The concept of getting free traffic from Google and the other major search engines, sounds like a great idea, that is until you realize that you have to go and build all the one way back links to your pages in order to get them to rank.
Finding one way back links that pass page rank on to your site can be difficult and somewhat of a tedious task. Therefore in this post I am just going to give you a list of free one way back links. Before I do though I would like to point out that when building back links it is a good idea to have a variety of them coming from different sources, as this looks more natural in Google eyes.
There are differing opinions on whether ‘off page’ SEO, which is what gaining one way back links is, done badly can hurt your rankings or not. I know some people that claim it does not, and their reasoning is that if it did, then the internet would turn to chaos, because you could build ‘dodgy’ back links to your competitors sites in order to hurt their position in the search results, and in turn they could do the same to you!!
Other people however believe that building links too fast doesn’t look natural to the search engines and can draw a penalty. How fast is too fast? Well I am not sure but I think if you are building 100’s of links a day to one page and not remaining consistent at that pace, then I think that might be a problem.
I can see the argument from both sides and therefore I always play it safe and build links at a steady pace, and I do not buy one way back links from link farms.
With that said here are some sites that you can use to get free one way back links to your site now.
Directories
I don’t spend too much time submitting my sites to directories, as a lot of the free ones don’t allow me to submit deep links to pages inside my site, ie. anything other than the home page.
However they are still a useful place to get easy free one way back links, so here a few to get you started:
- dmoz.org
- open-site.org
- popsz.com
- e-mediate.org
- bloggernity.com
- directory.brainontology.org
- onlinedirectoryweb.info
- femina.com
- viesearch.com
Education and Government (.edu/.gov)
One Way Back Links
In case you didn’t know already, not every link that you create holds the same value in Google eyes. A link from a .edu domain, or a .gov domain are worth a lot more for your search rankings. However these websites, that allow you to get 
a back link from them, are hard to find.
With that said though, here is a quick tip on how to search for them in Google:
By typing in the following search query and replacing ‘keyword phrase goes here’ with your actual keywords, you should find wordpress blogs that are on .edu or .gov domains.
“keyword phrase goes here” “powered by wordpress” site:.edu
“keyword phrase goes here” “powered by wordpress” site:.gov
Keep in mind that not all of the websites you find will allow you to post comments and not all of them will be follow links, so you will have to test them out.
Article Site One Way Back Links
Writing and submitting articles to top article sites is also a good way to diversify your back link portfolio. I recommend however that you get a tool like Magic Article Rewriter and Submitter (eamarketingtools.com) to help you do this. The reason being that writing content is VERY time consuming and working smarter with a tool like this will speed things up super fast.
The great thing about article spinners like Magic Article Rewriter, is that you can use the content for other sites, and not just submit them to article directories. I will explain this in more detail in the next section when we look at web 2.0 sites.
For now though here is a list of top article directories for easy one way back links:
- ezinearticles.com
- buzzle.com
- goarticles.com
- articledashboard.com
- a1articles.com
- articlecity.com
Web 2.0 One Way Back Links
Another way to get free back links is to post content onto web 2.o sites. These sites are free to join and allow you to build pages within them, and much like article sites, contain your links.
As I mentioned above, when I have written and spun an article in Magic Article Rewriter at: eamarketingtools.com (sponsored affiliate link). I them take a few of the 100’s of unique copies of the original article that it automatically generates for me, and simply copy and past them into other web 2.o sites. This saves me a lot of time!!
I also advise you to make sure you read the guidelines for each site and make sure you abide by their rules, as rules vary from site to site.
Below is a list of great sites that you can participate in:
- squiddoo.com
- spongefish.com
- blog.co.k
- easyjournal.com
- tumblr.com
- friendster.com
- youbundle.com
- multiply.com
Social Bookmarking Back Links
Getting links from social bookmarking sites is possibly the easier way to get links, but keep in mind that if all your links are set up from the same IP address, Google knows this and I assume pay less attention to them. However if you can get other people to bookmark your sites, then that can help.
There are 100’s of social bookmarking sites, however once again, here are a few to get you started:
- del.icio.us
- spurl.com
- digg.com
- linkagogo.com
- backflip.com
- technorati.com
- blinklist.com
- diigo.com
- folked.com
- jumptags.com
- propeller.com
- mixx.com
There are many more ways to get quality one way back links, however I hope this post has helped you in some way with the task. If you have more examples to share I encourage you to add a comment below so we can all benefit, because as I mentioned in my last post, networking is key, so lets help each other out.
Matt Carter
FREE 12 Part Video
Hi,
Appreciate your help. I managed to get round 20 links for my site to first test and see how it performs as I am new to it.
Its been 2 days and google still does not show/recognize the backlinks.
How long does it take as per you for the links to show up.
Also on a separate topic how long does it take for google to give your site a pr rating.
Cheers,
Vishal
Hey Andy,
Thanks for the input, makes sense. I am a little unsure about it, but what you said sounds right.
Thanks
Matt
Hey Matt,
Re Magic Article Rewriter & Submitter.
Does Magic Article Submitter submit articles to EzineArticles, if not, can a unique, re-spun article be extracted to upload to EzineArticles??
Cheer,
Peter
Hi Peter,
no magic article does not submit to Ezinearticle, but yes you can take a unique article and submit it to Ezines.
Keep up the good work
Matt
Hi Matt, Thanks for this list, very useful. I’ve been on your list for a while and have always found your content to be great, but haven’t got around to thanking you before.
While I’m here, is there a downside to using spun content on your own website? Fair enough a web 2.0 site but whilst I would like to add every spun article to my blog, I do not want to put it at risk.
By way of contributing back, here are some more web 2.0 sites:
Typepad
Bravejournal
SOS blog
Thoughts
Diaryland
Terapad
InsaneJournal
ZoomShare
Zoomgroups
AtWiki
Nexo
EasyJournal
Blogetry
OnSugar
Gather
Zoho
Jimdo
Ning
Blog.com
Xanga
LiveJournal
Vox.com
Webs.com
Tripod
Msn spaces
Google Knol
Quizilla
Hi Greg,
There are differing views on duplicate content, some say it is a myth others disagree. I think it is
not a good idea to place duplicate content on your money sites, like you blog. Best to stick with
original stuff, or at least rewritten stuff if not your own ideas.
Thanks for the extra sites also
Matt;
I have been working really hard on programs and have realized I have missed your work lately. I have just reviewed some of your blogs and have come to realize (again) how thorough and how much incredible integrity you have. I won’t go away again. You have way too much knowledge and sincerity for me to miss.
Ed
Hi again Matt;
Can you please tell me what the Toekn button does on Magic Article Rewriter does. I understand about replacing the words with synonyms but unclear of what the “Use Tokens” does.
Thanks,
Ed
Hey Ed,
The tokens is the same as replacing a word, but what you do is save a certain word, like for example: Car, and save it as a token and tell the token to replace all the occurences of the word car, with words you tell it to.
So if I have car, I might save a token for ‘car’ that were: Vehicle, Auotmobile, hatchback. This way when you have a new article you don’t have to change the word “car” every time, all you do is hit the token button and bingo, every time the word ‘car’ would be replaced,
Hope that helps
Cheers
Matt
Hey Ed,
Thanks for the kind words
Cheers
Matt
Matt, Thanks for all the helpful information, I have implemented several of the ideas you have commented on and I am seeing great results form them. Thanks again!
This concept is GOLD!
“keyword phrase goes here” “powered by wordpress” site:.edu
“keyword phrase goes here” “powered by wordpress” site:.gov
Talk about Law of attraction – I was asking this very question to myself yesterday trying to figure how to get google to identify edu and gov sites that will allow for posting comments and a backlink.
Does it matter if the edu/gov site has “nofollow”?
Oh, I also use TrafficGeyser as a tool to automate my backlinking for Socialbookmarking, Video, Articles, Blogs and Social Networking. Saves me hours and the ROI is really good.
Andy
Thanks for your comment there Andy and great to see you on the blog
Matt
hi matt ,
you have been very helpful , i been in your list from last two months and i have learned a lot. thanks to you dear.
i have one question, i have lots of PLR articles.
i want to ask you that if it is possible that i can use them on my site, or in article directories if its allowed. or i have to rewrite them to submit in directories?
and if i use them on my site is it a possible chance to get a duplicate content voilation flag. or i can use my PL RIGHTS freely??
i ll much appreciate your advice.
regards
Hi Umar,
To be honest, I don’t use PLR stuff, as I find the quality is usually very poor, and yes you do have the duplicate content issue to deal with, so you have to rewrite them anyway. I always get original content written
Thanks
Matt
thanks a lot matt for such a nice and honest advice.
i appriciate your help./
regards,
umar.
Hi Umar,
No problem at all, glad to be of service to you.
All the best
Matt