Is success in Hubpages possible with no Backlinking?

1. 58

   sid_candidposted 13 years ago

   My aim at hubpages is to earn an average of $500 or more per month in a years time. Right now I have 165 hubs and earn between $20-$30. I wanted to know if I can achieve my goal in a years time or less if I concentrate on keyword and good topic selection and don't do any backlinking.

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      katiem2posted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I have over 200 hubs, I have always back linked and earn well beyond that amount, yet can't comment on the no backlinks question.  Interested to see what response you get.

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      Garrett Mickleyposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      For the last year, my most successful hub had significant backlinking.
      
      The next 3 most popular hubs all had 0 backlinking done to them (by me, I don't know if anyone else linked to it).
      
      It is possible, but I think backlinking helps a lot.  It really depends on your subject.

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      2besureposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Sid, do you mean $20 to $30 a day?

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         ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         No, he means per month.

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            2besureposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            Wow!  that's got to smart! 

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      Ms Deeposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I've learned, though I'm a relatively new hubber at 8mos., that instead of back linking, the hub title is more key. Finally at Hub Camp I grasped how to use Google AdWords Keyword Tool productively. My time put into long tail google-type titles is paying more than back linking -- that and high quality content.

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   Randy Godwinposted 13 years ago

   For me it is!  Almost no backlinking and still pull in several hundred a month!  Depends on the subjects one writes about,of course!

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   habeeposted 13 years ago

   I used to do some backlinking, but I seldom do now. I've found that others are doing the backlinking for me! I get emails quite often from people who like my hubs and have backlinked them on their sites.
   
   Perhaps I would make more money if I did a lot of backlinking, but I'm happy with what I earn each month. Besides, I love writing, but I HATE backlinking! lol
   
   BTW, RD, thanks for introducing me to HP!

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   TopUniverseposted 13 years ago

   Here is the similar thread started by me. Hope it help you.
   
   http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/58281

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5. 75

   Bard of Elyposted 13 years ago

   Well, from what I can tell from reading hubs and tips by Ryankett, Misha and other very successful hubbers it is very important, so I get as many backlinks as I can but I still haven't cracked the how to get anywhere near 500 a month and I still hover around 100 and that's after over two years!

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   relacheposted 13 years ago

   I'm one of the people who doesn't do backlinking, but I'm also more patient than many of the others who post.
   
   At the four year and 200 Hub point, my October earnings total fell just shy of $1700.

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      rmcrayneposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Was this only from HubPages AdSense and Amazon?  How sophisticated do you get with keyword research?  Do you use a service or software, or AdWords?  Can you suggest a hub on keywords that is written at a novice level?

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         JulieBMackposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I have written a few hubs on keywords and I also have posts on my blog if you are interested.  There is one place in particular that showed me a lot about keywords!!  Keyword Academy - again you can read about it in my blog.  Keywords are important since that is how search engines will find your articles.

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      Terryandcoposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Im with you on this one Relache, I spend no time whatsoever trying for backlinks. However, I am unfortunately not with you in terms of revenue, but perhaps after 4 years I might be :0)

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7. 61

   manicmusicfanposted 13 years ago

   Well, it all depends on what you mean by backlinking.
   
   Normal use of hubpages (such as this post in the forums) actually plants a link back to your author page.  This doens't just improve your author hubscore, but also the backlink count to the hub itself.
   
   Putting tags on your hubs, also increases the backlink count.  Your hub will be listed on the tag pages for that particular phrase.
   
   Of course you can do many other methods to increase the backlink count to your author page (and/or to your hubs themselves) which will help you get more traffic, but it is not required to get ranked (if you use the site as intended)

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   Amie Warrenposted 13 years ago

   My thought is that you have to first write something that is different enough or informative enough so that people will want to link to it. That's hard, because there isn't much that isn't written. Everything new has 10,000 pages on it within the first 24 hours.
   
   I think one key is to learn to write a different view on an old topic. I haven't perfected that yet, but I'm very new at writing for traffic and backlinks.

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   aidenofthetowerposted 13 years ago

   I am just now trying to decide whether or not to do backlinking. I did it in the beginning for about three days or something, hated it, and haven't done it since. Plus most of the sites where you backlink to have clauses about not backlinking just your articles, which means that you are supposed to backlink other people's stuff. For someone who hates backlinking it all sounded horrible.
   
   I have 127 hubs, many of which are in areas that don't earn money such as advice, writing online stuff, HubPage stuff, and religion. I was so excited to answer everyone's questions that I didn't think bout what would earn me money. :-P Anyway...I make $65 to 85 a month with Google Adsense, have never made payout with Kontera, and am not making $12-20 a month on Amazon (a recent development).
   
   To get to $500 a month in a year you will probably need to write more, write in areas where you will make more money, and find a way to do at least a little promoting...

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    Jason Menayanposted 13 years ago

    You will see in our Success Stories that many of our very successful Hubbers don't do much at all in terms of backlinking, but are still successful:
    http://hubpages.com/help/success-stories
    
    Very high-quality content and patience is key.
    
    That said, some conservative backlinking (posting to Twitter with appropriate hashtags, posting to Facebook, linking from your own blog on a complementary post) can only help.

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       darksideposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       That's it right there!
       
       The two steps to success.
       
       
       That's something a lot of people overlook. They think they need thousands of followers and waste their time fretting over that, when the most powerful tool is the vast audience who have no interest in following someone, they're using the search functionality of the site to find information of interest.

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          JulieBMackposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Very true!  Hubbers are probably less likely to click on your links than and outsider who found your hub using a search engine.

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    JulieBMackposted 13 years ago

    While, I am relatively new to Hubpages, I am not new on other content sites.  I do little or no backlinking and I do not see how it has made any difference. 
    
    What I think is more important is good content, quality keywords, and just like anything else - time and patience.  Articles need time to saturate in the search engines. Basically, the more traffic, the more likely you will get clicks onto your ads - if that is how you are defining "success."

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    Muktuposted 13 years ago

    You can certainly wait to see what happens with no backlinking. But you can have more control over your own destiny if you backlink. It improves your chances of higher rankings so if you have time, why not? Just don't anything crazy like spam a thousand links to your page using some bogus program.

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    IzzyMposted 13 years ago

    I did very little backlinking in my first 8 months or so and those hubs have stood on their own quite well - not brilliantly because they aren't high search terms, but they do OK.
    
    Then for about six months I backlinked all my hubs round the usual backlinking sites with a short blurb about each written freshly for each hub. That helped get them indexed and placed high the serps quickly, but I've noticed most of them have lost their backlinks since.
    
    For the last 2 or 3 months I haven't backlinked at all, and the hubs seem to be holding up pretty well. Some of them. The rest have died a death as have some of the hubs I backlinked. Maybe given time they will come back, who knows?
    
    My hubs that do best have organic backlinks that I didn't put there. One has 3 PR5 backlinks which is what has held it up since the algo change although it did drop one place.
    
    I think I lean towards agreeing with someone on another thread who basically said that if you are going to go the effort of backlinking, you might as well reserve using that energy for your own site.
    
    *Edit - all I do for new hubs now is post to Twitter and Facebook, not that anyone comes over to read..

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       Rosie2010posted 13 years agoin reply to this

       same here, I don't think I got any views at all from Twitter.. very few on FB, but my friends in FB are mostly from HP.

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    ryankettposted 13 years ago

    My older hubs, with a few unorganic backlinks (nothing major, perhpas 2-5) are doing much better post-algo than my non-backlinked hubs.
    
    A couple of months ago I would have said yes, but now I am beginning the process of giving my hubs a little boost, with a backlink here and there.
    
    Don't go mad though. I am trying to stick with articles to be honest, driving traffic through other articles (with different titles) to my Hubpages through links. If the links have SERPS value then great, if they don't then at least the articles will send me a few views.

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    BRIAN SLATERposted 13 years ago

    I did backlink then I stopped completely, then about 4 weeks ago started again.
    The hubs that were backlinked originally in one niche have performed well and still do even after the algo change. Other hubs that had none or v. little backlinks have floundered or sunk.
    I think to answer your question it depends on your niche and how competitive it is. A competitive niche will need plenty of backlinks to make money.
    My best performing hub on Amazon has had very few links but consistently performs.
    My suggestion for you is to do your homework first, before you reach for the keyboard.

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    Entourage_007posted 13 years ago

    I have had mixed experiences with my hubs.  I usually neglect back linking but now I am starting to focus on it a lot more.  In general you can't go wrong by creating back links to your hubs, but I also agree that depending on what topic you write about.  It may not be necessary. 
    
    Think about youtube videos - most people don't back link their videos.  But high quality content will always get links anyway and it has its way of getting around in the internet world.

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       prettydarkhorseposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       maybe bec. youtube is part of google

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