Link Building Tip – Use Stop Words

Posted by Pixelhead

Last week, I did a Link Building Tip post, and I was asked by Wayne of WayneJohn.com, what my goals are for my videos. At that point in time I really did not have any goals. But Wayne got me thinking, and I decided I would start doing a weekly Link Building tip post with at least one little SEO/SEM related nugget in each video.

This weeks video tip goes over the use of “Stop Words”. Check the resources at the end of the post for a definition of Stop Words.

When doing Link building, I don’t always use stop words, but rather I use them sporadically to add variety to my links.

Stop Words Resources

One of my favorite SEO tools sites Webconfs.com has a pretty nice stop words list.
Wikipedia has a good Stop Words definition. (don’t worry, I put the nofollow attribute in the link to Wikipedia)

Got any link building questions or concerns? Do you use Stop Words?

Technorati Tags: stop words,link building,SEO,SEM

Written by Pixelhead on August 13th, 2008 with 14 comments.
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14 comments

Read the comments left by other users below, or:

Alex
#1. August 13th, 2008, at 6:21 PM.

Nice tip. Great way to make links look much more natural.

olly@Cheap Toners
#2. August 13th, 2008, at 7:05 PM.

Interesting – I had never considered using these “stop words” before – In fact I didn’t really know they even had an expression.

I can kind of see the benefits of it to juggle your links a bit but why bother? And why not *just* use your keyword or phrase? If G ignores it anyhow?

Pixelhead
#3. August 13th, 2008, at 7:53 PM.

As Alex said, it does look more natural. Looking at directories that sort alphabetically, you could get your listing on the front category page if you used a search phrase such as all, any, a, etc…
Looking at the SERPs, I also noticed that they are different. For example I searched for “computer parts” and then “All computer parts” and there was a difference in the SERPs. But sure there are a ton less searches for the keyword with All. I also think that if you can get yourself to be number 1 for your keyword with stop words, it will be that much easier to rank without.

Sid Savara – Personal Development and Life Hacking
#4. August 13th, 2008, at 8:02 PM.

I like it. It’s not intuitive unless you walk through it the way you did, but I can see how it might be effective.

Personally, my approach so far has been to just focus on creating content, but perhaps as I’m writing I’ll keep this in the back of my mind and use it as appropriate.

Making money online:SFM
#5. August 14th, 2008, at 11:59 AM.

I haven’t used stop words for any kind of link building campaign. I will study in deep about stop words and how to use in my link building strategy

Arthur
#6. August 17th, 2008, at 7:14 AM.

Pixelhead,

I couldn’t watch your video (slow connection) and need to clarify what this is. I’m currently reviewing my keywords and this might help.

My Question:
Since stop words are not recognized by search engines, does it mean its useless to use these as part of our keywords?

Pixelhead
#7. August 17th, 2008, at 1:25 PM.

Arthur,
When I began as an SEO, “stop words” use was one of those little tricks that was not talked about, other than it was suggested that you use them.

What I am aware of is that stop words are less important because as part of their algorithm, many of the search engines(not all), give much less juice to these types of words, due to importance.

For example, I have a client who is a landscape contractor, I build links to his site using “landscaper, find a landscaper, get a landscaper,a landscaper, landscaper needed, etc.(I also put locations after each word) so that sure he will rank for phrases that no one searches for, but he will also rank for the big keyword “landscaper”. Not that he is interested in that, but he does rank for “landscaper Easton, PA” This is one of the methods I use to go after big competitive words. It does take a lot of links, but it can work.

Amaterashu
#8. August 17th, 2008, at 2:42 PM.

I can’t watch it too.. my connection is so damn slow..
Does it really work?

goran
#9. August 19th, 2008, at 8:01 PM.

I have heard about this in the past but never quite got it. You describe it well. You have peaked my interest in learning more. enjoy.

Young Blogger
#10. August 25th, 2008, at 6:47 PM.

Hey Pixelhead, I’ve never really heard the term “stop words” for them until now, great post. I usually never use stop words, but it seems we all should. By the way, I thought the wind noise was actually in real life, not on your video. lol.

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#11. August 26th, 2008, at 7:03 PM.

this could work for less competitive keywords , but i do like the way you are using video .

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#12. August 29th, 2008, at 1:45 PM.

Throwing in stop words is a really good idea. It will totally make your links look more natural. Varying your link text makes it look like you’re not googlebombing your main keyword. For smaller sites it probably isn’t completely necessary, but every little bit helps. Anything that keeps you from a Google penalty right?

Goran
#13. October 9th, 2008, at 1:06 PM.

Just an update, I have been implementing stop words and it does work, thanks again Goran.

Cheap DVDs
#14. April 8th, 2009, at 10:46 AM.

Thanks – that’s an interesting idea I’d not thought of. Though I’m not sure how it works in practice. E.g. if in Google I do a search for ‘DVDs’ it returns one set of search results. But if I then do a search for ‘Find DVDs’, or ‘a dvds’ or ‘the dvds’ it returns different results each time. So it appears that Google does see the phrases as different.

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