I still do quite a bit of SEO work for myself and now some clients, and I can’t tell you how important it is to be so squeaky clean with your work if you want to stay ahead of the game and last a long time. Sure you can go out and get a million garbage links and it may work for some time, but you will not hold up over the test of time. So here is how I have built a solid network of sites that I can use to feed other sites when needed. I mainly use Wordpress for these sites, and also have an arsenal of HTML static sites which are another network. For the sake of time and simplicity lets take Wordpress as an example.

Here are a few things to keep in mind for starters.

1. Don’t leave footprints by using the same author username.
2. Don’t add a link in every post, make sure to write some solid posts where you don’t have to always link out.
3. Use only one link per post to your target site. Include other links throughout your blog to random authority sites around the web. (Ex. microsoft.com, nba.com, fandango.com)
4. Use a decent theme and give a good 5-10 mins making a logo or have someone on Fiverr do it for you.
5. Extremely Important. Don’t write garbage content. Add articles that actually make sense. Don’t spin the content.

Also you will want to keep the majority of the topics on your site similar. So lets say you have a blog in your network about business. Then you will want to always make posts about money, investing, and anything else that could be considered relevant for a business blog to be on topic. So how do we incorporate a slightly off topic health link? This is where you will need to be a half decent writer, or have a half decent writer to take care of this for you. So say for example you need to send a link to a lap band website you have or a doctor has. The best way to incorporate that might be to discuss the cost of lapband surgery, and how it has become something more affordable than before. This way, you are still talking about finance and keeping it about spending and money.

Other things of note when building a Wordpress network is to purchase some C class IP’s to spread out your sites, and make sure all your domains have private registration.

Don’t ever cross link between other blogs in your network. This is one way you also leave footprints and get lots of sites canned or ratted out. Instead, build individual links through profiles, blog commenting, free blogs. If you know someone who is a Wordpress designer you could probably find a way to get some footer links on released themes as well. I’m not going to go into that, but you get what I am saying. If you are going to put in the time to build a solid network then don’t go in on it halfhearted. Keep all your sites clean and make real blogs. I know your probably saying, “How in the heck do I do all this on my own?” Well have no fear, I will start talking more in future posts about outsourcing. If you are broke and just getting started then go slow and build these blogs one by one. If you want to scale this then stay tuned for the series on outsourcing work.

Got questions? Spit it out below.