If you want to get top rankings for your site, you need to work on your links. Many people, however, go about this without thinking through a plan. Here is what everybody ought to know about linking.

Why do you need links for your site? It may sound like a stupid question, but do you have a real answer? I want higher rankings isn’t the correct answer. If you can get a grasp of why links are important, then generating the type of links that will produce high rankings becomes much easier.

To understand the purpose of linking, one has to step back in time. Yep, we are going all the way back to the mid-1990s. That’s when a company called BackRub launched a search engine that did something amazing. It ranked sites by links. Specifically, it took a site and analyzed the number and types of other sites that linked to it.

The theory was simple. Sites that were “good” and “authoritative” would have a lot of links from similar sites. For instance, the IRS site ranks high on all search engines. I think we can all agree that the IRS has never done any search engine optimization. So, how does it rank high? Well, millions of other sites link to it. Moreover, a majority of those sites have something to do with finances and taxes.

In the view of BackRub, such a site should be ranked highly. The number and type of links reveal that it is both relevant and authoritative. The fact that the IRS has never done keyword research, meta tagging or keyword density analysis simple doesn’t matter.

As you may know, BackRub revolutionized the search game. The company and site was later renamed Google. Although the name changed, the lessons did not. Google and other search engines may change their ranking methods from time-to-time, but two constants always remain. If you want to get high rankings, get links from relevant and authoritative sites in your niche.

Aazdak Alisimo writes linking articles on one way link building for OneWayLinkBuildingServices.com.