Everyone does their share of volunteer work without asking for anything in return. And sometimes we offer business favors with the expectation that they'll be returned in the future. However, if you ever feel like you're doing too much work for free, it's time to ask for something simple as a "payment," like asking other organizations to link to your website.

Inbound links can give your website a lot of "Google juice," which means they can really improve your search engine ranking. But not all inbound links are created the same. For example, if your logo is placed on someone else's "sponsor page" with no content other than more logos and links, Google and other search engines will not offer much of a boost to your website rank. However, if someone writes a blog post referring to the type of business you offer and includes a text link with highly specialized keywords, your website will start its climb up the ranks.

Google's algorithm for ranking websites is built on several different factors, and inbound links are key. Basically, search engines use a combination of keywords and numbers to rank your site. So the more websites that link to yours, the more "juice" you get - but the quality of those links is extremely important, as well. Blog posts, like I mentioned above, use original content with their own set of keywords. If the words in a particular post are favorable towards the keywords you also use on your site, having an inbound link in that post will help your website rank.

When you ask for a link to your website from a blog post or other page with original, specialized content, ask for a text link that includes some of your best keywords. For example, in a sentence that says, "click here for inbound marketing tips," it would not be very helpful to hyperlink the words "click here." That's because those words have nothing to do with the website they're linking to. Hyperlinking the words "inbound marketing tips" would be much more valuable to the linked website.

So next time you need a simple favor from an organization where you volunteer or a business where you donate some work from time to time, be sure to know how to ask for it. The quality of the link-back could make a big difference!