Top of Google without backlinks???

Does you website still need a high number of backlinks to appear on the first page of google?
Judging by the success we've had in ranking our website in various search engines leads us to believe that backlinks are becoming less of a ranking factor.

For the last 8 months Local SEO Edinburgh have been focusing on trying to rank our website for the term "seo edinburgh". Within this time we have made little attempt to acquire backlinks from other websites apart from listing ourselves in business directories such as yell.com and Thomson.

Our main activity over this period has been the creation of quality content for syndication to our social media profiles. The search term 'seo edinburgh' gets approximately 280 searches per month, sites that are currently listed on page 1 of google have up to 400,000 back-links and aged domains of nearly 13 years.

Our website has around 5 backlinks and was created in march 2015.

What does this mean?

The world of online marketing and SEO are changing. Forget about buying your way to the top of google or employing techniques that are seen as 'black hat'. Success is now obtained through producing quality content that keeps your visitors on your site for longer. You also have to replicate what your main competitors are doing and more.

Google’s Matt Cutts: Over Time Backlinks Will Become Less Important

How can you achieve this?

Having a well built social media presence is the place to start.
At the very minimum you need accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and of course Google+.
You need to continually create content that your site visitors will find interesting. Quality content is becoming the number one ranking factor with search engines.

Googles algorithm identify quality content by the amount of sharing your content receives and by amongst other things the amount of time spent on your site.

As a business owner you know doubt have little time to produce such content. You concentrate on running your business and let others run your online marketing.
Having to update your content on a daily rate is a difficult task for many businesses. It's easy to begin a social media campaign but not so easy to continually update your profile with fresh content over the days and months ahead.

To have any sort of success you need to employ the help of an online marketer.

Let Local SEO Edinburgh build online marketing campaigns that effectively target the right customers.
As web developers we can also assist with help and advise on technical factors that can affect your rankings.