You increase website authority through in-bound links to your website. Those links can go to any webpage within your hosted shopping cart website; they do not need to go to your homepage. The more authority your webpage has the harder your competition will need to work to surpass your webpage in the search results. Use these on-site features to help increase the number of webpages to which people will want to link and increase your authority.

1. Product Comparison Guides
 

Think Consumer Reports or any other product comparison source and you have the idea.

When you create product guides, you're creating valuable information. Put it on your website and you now have a source people can appreciate and share with others. Of course, sharing with others means links to your website.
 

2. Product User Manuals
 

Presumably, everyone has lost or tossed a user manual at least once and then needed the manual later. The internet allows people to find user manuals when they need them. The manufacturer may have user manuals, but does that bring customers back to your business? If the manufacturer has user manuals, add them to your website and make your website a valuable resource for your customers.

In cases when the manufacturer provides no user manuals, create your own; especially if you're the manufacturer. Create your product user manuals in both HTML and PDF.

The HTML version allows you to cross-link webpages within your website. This helps search engines find your webpages.

The PDF version allows people to download and/or print the document. Ensure you include your URL with links to your website on each page of the document.
 

3. Product Technical Manuals
 

Technical manuals, like user manuals, offer you a great opportunity to appear in the search results and have people link to your website. Create both HTML and PDF versions following the same idea for user manuals.
 

4. Product Demonstration Videos
 

Off-line sales occur more easily than online sales because shoppers can touch, taste, smell, and hear. Online, shoppers cannot yet touch, taste or smell.

Product demonstration videos help you provide your shoppers with a sense of ownership. They can more easily perceive themselves using the product. This helps increase online sales.

Make certain you brand your videos with your company or domain name. If possible, embed a shortened URL using a service such as bit.ly.
 

5. How-to Videos
 

This tip follows the same premise as product user manuals. Creating videos about how to use your products not only help sell your products, but they are a great way to get others linking to your website.

Make certain you brand your videos with your company or domain name. If possible, embed a shortened URL using a service such as bit.ly.
 

6. On-site Blogging
 

As the quantity of webpages within your website increases, the authority of your website increases, all be it a little. However, as you create blog entries others appreciate the more links you may receive.

On-site blogs help you build your website infrastructure stronger. You should always find some way to include a link to other webpages within your website. For instance, here at Ascender, we use our own blog software and the link now adds strength to that page for the phrase blog software.
 

7. Create an Industry Guide
 

With so much information spread across the internet, people just don’t know what to believe or where to go.

By creating an industry guide, you create a resource to which others can link. The more helpful people find the guide the more people will link to it.
 

8. Create and Provide Useful Tools
 

People love great tools that help them perform tasks more efficiently. People also love games.

This one may not fit every industry, but get your creative juices working.
 

9. Create a Helpful List of Resources
 

You can create two types of helpful lists of resources. First, you could create a list for people in your industry. Second, you could create a list for customers of your industry. In either case, the quality and uniqueness of your list determines how many people link to your list.
 

Your Takeaway

Creating these valuable bits of information increases the chances people will find the information and create links to it. As the number of links increase your authority increases. As your authority increases your chance of being found continues to increase.

Additional Parts:

11 Tips for Making Your Website an Authority Site

11 Off-site Ideas for Building Your Authority Site