While it was always a good idea for SEO to build authority in your niche, now it's more useful than ever. This is because Google is gradually decreasing the value of links you can build yourself, and making voluntary one way links from others comparatively more valuable than they were before. And if you are seen as an expert in your field then your website or blog is sure to get some of those links eventually.

This idea of expertise and authority can apply to any field or business. Say you're a hairdresser in Adelaide, and you have a website for your salon. You may have added your URL to relevant directories, classifieds, etc. But then what? Well, you can definitely improve your SEO substantially by expounding your expertise in different ways online.

Keeping your own blog (and writing guest posts for other blogs) is the obvious way to build your authority. This is not only because you can keep adding insightful, expert information to it; but also because if your blog is part of your main domain you increase the odds of getting links directly to it.

While a blog is preferable, you can get a similar effect by building authority on Twitter. If you constantly link to interesting articles and blog posts (by yourself and others) as well as tweet quality tips and insights then you will definitely develop a reputation as someone who really knows her stuff. Links to the URL you include in your profile are sure to result after a while.

Of course blogging and Twitter are mainly about words, so they're great for people who love to write. But what if you're not this way inclined? There must be a lot of people in this boat; people who have much useful and detailed knowledge about a subject, skill, or profession, but just don't enjoy working for hours on a PC keyboard.

If you are one of these people then YouTube could well be the go. There are countless people who have built substantial followings on that site simply by sitting in front of a video camera in their homes and telling -- or better still showing -- viewers how to do stuff.

Deliver interesting, insightful and most of all useful tips, advice and observations in your videos and people will have no doubt that you really know your stuff. Some are sure to share it on social media. As long as you feature your URL in your visual offerings some sturdy dofollow backlinks will result eventually.

Since being on Twitter, I've noticed much tweeting and retweeting of blog posts featuring infographics. And they clearly do attract links, so using them is being seen by many as a good SEO tactic.

The reasons people like them so much are obvious. They make a page more visually interesting, as well as containing lots of useful information that can be easily and quickly processed by the visitor.

I've never created any infographics myself, but it doesn't seem all that hard to do. And you can find the raw data to inform and organize your images in many places on the web.

Their use by bloggers and other web publishers could have peaked, however. When infographics are being used to explain why you should use them, it's clear that the method is on the verge of over-saturation!

Also, while the backlinks that they generate do have definite SEO benefits these days, it looks like Google may well be discounting their value in the future.

That said, there's nothing inherently wrong with them. I doubt they could do any SEO harm, and they certainly have a lot going for them in other areas.

As yet, I haven't published any ones that I've found elsewhere on this site and probably never will. One reason for this is that I want to maintain the blog's look and feel. I'd prefer to keep it clean and basic in design and focus on the verbal content.

Traditional blog posts are not nearly as eye catching as those containing infographics, of course. But you can still give them some visual impact by using bullet points, bold text and italics, etc. And of course you can describe all the same information contained in an infographic.

Better still, you can simultaneously investigate and interpret the information in an insightful and comprehensive way. While people do tend to have much shorter attention spans these days a certain proportion of your visitors will appreciate this more old fashioned approach.

Social media is going absolutely gangbusters these days, and is very useful for anyone with a website or blog. The more people you connect with online in your niche, the more you learn, and the greater the likelihood of getting those valuable, natural one way links to your URL.

But you shouldn't forget offline social networking. (You know, the real world activities people used to engage in during the olden days before the internet completely took over our lives!)

Of course, you can use the big social sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin to find get-togethers in the real world. However they do lend themselves much more to online networking.

One site that is much more focused on offline activities is Meetup. Joining this site could be a really good move for anyone with a locally oriented business website or blog. For those in Perth, where I live, there's this group. I might even go there myself some day.

I'm surprised that there aren't many other sites like Meetup. But Zenergo looks like a new and promising social networking site with more of an offline focus.

Of course there are plenty of other ways to network with locals in your niche. I just did a search for "meet bloggers in Perth" and several seemingly independently organized events popped up (mostly mentioned on blogs -- funny, that!).

You could even organize and promote such a gathering yourself. Not only would the event itself be a great way of making valuable contacts in your locality and niche, but just the act of writing about it on a blog could actually be good linkbait.

Firstly, you might get some bloggers linking to the details about when and where it will be held. Then if you took some photos and/or videos at the actual get-together and posted them afterwards, that content could generate still more links down the track.