The SEO game is one of the most intriguing digital marketing techniques of the 21st century. The stakes are high, the competition is big, and the resources are basically unlimited.
Generating organic traffic to your website is one of the most reliable and productive ways to grow your business without having to rely solely on advertising networks, paid social media campaigns, or expensive influencers. Some interesting statistics show that:
· There are over 67.000 searches on Google every second
· 93% of today’s online experiences start with a search
· 80% of search engine users ignore the paid ads that sit on top of the organic results
· 39% of the entire world’s ecommerce traffic is provided by search engines
Quite some benefits.
Nevertheless, SEO success involves well-defined strategies, consistent hard work, and a great deal of patience.
Backlinks are key elements that define the overall success of an SEO strategy. Google and the rest of the popular search engines will define the quality and relevance of your website by looking at multiple factors.
According to a Google senior search engine strategist, content and backlinks are the two most important ranking factors that Google takes into consideration when assessing the relevance of a webpage and website.
It’s just like Pareto’s principle: 80% of the results come from 20% of your actions. If you start focusing on content and backlinks (which are absolutely interrelated), you’ll improve your odds of climbing the ranking ladder and reach the top organic search positions.
How Backlinks are Impacting SEO and the Ranking of Your Website
A backlink is a hyperlink on a text or image that points from one site to another. A backlink to your site is embedded in the content of an external website that is willing to send part of its traffic to your website.
Why? Because the webmaster who includes a hyperlink to your pages believes that your content, products, and services may add additional value to the people who are seeking to satisfy specific needs and solve specific problems.
Google’s purpose is to improve the search experience of its users. Backlinks are a major factor that allows the search engine to approximate the value that your website can provide. If authoritative websites point backlinks to you, Google will start “trusting” you more.
How Backlinks Can Help Your Site
Perceive backlinks like word-of-mouth recommendations combined with positive online reviews. Every time you get a high-quality backlink, you’re gaining a red dot. The more dots you acquire the more credibility you’ll receive from the major search engine. The rewards are essentially better rankings.
That may get you to think: “Well, it’s all a numbers game, and the more backlinks I get the higher I’ll rank”.
Wrong.
Backlinking used to be a numbers game, but it is no longer. Nowadays, Google leverages extraordinary intelligent mechanisms to define and grade the quality of a backlink. The ideal scenario is this:
Strive to acquire backlinks from a wide variety of highly authoritative websites. Giants like “Entrepreneur”, “Forbes”, or “New York Times” are just a few examples that should help you understand what highly authoritative means.
Either way, you should always try to get backlinks from websites who have high domain authority. You can use Ahrefs to check the authority of a domain.
The Most Popular Tactics to Get Backlinks
Now that you understand how backlinks work and why they’re so important for your SEO strategy, it’s time to get practical.
Let’s have a look at some of the most popular tactics to get high-quality backlinks to your website.
Get Backlinks from Your Own Website
When you provide a backlink by inserting a hyperlink that leads to another website, the webmasters of that website will be able to notice your deed.
A good strategy to get organic backlinks is to simply create content that links to a lot of valuable resources. For example, a roundup post implies gathering essential resources from many indirect competitors and compiling a comprehensive resource article that helps your readers find reliable solutions to their problems.
Leverage a link checker tool to provide backlinks to authoritative websites. After you post the content, follow up with an email. Let them know that you’ve decided to mention their resources and that you hope they’ll do the same when they get the chance. Don’t be intrusive. Simply let them know and congratulate them for their good content and services.
Optimize Your Content for Backlinks
Content development is another fine art that requires strategy, time, and attention. Optimizing your content for backlinks means to craft it in such a way that other webmasters and article writers will feel compelled to link to it.
Improving the quality of your content can bring you only wins. Great content gets remarked both by Google and by social media users who are always eager to share relevant information that is helpful, informational, or inspirational.
Here are qualities of high-quality content that is purposed to attract backlinks:
· Long-form articles that are both comprehensive and simple to digest (1000-2000 words)
· Easily readable (no blocks of text or/and grammar mistakes, enough white space)
· Keyword optimized
· Evergreen or trendy
· Well-optimized meta description
· Catchy headline (use power words)
· High-quality images, infographics, and videos
· Links to high-quality resources (authority sources)
· Contains internal links
· Social sharing made easy (buttons at the end of the text)
· Responsive design
· CTAs (calls-to-action)
Moreover, you should consider writing the following content formats:
· How-to articles
· Ultimate guides
· What-is type of articles
· List posts
· Infographics
· Resource articles (lists many useful tools)
Craft and Promote Infographics
Infographics are a special type of content that receives a lot of backlinks. HubSpot suggests that infographics get 3x more engagement performance (likes, comments, and shares) than any other type of content.
Designing a quality infographic is not easy. You should perform original research that supports a specific purpose. An infographic can be a how-to guide, a resource graphic, an inspirational resource, and much more. Before you create it, make sure you define its message and purpose.
Once you have it done, integrate it in a comprehensive post on your blog. Later, start promoting it using direct outreach. Search for authoritative blogs that have posted content that’s highly connected to your infographic and send them an email that suggests them to integrate it into their content.
Create and Publish Amazing Guest Posts
Guest posting is another popular yet truly effective way to generate high-quality backlinks. Most websites need unique and high-quality content. If you can provide that, many blogs and authoritative sources will be eager to take your content, edit according to their needs and expectations, and post it on their blog.
In return, they will provide an “author’s box” that mentions your name and includes the link to your website. That is a backlink that counts. The more guest posts you manage to craft the more backlinks you’ll build!
Fix Broken Links
Many blogs don’t even realize that some of their content contains broken links. There are plenty of free broken link checker tools online that will help you detect these links.
When you find a relevant website that hasn’t already fixed its backlinking errors, find a relevant piece of content on your own website and send them an email suggesting that their broken link can be replaced with your functional link. Generally, they will appreciate the fact that you’ve discovered one of their problems and will reward you by giving you a backlink.
Takeaways
Backlinking is both a skill and an art that requires consistent practice to be perfected. If you’re serious about your search engine optimization strategy, content and backlinks should become your highest priorities and efforts.
Take today’s strategies into close consideration and start applying them as soon as possible. Test, test, test, measure your results and optimize your strategies. Do it consistently and your site will receive the prizes it deserves!
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