Yes, I booted all of the web sites that did not have a link to my web site!! Some surprised me since at one time they did link back to my web site. Hmmm, I only wonder. Some were people that I knew or used to have contact with.
Needless to say it is common courtesy amongst webmasters to exchange links. I gave a few exceptions to the people I know that do not have the technical ability or $ to do it.
I have been at this (the Internet in regards to marketing) since 1995 and followed the trends very closely.
Today (the last few years) the big craze is "relevance" and that basically is how your web site is relevant to other web sites in the same business sector in regards to links.
So as a webmaster I need to link with other relevant web sites and those sites should link back to me.
Now with that principle goes a certain rule and I relate it to a quote which I have modified. " You can't soar with eagles if your hanging with the pigeons "
It is one thing to have tons of links, but if they are with non-related web sites and sites that have poor rankings it could harm your ranking position!
We have a solid bargaining chip with this web site because it ranks high based on traffic (well over 1 million hits per month and 20 thousand unique visitors per month).
Other drum sites should be flocking to join my links page! Especially sites that sell drums and related merchandise.
Well that is not the case and I attribute that to a learning curve in this business sector and they will probably figure it out soon..
Other factors like Meta Tags, Keyword Bidding, Email Lists etc also all play a factor in a web site marketing plan.
More on that later.
David
Webmaster