Link building is the popular go-to SEO strategy, and it’s no surprise considering the power links hold.
The problem is, most people build links before they have a site worth linking to. So, if you haven’t got your website set up properly with a solid SEO foundation, it’s time to do that now.
However, if you have all your SEO ducks lined up, now it’s time to give your site a boost by adding links into the mix.
But before showing you some excellent link building strategies, it’s beneficial to know what makes a powerful backlink so you can make smart decisions whilst building links:
What Makes a Powerful Backlink
Whether you’ve decided to hire professionals or you’re planning to do it by yourself, you must understand what makes a powerful backlink. If you choose to outsource the work, you won’t have as much control over the links so be extra careful on which link building services you use.
When building a powerful backlink, you need to consider the following factors; if you don’t, the backlink could cause you more harm than good.
One of the first things to consider is having the link naturally placed; it shouldn’t look forced into the page. You should also keep in mind the level of authority the referring domain holds; the better the authority, the more power the link has.
And these aren’t the only factors to consider:
The referring website has to be relevant to the content you’re trying to rank. There’s no point in having a website in the transport niche linking to a site in the dieting niche. There’s no relevance, and Google knows it.
Lastly, it needs to be a real website! And just as importantly, (in most cases) you need to avoid sites with a “write for us” section.
This is like a big flashing neon light in Google’s eyes; basically saying, “I Manufactured This Link, Penalize Me”.
If you keep these things in mind when building your links, you’ll end up with stronger links with a lot more chance of moving the needle.
Link Building Strategies
Okay, link building strategies have been around for a very long time, which is good news; it means you have plenty of opportunities to score powerful backlinks.
Below, I will walk you through three of the best strategies for building powerful backlinks. And as a bonus, you’ll also be introduced to one of the most underused strategies:
Guest Posting Your Way to the Top
This link building strategy is very popular, and for a good reason; it’s incredibly effective.
Now, you may have heard the age-old debate about link building being a ‘black hat’ strategy.
Google has given many warnings about using guest posts to rank your site, but when done correctly using my advice from the previous section, you are at very little risk.
Not only does guest posting do that, but they also help you build a larger target audience, which is fantastic for marketing.
Guest posting is an easy technique, but it’s not what it used to be.
Once upon a time, you could score guest posts with very little money involved. Unfortunately, this is not always the case anymore, you may be required to pay a publishing fee (just make sure the link is really worth it before investing).
If you’re going to build guest post links, follow these four simple steps:
Pick Your Targets
The very first thing you need to do is find targets you want links from. But how do you do this?
Your best option is to use Ahrefs link intersect report to find out what links your competitors have. Make a list of any referring sites your competitors have, but you don’t.
Check the Power of the Sites
Now you have a list of potential opportunities for you to score links from, it’s time to check if they are worth your time.
Again, you can do this with Ahrefs.
For each URL you’ve found, you want to run it through the site explorer to analyze the site.
Ideally, you’re looking for sites with a high domain rating (DR); what counts as high? Usually, pages over 60+ but a good mix of sites work so also consider anything 30+.
Contact the Blog
If you feel the site ticks all your boxes, it’s time to reach out to the blog owner and offer them some fantastic content that adds value to their website.
Make sure you write a really good pitch as no doubt they get lots of requests, so you need to stand out.
Create Your Content
If they are happy to move forward with the guest post, it’s time to get writing. Whether you are writing the content yourself or outsourcing, just remember to keep the audience in mind.
You should try to include things like:
- Images
- Videos
- Internal links
- Quotes
Once everything is completed, it’s a case of submitting and getting it published with your bright shiny link placed naturally within the content.
Testimonial Link Building
It has to be one of the most straightforward strategies out there; in fact, it almost feels too easy to be effective.
Using this technique, you can build powerful homepage links. All it takes is to write a few lines of text.
The idea is to reach out to products or services you’ve used within your niche and offer a testimonial.
For this, you’ll need to follow these steps:
Think of Your Targets
This step involves brainstorming all the products and services you’ve used that relate to your niche.
If you’re struggling to think of suggestions, look at what your competitors use; just make sure you can provide a genuine testimonial before reaching out.
Pitch to the Right Person
Finding the email address might seem tricky at first, but with the right tools such as “Hunter.io” or “Find That Lead” it’s quite easy.
For each email you find, add it to the spreadsheet next to the URL ready to send the pitch.
Pitch Your Idea
The next step is to pitch your idea to the owner of the product or service.
In the pitch, you should introduce yourself, and explain how the tool has helped you do X, try to include some real results (this is more likely to get approved).
Ask them if you can put something together for them; just make sure you keep it simple.
Get the Link
Once everything has been agreed upon, it’s time to write the testimonial. It only has to be a short piece but should include things like
- What you like
- How it helped
- Tangible results
When it’s written, it’s time to send it off and get it published.
Help A Reporter Out (HARO)
This is another excellent strategy you can use to build links for your website; more importantly, it’s an entirely free service.
What makes this technique different from the other strategies is the websites come to you. More importantly, big websites use this service.
But how does it work?
Sign Up To The Service
The first thing you need to do is sign up as a source on the website.
Once you sign up, they will send you three emails a day, which are broken down into categories.
You need to look through the list and find questions that are in your niche. You then want to run their website through Ahrefs to see the DR.
You’re looking for sites with a med-high rating.
Make Your Pitch
Websites with a higher domain rating will get more requests, which means it will be more challenging to get the link…
So you’ll need to bring your A-game.
Make sure you answer all their questions in great detail and include your website’s bio and a link to your relevant page.
The journalist will then get in contact with you to say whether they’re going to use your content or not.
Easy!
BONUS: Internal Link Building
As mentioned before, this strategy is severely underused, yet it holds so much power. The best thing about internal linking is the fact that is completely free to use, and more importantly, you can’t get penalized for it.
- Help Google find new content
- Help Google rank your pages
- Directs traffic to money pages
How do you increase your internal links?
You need to think of a list of pages that you want to increase the rankings for and add their target keywords next to it.
From there, it’s pretty easy.
You need to perform a Google search to find pages that are related to the primary keyword. It should look like this:
You want to open each search result and add your links to the page, preferably using an exact match anchor text.
Do this for each of the URLs you’ve listed as essential. This will take some time, but the results will make it worth it.
Conclusion
There you have, four strategies to increase your rankings. Remember for these to be successful you need to have a site worth linking to in the first place.
Links are a valuable commodity and can push your website to success if built correctly.
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