a link from their home page or within the 'body-text' of their pages. For example if the website is a Roller Disco site talking about Rollerskates then it would be ideal for Wheels of Steel if the world Rollerskates links using the 'anchor text' to their Rollerskates page.
Basically, Google likes websites with links incoming from other websites - it deems them to be relevant to the word or phrase being searched for - so by providing a link exchange, you are helping both yourself and your 'link buddy' achieve higher ratings. A link on their homepage would be ideal, as it's the most visited area of anyone's site, and the more popular the site, the more valuable the link. It goes without saying that a link on the BBC's website would be pure gold.
Don't email competitors or those with a similar service to your own if you are concerned that your visitors may use them instead of you, but if you don't provide your service in the area they operate then the link exchange could be a good idea and no matter how tempted you are, don't provide links to personal sites, such as your Myspace or your Grandma's Facebook. You potential customers don't need to know what music you like and how Granny likes her eggs - keep it useful, informative, but above all, professional.