The Secret Life of Link Building
As an SEO professional, I noticed my inbox filling with requests from other online marketing professionals to partner up and link build.
I’ll admit that, at first, I was quite dismissive, being more annoyed with extra emails to siphon through. Then I got to thinking; maybe there’s more to these emails than I’m giving credit to, and perhaps these connections are exactly what my clients need.
Link building can be an invaluable tool that originates from other websites linking to your own website, known as backlinking. Google uses backlinks to help determine where a website should rank in search results. The more places that support your web pages, the more reliable and valuable those pages become to Google searches.
What exactly will link building do for your clients and/or business?
Generates credibility for the website
Will rank the website higher in Google search results
The above two can ultimately lead to more traffic on the site, which translates to a higher probability of consumer clicks, shares, and/or purchases.
There are a few different ways that you can begin the link-building journey; ask, add, or earn.
ASK
This would be what I mentioned at the beginning of the blog, the emails flooding my inbox asking to backlink. It’s like the salesman knocking on your door wanting to provide pest control services; you keep asking until you get enough yes’.
ADD
Doing this requires you to visit websites and add your own links. Though this may seem easy and efficient, it isn’t really ideal. Oftentimes, the places that allow you to add your own links aren’t very reliable, so you risk connecting with a website that isn’t considered credible. It won’t necessarily hurt your ranking, but it doesn’t really do anything for it, either.
EARN
Probably your best choice! When other websites are voluntarily taking your link and adding it to their own website, it means you’ve created quality content that they see as valuable and credible. This is the most organic way of link building and the most effective.
Good backlinks are important to recognize so that you can boost your Google ranking. Authority is important. In SEO, authority is the overall quality of the website. With a higher authority score, there’s a higher probability that the links from and on this site will be of more value. SEMRUSH has a good backlink analytic tool that can help determine the authority of a website.
Another important aspect of backlinking is in regard to the relevance of the links. Google not only relies on keywords but also on how the content matches the search directly. Connecting people with what they actually are looking for is what Google prides itself on, so when creating backlinks, be sure they match the content of your own website.
Does it matter where the link is on the page?
In short, yes. Good backlinks should be placed in the main body of the webpage. Google has a patent model it follows in order to determine the relevance of a link based on where it is on the webpage. Trends of users show that they are more likely to click on a link when it is in the body of a text versus placed in a sidebar or in the footer.
In the end, backlinks are only as good as the source they are coming from. If you want other sites to link to yours, ensure that your content is unique, informative, and relevant. When you become a source for other sites to connect with, Google will recognize these efforts and reward your website with a higher ranking.
Don’t have time to worry about building links for your website or content? Klusster Media offers SEO services that fulfill your digital marketing needs. You provide the business; we provide the content and results.
Visit KlussterMedia.com to start your climb on the web.