Guide to Link Building for SEO Beginners

Author: Evlyn Lim

This is music to my ears as it is really what online marketing is all about. Some sales person might tell you they get a trillion hits a second to their website - just put the phone straight down. They don't know what they're talking about, or they assume you don't. 'Hits' are a nonsense, no-one in the biz talks about hits. Technically a hit is a page impression. But what is a page impression and is it important? If you view any web page there will be numerous page impressions on it - made up of images, links, titles etc. The mean nothing. They don't tell you about traffic or visitors, how long someone spent on the page (=engagement), whether they bounced straight off, or whether they took any action = conversion. So put the phone down on anyone trying to sell you their hits, or ask them what their conversion rate is and they'll probably put the phone down on you!

So a conversion = action taken. The type of action you want a visitor to your website to take is up to you. You might have online booking facilities in which case a conversion will be a booking. You might want people to phone or email you from your website and either of these actions might be a conversion as they might lead to a booking. You might want someone to sign up for a Newsletter so that you can begin contacting them with information about future events taking place in your business eg half term events or offers. Whatever the action is is for you to decide. On the Guides a conversion for us is defined as

- a click through to a clients website or

- a phone call to a client (this is why we have the 0844 telephone numbers for you so that we can track volume of calls to you from the Guides)

- or an email sent to you via the Guides (using the Send Email button on your advert).

Our conversion rate is something we track constantly as there is no point in growing traffic if that traffic doesn't convert and make bookings with our clients. Simple really. On the Tourist Guide the conversion rate is ca 26%, the Hotels Guide is a mighty 57% and the Weddings Guide 28%. Not bad but could do better. We'll go through how you can improve your conversions rates any minute now.

In the meantime let's enjoy the sunshine and glorious Autumn colours here in Suffolk - how lucky we are to live in such a beautiful place.

Sarah Quinlan - Sarah in Suffolk Blog