Brokered Links are secured through negotiation or agreement and can often produce moderate to high authority links. Brokered links often come about as a result of direct analysis of
opportunities found through backlink research. They can involve a good deal of individual negotiation and must be addressed on a site by site basis,
which may be time consuming.
Many brokered link opportunities are bartered arrangements between sites that, if done correctly, can elevate a site out of obscurity.
The more controversial side of the
brokered link tier is link buying. Several services offer bulk link placement as a method to increase the number of search-friendly backlinks for specific keywords.
Google does penalize for explicit link buys, and the risk associated with this tactic is significant.
If one is looking to attempt link buying, it is best to do so sparingly and slowly. Link
buys boost search visibility in the short-term but will require the use of other tactics to sustain ranking.
Formational Links are the initial set of links one should pursue in establishing a new Web site.These links are sometimes overlooked during site launch and can be addressed up
until the point that a Web site achieves a moderate level of backlinks or measured trust. This is subjective to the site and must be judged by the type and quality of
backlinks observed.Formational links include links from directories, easily placed links and relevant niche links.
Community Links reflect much the hidden wiki of the Web 2.0 landscape, referring to blogs, social media, and user generated media. These links may be gained by engaging participants in
the community on their terms through link bait, relevant content and social opportunity. These links can snowball if done correctly, generating a nature stream of backlinks.
Tactics such as link baiting may result in a traffic spike that raises the search visibility of a page, but direct community involvement can foster long-term benefits.
Authoritative Links are high value inbound links from trusted online sources. These sites have high trust metrics and transfer the most link popularity per link.
Authoritative sites include trusted news sites, .edu pages, and other sites regarded highly by search engines. A site should examine its backlinks and existing
offline relationships to determine any opportunity for high quality linking. While these links are the most likely to remain active, the one downside of
authoritative links is that they commonly link to the domain of the target site and not individual pages. The effects of this may be balanced by savvy internal linking.