What Are Link Wheels?
A link wheel is a linking strategy that uses a group of sites to make one site appear to be an authority site. By using a link wheel system, the promoted site will receive improved rankings in the search engines organic rating. Just like a real wheel the link wheel uses a hug and spoke format. The spokes employed are major web 2.0 web authorities and the hub (or center of the wheel) is the promoted site. All other spokes link back to the promoted site and link to each other in a circle. Most link wheels use 6 authority sites in order to create the wheel. The Google algorithm supposedly likes this format because it looks natural.
How Do I Build a Link Wheel? Building a Link Wheel
There are several softwares that can help you to build a link wheel like SENuke and Link Wheel Lite. However, if you want to try on your own it’s not hard to build one. I created a list of good authority sites below. Sign up for an account at each and submit an article. Have the articles spun (this means make modifications to the content where the meaning remains but the phasing changes). So you should use a different variation of the article on each site and make sure each link to your site with your targeted keyword and as well have them link one way to each other in a circle. Below are other ways of having them linked but the circle is the basic format. To really get some power to your wheel get social bookmarks for the spoke pages.
What Are Some Variations of Link Wheels?
Closed Link Wheel
“Closed wheel” is where all spokes link to complete a full wheel (example a->b->c->d->e->f->a). This makes the basic link wheel, but it leaves a “foot print” for search engines to follow since the link pattern is very linear and generally you don’t want search engines to clue into the fact they are being manipulated.
Horseshoe Link Wheel
“Horseshoe” is where all sites link to each other but the pattern is not closed (example a->b->c->d->e, but there’s no link from e to a). Though this may hide the foot print seen in the basic version it weakens the wheel because one of the spokes lacks back links.
Random Link Wheel
Random Link Wheel is where you have the spokes randomly linking to each other instead of using a linear pattern. This completely hides any potential footprint and appears more natural. It’s easier to achieve when more spokes are involved.
Basically, you have a group of sites, linked together, that also link to a central hub website. This would be the site you’re trying to rank highly for.
Variations of the link wheel.
Different Numbers. You could add or remove however many websites you want. You could use a 5 site wheel or one with 10. This is dependent on how many sites you have, and how strong you want it to be. Too few (4 or less) is not that strong, and too many (more than 10) is a ton of work.
Different Websites. Most people use web 2.0 properties in order to create your link wheels. Sites like:
- Hubpages
- Squidoo
- WordPress.com
- Blogspot
And others. But if you have your own, you can use those as well.
Different Link Structures. Some people like to add variety to their link wheels in order to leave less of a footprint, like linking from the hub site to one of the outside sites, or cross-linking some of the outside sites a bit.
Example: Linking site 1 to site 2, AND site 4.
An Example of a classic linkwheel.
Are you ready to go on a journey?
I’m about to take you through a completed link wheel journey. Right now, we are on the “central hub” page. From here, we’re going to go to the first site on our list. The first site answers the question what are link wheels (just click the link to follow along). While there is some info here, we’ll cover it more in depth.
Additional Info
If you want to automate your link building process, you seriously need to check out SE Nuke. This piece of software can speed things up A LOT. You can do market research, create web 2.0 sites very quickly, and it even verifies emails and stuff for you.
But, you can additionally check out Link Builder Pro. Link Build Pro was created by a guy I respect named Maulana Tasaufi. His websites always rival my own, and he knows a few things about getting links and creating link wheels. His program is also cheaper, and extremely effective. Seriously, Link Builder Pro can do some damage.