6 Link Building Strategies for Powerful Links
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A backlink is a link that goes from another site to your home page or a page on your site. Link building — building backlinks, in other words — is an important part of SEO because it tells Google that other websites deem your content important. In turn, Google considers your website to be more valuable thanks to those votes of confidence.
In this article, we’re going to cover several link building strategies to help improve your backlink profile and, as a result, your ranking in search results.
As we go through these tips, keep this in mind: Quality is more important than quantity when it comes to link building. Google doesn’t just want to see any links going to your content; it wants to see links from high-quality sites leading to your content.
As you consider the link building strategies that are right for you, focus on getting links from high-authority websites and high-value pages.
3 Steps to Create Link Building Strategies That Work
These three steps will lay the groundwork that you can build upon with link building tactics.
- Analyze your website. Figure out what your site does best — that’s the content you want backlinks to go to.
- Consider your target audience. What sites are they visiting? Those are good places to focus your link building strategies.
- Build a list of potential backlink sites. Prioritize the sites you uncovered in the step above by authority and relevance. This ensures that you’ll reach out to the most important websites first.
You can also audit your content to expose content gaps. Not only will this make it easier for your site to compete in search, but other sites will begin to recognize your site as an authority in the space, which makes it more likely to gain backlinks from them.
Top Link Building Strategies to Consider
There are a number of link-building tactics you can use as part of your SEO strategy. Think about your end goal, be patient (link building takes a lot of time), and regularly evaluate your link building strategies to make changes where needed.
It also should be a given that the only way to get quality backlinks is to create content that’s worth linking to. Educational, informational and thought leadership content, especially when it answers common questions or addresses pain points, is the best type of link-worthy content.
Another way to encourage backlinks is to do newsworthy things for your brand. For example, if you create a new product, have a new partnership or host an event, those are newsworthy happenings that sites will want to talk about and link to.
Now, let’s jump into the link building strategies!
1. Ask for a Backlink
Simply asking a site for a backlink is called outreach, and it’s one of the most straightforward link building strategies you’ll find. Whenever you create high-quality content, share it with sites that you think would benefit from linking to it. Try this in the following scenarios:
- You created new content that you’re promoting.
- You’re working on improving SEO for existing content.
- There’s an unlinked mention of your company or content that you want the site owner to add a link to.
Contact the content manager or site owner directly and briefly let them know why they’ll benefit from linking to your page.
2. Send Press Releases
If you have a broader announcement to make, sending press releases can put you in touch with news sources, publications and other media contacts. This is a good tactic when your brand has something newsworthy to share, like making a large donation to a cause or offering a scholarship.
Just as you do with basic outreach, make sure the press release talks about why your story is important for the media to cover and why their audience will be interested in it.
3. Promote Yourself as a Thought Leader
A thought leader is a person who is seen as an authority and expert in their niche. They frequently publish new content and come up with fresh ideas or insights related to their industry. As a result, their audience sees them as a leader and other websites want to promote their content.
There are several ways to establish yourself as a thought leader and gain backlinks:
- Contribute guest posts to other websites.
- Create an online class or webinar.
- Get involved in Q&As on forums like the AMA subreddit.
- Post on social media.
- Reply to journalist requests via HARO.
- Seek out interview opportunities.
- Start a podcast.
These tactics can lead to backlinks in different ways, either by you providing the backlink yourself or encouraging others to link to your content.
For example, when you contribute guest blog posts, you will probably be able to add a link to your byline. On the other hand, if you’re interviewed by someone else in your niche, they’ll probably promote your brand or website to provide value for their audience.
4. Write Testimonials and Reviews
If you’ve purchased products, software or services that relate to your niche, you may be able to get a backlink by writing an honest testimonial or review.
First, contact the company to let them know that you like their product. Offer to write a testimonial or review, and if they’re interested, include a backlink in your byline when you submit it.
5. Create Statistics Articles
By creating content that lists statistics you curate from other sources, you include a lot of links to other websites in just one article. This can benefit your backlink profile in a couple of ways:
First, those sites may return the favor by linking to your content, too. Second, other sites that include those stats in their content may link to your article instead of tracing the stat back to its source.
Plus, this type of content is relatively easy to create since you’re essentially aggregating information that’s already out there.
6. Become a Sponsor
By becoming a sponsor of an event or venue, you guarantee that your brand name will be mentioned in related coverage. You can sponsor an industry conference, a niche meetup or even the venue that hosts one of those events.
This can improve word-of-mouth marketing along with backlinks. At the very least, your business name and link will be added to the event or venue’s website.
Perform a Technical Audit of Your Backlinks
Performing a technical audit of your backlinks means finding mentions that have broken links or links that need to be updated in some way. This can help in the following situations:
- 404 errors (page not found)
- Broken links
- Migration to HTTPS
- Redirect chains (learn more here)
The site manager may not realize the backlink doesn’t work or needs to be replaced, so it’s up to you to let them know.
Black Hat Link Building Strategies to Avoid
On top of knowing the best link building strategies, you also need to be familiar with frowned-upon strategies that could do more harm than good.
- Automated tools that create backlinks
- Buying backlinks
- Bribing website owners for backlinks
- Link exchanges
- Spamming comment sections to add more backlinks
Remember, Google doesn’t just care about how many backlinks you have but also how valuable the linking sites are.
Wrapping Up
There are probably several more link building strategies you’ve heard of, like creating an RSS feed for your content or adding your website or page links to niche directories.
While those methods may still have some relevance, they’re probably not going to give you the bang for your buck that you’re after. Instead of spending your time on those sorts of tasks, you can get further by creating excellent content and networking with big players in your niche.
You’ll also want to check out our article with the best free websites for backlinking.