What is a backlink?
Moz.com describes a backlink as “a link created when one website links to another.” Google and other search engines use them as ranking signals because they signify that your website has something useful and has essentially been vouched for by the linking domain. The amount of trust and history a domain has, usually referred to as domain authority, determines how much gravitas Google gives to your domain due to the domain linking to you. For instance, a link to your website from a huge respected and established website like bbc.co.uk will provide a bigger boost than a relatively small, unknown news website.
Early on in my career, backlinks were one of the scariest areas of SEO for me. I had seen when businesses has been penalised for buying multiple backlinks and adding their links to any old crappy directory, which at the time these business thought they were just playing the game, and weren’t to know Google were necessarily going to punish them - it’s just what
many people did to gain backlinks quickly and boost their rankings.
On top of that, getting backlinks from other good websites without buying them can be difficult and hard work as nobody is going to link to your site unless it is worth linking to. It takes time and effort to build a healthy number of legitimate backlinks - there is no shortcut.
Things you can do to ensure you boost your SEO with backlinks
Look for quality not quantity
As mentioned above, all domains are not created equal and having a link from a respected, reputable site is worth much more than several low quality links. The more good quality links you have the higher your ranking will be, but it is not the only factor so don’t get consumed by quantity. Focusing only on quantity can result in working to gain any old link which can be a waste of time by either having no effect or worse by causing harm if you have too many low quality links.
Create useful, quality content
Having useful, high-quality content will be attractive to reputable domains and will help you earn those useful backlinks. Create content that your customers or followers want to read and reach out to quality publications or blogs in your industry for a feature, when the content is good, good websites will want to promote it.
Don’t buy links
Buying links is a direct violation of Google’s webmaster guidelines and should be avoided, otherwise you are risking your rankings being negatively affected. The chances are any domain that is selling backlinks has poor domain authority anyway, and the link will not have much impact even if Google doesn’t realise it’s a paid for link. Sometimes you may wish to sponsor content or pay for a PR piece in an online publication, this is fine but be careful that you want to be on this domain and the backlink isn’t the only reason you’re doing it - you should also use the rel=”sponsored” attribute.
Have a digital PR strategy
A digital PR strategy is a great way to build links particularly with news publications and journalists in your industry. Build relationships with journalists and editors in your field, and also your local press for any company stories that would be interesting locally, and share quality content with them that they can link to.
Analyse your competitors links
Find out which quality websites link to your competitors and reach out to them. If they have an interest in your competitor and their products or services, the chances are they would also be interested in yours.
Thank you for reading, and if you have any comments or questions please don’t hesitate to get in touch!
Comments