Links and SEO

Hi, I have had a request to place a link on a site I run because we perform well in the search engines, especially Google... although I have offered to place the link inside the site the person in question believes his chances of a good ranking will only improve if the link is on the front page... is this true? can I have please have some comments on this?

Also, I don't actually mind placing the link on the front page but on viewing the source code of the site to be linked to, there are no meta tags, no alt tags, no DOCTYPE and the HTML does not validate using W3C validator which makes me feel that the designer is looking for a high ranking on the back of my site without doing any of the ground work.

Our organisations are linked so I have to be diplomatic in my response.

Thanks in advance
Najm

I can't comment on the placement of the link, other than to say that I don't think it matters.

However, the fact that their site doesn't validate hurts them to begin with, so the link will only have limited effects. The link plus a well formed site would provide much better results.

It is advisable to update your page and add few good contents but even the ranking can go ups and down as when you update a page the spider will re-crawl it.
Keeping your page clean and crisp will also much helpful to your for good ranking.

However I think, keeping changing it just for the sake of ranking might not produce the desired results.

Thanks guys

Just a subnote on the validation there !! Even if the validation do not go doesnt mean that the crawler has problem with it, using a simple linux browser (the old style ,, that shows no picture but alt tags and so on) will show you how the crawler sees it.

also some site,, even some of mine will not validate due to php default *prior to php 5), made &element=value in url insteed of & which the validation insists on,, (even though no browser has failed using & insteed of &amp),

I agree that you should go so close to validation that you can, but its not always possible, but by using a linux browser ,, you will see what the crawler sees.

Seems also that Google are not using meat tags at all *unconfirmed I can not stand by this statement*, as they have seeked patent on their ranking system they also needed to go public with how they ranked it. Meta tags are not mentioned to my knowleadge. But the likes as

Domain registration has an impact on the ranking,, if its only registered for 1 year you are considered unseriouse and will get a lower ranking.

Content updates

Links from external pages not owned by the same person as mother page is also vital for the ranking.

These are just some of them.. But not sure if this is 100% true

You know you can change this in .htaccess, right?


Maybe I should have specified that validation improving rank is probably an indirect affect. As I've gotten into validating sites I make now, those sites consistently rank better than those I've built in the past. Maybe I know more overall, maybe it's b/c it's all <div>s and no tables so the content is easier to get to. Whatever.

If you stuff the link onto a deep page, the PR won't be there.

I think he is wanting the PR from your main page(which most of the time has more than the rest of your site) to trickle to him. As long as the content is close to your content, there shoudn't be a problem with adding him to your home page.

If his content is way diffrent than your content, tell him he should ask for other sites where the content can more closely match his own.