From my vantage point, at least, it seems that the entire Internet world has been going crazy lately -- all over the topic of backlinks.  You know what these are, don't you?  These are the little text links that are found on one webpage which point to another.  That's their function: when you click on them, they automatically take you to that other place.   Here's the problem -- everyone is finding out that the search engines value these links and use them in various ways to gauge the importance of a webpage, as compared to webpages with similar content.  As a result of gaining this rather dubious "insight" we now have all sorts of website owners running around in a frantic effort to gain all the backlinks that they can for their website in the shortest amount of time.   Let me set the record straight: if you focus on gaining as many backlinks as you possibly can, in the shortest amount of time, you are most likely going to sabotage your own Internet marketing efforts.  The reason for this is that, in order to gain those massive amounts of links back to your website, you will be tempted to take shortcuts to acquire large volumes of links with a minimal amount of effort and expense.   "But", you might say, "what's wrong with that?  The more backlinks I have the more highly my site is going to be ranked."  Here's what's wrong with that -- the search people know what's going on, and they are on the lookout for any type of suspicious linking behavior.   For example, suppose you have a brand-new website, one that has been in existence for a week or two. Suppose you have recently purchased the latest "Warp-Speed Backlink Blaster," or some such similar "product" -- and have used it to mass-submit entries to 200 online directories. After pressing the "submit" button you relax, thinking that your website will SURELY jump 10 pages in the SERP's (Search Engine Results Pages) two weeks from now.   But, several weeks (or several months later) you discover, to your dismay that this long-anticipated boost in your website's rankings never materialized! Why not? Because search engines are looking for linking behavior to occur NATURALLY.   When it comes to search engines, two fundamental rules apply:   1. They HATE anything that smacks of an automated process -- to them that is too much like 'cheating'. (I know you may disagree, but that is beside the point -- it's their show, not yours or mine...Sorry, but that's reality.)   2. They LOVE anything that leads them to conclude that real HUMANS are involved, doing the things the way humans do them.   Now, back to our linking scenario: When you blasted out those 200 website backlinks within just a few days, what would that look like to the folks working at Google, MSN and Yahoo? Is it reasonable to think that a human being, working diligently, could (in most cases) acquire that many backlinks within that period of time (especially if it were in existence for only a short period of time)?   Nope, it isn't reasonable -- the search engines know it, and you and I know it -- at least you will when you see the negligible effect it has on your sites rankings.   If you want to try and trick the SE's, go ahead and try. It's your site, do what you like with it. Thousands of people try, every day. But if you want to do effective backlinking, do it NATURALLY.   Here's where I get specific, so get ready to take notes:   1. If your website is new, don't mass-submit ANYTHING to get backlinks. NO new site suddenly springs into existence with hundreds (or even thousands) of backlinks within a few weeks. Think: if your site were gaining backlinks through visitors coming to your site and spreading the word, how many backlinks would your site end up with in it's first month? 1000? 500? Hardly. Look at your sites actual visitors -- if your (new) site got 30 visitors last week, how could it have acquired 500 backlinks -- except through some sort of dubious method? Hmmm...   2. A good linking strategy is maybe 5 links a week, something like that. Contrary to what you may have been told, perhaps -- and at odds with you may want to happen. But it's not contrary to natural linking patterns, and that's what the SE's look at. Acquire those backlinks at a reasonable pace, not at an automated pace, and you'll be just fine.   3. Don't acquire the same number of backlinks every day. Again, what website acquires those links NATURALLY at the rate of 2 per day, every day, every month? Some days put more links out there, on other days put out less. Some days (gulp) put out NONE. That's what happens in the real world, folks.   4. Don't go for the same type of backlinks. Vary the PR (page rank) of the sites that link to you. Get links from article submissions -- but not all the time. Comment on blog site postings and leave comments on Squidoo and Hub Page listings -- but not lots of them every day. Vary the mix...just like in the real world.   In this matter of backlinking, you have two choices: act like a machine or act like a human. One choice will spell disaster for any site; the other choice will work all the time, every time, for every type of site, in every market and interest area, for any demographic, country, TLD (Top-Level Domain), or language group. Can you guess which one?