An Introduction To Link Building For SEO

Link building is an important part of building any SEO strategy.

If you’re new to SEO or looking to expand your knowledge, you have come to the right place.

In this article, we will be giving you an introduction to link building, explaining its importance, and sharing top tips from the industry.

What are backlinks?

Backlinks are created when another site links to yours.

By linking to your website, they are using you as a source of authority. You will see many sites hyperlink important bits of data back to the source, company names back to their websites and products to their corresponding page.

The link itself doesn’t necessarily exist to drive traffic to your site, and we do not tend to monitor the clicks. The importance here mostly lies with how Google interoperates a link.

The text used to link to your site matters too. This is called “anchor text”. These words will be used to tie your site back to specific keywords.

There are many different types of backlinks too. So, let’s take a look at those in more detail.

Link Attributes

When a website decides to link back to your website, they can also add an attribute to tell Google a little bit more about how they feel about your site or your prearranged agreement with them.

Dofollow & Nofollow Links

The nofollow attribute was introduced in 2005 and partnered with dofollow.

Much like their name suggests, one implies that you see the site that you are linking to as a valuable source while the other does not.

The nofollow attribute is used when you would like to acknowledge a source, but not pass them authority.

Perhaps you would like to share false claims another business is making but would not like them to gain any link building benefits – that is a good time to use this attribute.

To make a link a no follow you need to add add rel=”nofollow” to the code.

The dofollow attribute does the exact opposite. You are telling the crawlers that this is a trusted site that you would like to pass authority to.

Links default to dofollow when added to your site without the nofollow attribute.

UGC & Sponsored Links

Google announced two more attributes in 2019.

These work hand-in-hand with nofollow links and allow you to identify a source as less valued than a typical dofollow link.

Sponsor links are to be used when a link is sponsored or paid for.

People purchase links for many different reasons, mostly for PR, but we do not recommend this strategy. The most valuable links come from free press.

UGC stands for user generated content so the comment section of your website is a good place to think about for this type.

A very valuable use for UGC links is to give no value to users when spamming your website comment section. By turning links in this section to UGC, it should drive people away from this tactic.

What is link building?

Link building is the process of actively obtaining backlinks from other websites to yours.

When another website links directly to yours, they are showing that you are a trusted source of information and, in other words, are using you as a reference.

This means that ranking is based on how valuable content is to others, not just what is on the page.

As backlinks are such an important ranking factor, website owners and content managers have come to understand the value of links.

To cut through, you are going to need to create content that earns its links by giving users value.

One thing to bear in mind – given that links are valuable, unsurprisingly there are those who look to “sell” backlinks.

Google sees this as a direct attempt to manipulate its algorithm and has developed a number of ways to detect when people are buying and selling links. This means that, at best, Google will just ignore those bought links and they will confer no SEO value.

At worst, Google may actually penalise sites it thinks are engaged in link buying. Buying links is a waste of money that risks being penalised by search engines, don’t do it!

Why are backlinks so important?

Google was visited 89.35 billion times in the last six months alone.

The probability is, your customers are there, and they are looking for an answer to their problems.

Through link building strategies, suddenly you are not alone in a space trying to scream and shout about the amazing things your company or product offers – others are!

Not only does this allow the opportunity to capture users who are reading this content, but it also helps Google position you to a better fit ranking.

There are opportunities to get your products on lists that include the top gifts for your target audience, you can submit quotes from experts in your business to be featured as the industry leaders you are, or you can share customer reviews and experiences on other platforms that will have potential buyers clicking straight through to purchase with you.

Every business can benefit from a link building strategy.

5 tips for create a link building strategy

There are many different avenues you can go through, but for anyone who is just looking to start link building, this is our simple step-by-step guide.

Identify Potential Contacts

Obtaining a healthy list of online journalists and editors can help you make connections and create more valuable links.

Spend some time discovering where your audience is getting their online information (online magazines, blogs, etc.) and gather the emails of the people who work on those projects.

If you work with a PR company, they may be able to supply this. There are many ways in which SEO and PR work together.

Create an SEO Press Release

Make your content snappy and worthy of that click.

Think of your headlines and give the author as much information as possible.

Don’t forget to include a link to your website as well as a photo or two for the editor to choose from when possible.

Quality Content

To win backlinks, you will need to have some linkworthy content.

Interactive tools such as our ROI calculator work extremely well as they engage users and add value to their lives.

New data is attention grabbing to journalists, especially when ties in with a trending topic.

Just remember to add a newsworthy hook (or a few) to increase your chances of gaining that link!

Work Reactively

Stay on top of #journorequests on Twitter for a quick opportunity to get your brand featured in an article.

There is a constant demand waiting to be responded to, but you will have to check every single day to reap the most benefits from this strategy.

You can also sign up to Help A Report Out and find opportunities to pitch to journalists every day. Remember to be quick!

Continue, Continue, Continue

Creating a rolling strategy with valuable content months in advance is important too.

Make sure you have press releases ready for upcoming holidays and events that align with your brand.

And if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.

QueryClick: Experts in Link Building

Link building can be a tricky process but at QueryClick, we have a team of SEO experts that are ready to kickstart your campaign. If you’re interested to know more, get in touch with us today.