There are plenty of places to look for free backlinks – some of better quality than others. One trick you can use to build up a decent collection of backlinks is to regularly post on forums in your niche.

Not All Backlinks Are Created Equally

Before you go about posting on every forum you can find, understand that not all backlinks are of equal value.

Some forums (as well as blog comment areas) use the rel="nofollow" attribute in links. This means that Google (and possibly other search engines) ignores the link when crawling and calculating search engine placement.

Some other search engines – like Yahoo – may still count these. There’s no certain way to know how valuable they are, so I wouldn’t just ignore them. However, if you have a choice you should steer your time and effort to forums where the links you create do not contain the rel="nofollow" attribute.

Where Do I Put the Links?

On most forums, it’s considered bad form to just run around posting links to your site. Be sure to read the rules for the forum. Some forums may allow you to link to your site if the article directly relates to a question someone else asked.

However, there are two places you’ll generally be able to put backlinks.

In your profile, you should be able to set a “Homepage” value. Always do this. On some forums – like Programming Talk – each post contains a link to your homepage by your name.

You can also create a signature. This appears at the end of every post you make, and it is typically considered ok to place self-promoting links here. Some forums will have special rules about this – so be sure to read them.

Once you place links in your signature, make them count. This is a great place to start doing SEO. If you already have a link to your homepage underneath your name, I would use the signature to link to some deeper pages – like content categories. Give the links targeted text (like “PHP Tutorials” or “Web Design Tips”).

A Few Forums to Start With

Since you’re a webmaster, you’ll always find something interesting to talk about on webmaster forums. Here are a few well-trafficked forums that I frequent.

• DaniWeb – I think signature links here are rel=nofollow, but it’s a good forum
• Digital Point – Lots of traffic, and links are followed
• Programming Talk – Decent traffic, and links are followed
• Site Point – Lots of traffic, and links are followed

Start Posting!

What are you waiting for? Get out there and start posting!

If your website isn’t about websites, then you should probably search out some other forums based on your niche as well.

Forum backlinks aren’t going to make your website a success by themselves, but they are a good stepping stone to better SEO. You can use them to quickly build up backlinks for a new site until you start getting better backlinks from other sites.