As someone who has maintained a #1 position on Google for a competitive term for 5 years and as someone who has also shown I can bring other sites (our own and those of our members I coach) to page 1 of Google for highly competitive terms the number 1 question I get is :

How Many Backlinks Do I Need to Rank On Page 1 of Google?

Now I understand why I get asked the question but it is overly focused on only one element of what it takes to rank on page 1 of Google. The real truth is that backlinks are NOT as important as many people believe or as important as some ‘gurus’ out there promote. And you can believe me because I will tell you the truth with proof.

If you don’t know who I am, I’m the gal who built up over 200,000 backlinks on my site several years ago to rank in the highly competitive golf industry. I did that back in the 2004 – 2005 time frame because I was urged to do that back then by some of the same ‘gurus’ that are still around preaching the value of huge numbers of backlinks today.

Marketleap has documented the ups and downs of my link building, so you don’t need to take my word for it. Visit MarketLeap.com check TheGolfCollection.com "link populatity" and you’ll find the graph below;

Now it’s not just our Flagship site, TheGolfCollection.com, which has been #1 on Google for nearly 5 years for the term ‘golf gifts’, I’ve repeated the success and taught our members how to get page 1 listings for a variety of competitive terms including:

• Camping Equipment
• Personalized Gifts
• Tapestries
• Dog Beds
• Cable Providers
• Gain Weight
• Softball Gloves
• … and more…

In a nutshell, I can DO and TEACH. And this ability to do both makes me unique
in an industry full of gurus who tell you to do as they say but can’t show you their own sites ranking well on Google. But let’s get back to backlinks…

Anyone who suggests that you need 20,000, 30,000, or even more than 40,000 backlinks to rank high on Google is wrong! It’s not necessary. Even in
a super competitive market you can rank on page 1 of Google at under 10,000 backlinks and usually it’s much, much lower than that. In fact all of the sites that rank on page 1 of Google for the terms above, have fewer than 4,000 backlinks – some less than 2000 backlinks. Now that’s more doable – isn’t it? You see I don’t want you to give up on your dream before you even get started.

So what do you need to know about backlinks if you want to get to the top of
Google?

There are 3 rules to follow if you want some Google link love:
1. Get a good number of high content - high value links.
2. Get some links from very high trust sources.
3. Get links from many different domains & IP addresses.

High Content – High Value Link Sources

Now it’s hard to find a lot of what I refer to as high content - high
value links. These are links from sites you know Google likes and the links
are embedded in well written theme relevant content. One place our members
know to get these types of links is by writing a good article with unique content
for either Ezinearticles.com or Buzzle.com. Both these article directories
are well liked by Google. However, most article directories do not qualify
as high value sites so don’t assume you’ll get the same value when
submitting to other article directory sites.

When you write an article for either of these high value directories that is
on the same topic (or highly complementary topic) to the page you are pointing
your links to, Google gives you extra value for the link. As proof, note that
Google recently discussed this in a much ignored (at least ignored by most
gurus) algorithm patent application filing earlier this year. ]

Very High Trust Link Sources

These are links that don’t have a lot of content around the link but
are from sources so highly trusted by Google, it doesn’t matter. Consider
just for a moment how much trust Google would place on a link from Google itself!
Anyone can get one, just go to Google Maps

Getting Links from Different Domians/IP Addresses

Now this one is a bit more of a challenge – at least until you know where
to go get them. Here is where you can use sites of somewhat lesser quality.
In our SEO program, these types of links are referred to as ‘critical
mass’ links. While you don’t need tens of thousands of these, you
do need as many as you can get. Not only do these links help you diversify
the number of domains and IP addresses, they help your page build reputation
in Google’s eyes (i.e., what the page is supposed to be about and rank
for) but they also send pings of freshness to the target page. Google loves
fresh content so these pings of freshness help pages rank better and hold their
positions.

Now because you need as many as you can get, you can’t spend an hour
writing a nice article for each submission. Critical mass links should be acquired
in mass quantities and with low effort. Directory submission services like
Directory
Maximizer is one source but directory
submissions have been losing their efficacy for the last 2 years. More effective
are article directory submission services like Unique Article Wizard (UAW).
The reason I recommend UAW is that they use a clever semi-unique content approach that prevents the exact same article being sent to hundreds of directories. And they deliver articles out in batches so not all the articles are sent out all at once.

Summary

When you start to apply these link building tactics as part
of your ranking strategy, you will see improvements. Be sure to get links to many pages on your website and to not get too many links that all say the same thing and your rankings will dramatically improve. Remember that Google is always looking for natural patterns which is why getting links from many IP addresses, pointing to many different pages on your website with varied anchor (link) text is so important.

and yes it will work for you!…

Jesses’ (a LiveBlueprint member) success is one of the main reasons I am giving this as much time as I have been. I analyzed his site and yours using semrush.com,seo-elite and market samurai to reverse engineer them and then I listened to your seminars to see how it all matched up. And it did in a big way.
It’s incredible that he got that site ranked in that market as seemingly fast as he has. I’ve got ten affiliate sites right now that I am in top 3 Google positions for low to intermediate competitive keywords but now that I have a systematic way to get links that STICK I’m going for the gold. I’m also dropping my ———- membership. No need yours is so much better. Thanks again . . .
Bruce

I just checked my ranking and the beloved google just gave me an authority listing at the #1 spot . I can’t tell you how relieved I am. This is definitely a reminder to not let up!

Another thing I just noticed as well, is that Google gave me a semi-authority listing in the second spot for another term.

Jesse

I looked at my traffic for the last 7 months and I’ve averaged 40% monthly increases. I project January to increase 25% over December. Business is going nowhere but UP!

Jay

I used your training on a simple site - the results blow me away!!!!

Three weeks ago my girlfriend decided to sell her beachfront condo on the Oregon coast and I offered to create a simple 1 page information site, though told her it would probably never rank - just a place to send people for info after you found them. I registered the domain on 6/29/08 and put up a quick and simple website following all of your training (hopefully accurately).

So, today I do a little google search:
oregon beachfront condo

Guess what’s #1 on page 1 of google?

me!!

In less than 3 weeks (possibly sooner, I haven’t checked) - I’m amazed and this search term has quite a bit of competition.

Anyhow, I’m impressed, excited and wanted to share the news!

Thank you!
Stephen

I can’t tell you how much we appreciate your response. You really narrowed everything down and, the good news for us is, we’re doing about 95% of what you have outlined. The remaining 5% will get done or started by the end of the week.
A note on the money site progress: we went live on 9/3 and within the last week we have gained 123 positions on 1 highly competitive term and 138 on another. We also made the front page of Google with a couple of long term phrases so we know your system works.

Thanks again for all you do.
Taylor