Definition
A
link is a reference in a hypertext document that points to another hypertext
document or to a different part of the same document. Navigators usually display
links in another color, font or font style to distinguish them from the rest of
the text.
Types of links
Inbound link: A link pointing to my site
from an external site. These links are indispensable from the marketing point of
view, as they attract visitors from another Web site to mine. Many times these
visitors are potential clients, as they come from content-related sites. If I
have a Web site to sell bathroom articles, for example, there might be a link
pointing to my site from a site offering building solutions. The visitors of
that site are interested in building, and they will visit my site looking for
solutions to build a bathroom. These visitors are potential buyers for my
articles, rather than just visitors.
Inbound links are also very important because they improve
the ranking position of my Web site on the searching tools that use link
popularity as part of their algorithm.
You can find a mathematical analysis of the effect of
inbound links on search engine rankings in http://pr.efactory.de/e-inbound-links.shtml
Outbound link: A link from my site to an
external site. There are two attitudes toward the use of outbound links.
Proponents argue that offering high quality references enhances the value of a
site and increases the chance of return visitors. Opponents of outbound linking
argue that it is a way of losing visitors, as they abandon the site.
You can find a mathematical analysis of the effect of
outbound links on search engine rankings in http://pr.efactory.de/e-outbound-links.shtml
In my opinion, outbound links are good as long as they
increase the user's knowledge on what he/she is reading in my site. For example,
if I have a business partners' page, it is a good thing to have a link in each
partner's name, so users can see my partners' sites and value my
product/brand/service based on the quality of my partners.
I don't think it's a good idea to use reciprocal linking
if there is no way of relating the other site to my product, content, etc. For
example, if I sell bathroom articles, the value of my site will not be enhanced
by a link to Mercedes Benz, unless they have used my articles for all the
bathrooms in the company!
Orphan Pages: Pages without links
pointing to them are called orphan pages. Many search engines do not index
orphan pages.
Recommendations:
1- For outbound links: Open the external
site page on a new navigator. This could be accomplished by the following
GeneXus code:
Linkexterno.link =
link('http://www.genexus.com/')
Linkexterno.linktarget= ?_blank'
Where Linkexterno is a textblock. The procedure is similar
for a variable or a visible attribute in the webform.
2- For inbound links: Use tools to
identify broken links, orphan pages, etc. in my site. Broken links damage the
site's image and search tools may index a non-existent page because the link
pointing to it is wrong. The following are some online tools to analyze these
cases:
Tools
http://home.snafu.de/tilman/xenulink.html
http://www.elsop.com/linkscan/
http://www.netmechanic.com/link_check.htm
http://www.1-hit.com/all-in-one/tool.broken-link-finder.htm
http://lithopssoft.com/hlv/