There is currently much talk about link building being ‘dead’ and that it will only get you penalized. But guess what, it still works! AHREFS are constantly analyzing data and they have confirmed that backlinks are still a very strong ranking factor. Please be aware that technical SEO factors on your site are becoming increasing important and that backlinks alone will not help you to win! In this article, I am going to share 22 link building strategies that can dramatically improve your website’s search engine rankings. Whether you are new to link building or have been working on SEO for years, you will discover an exciting new link building strategy that can improve your website’s performance. Let’s jump straight in!
Contents
Beginner link building strategies
Ask people you know for links
Blog comments
Business directories
Contact the websites that you send links to
Ask for links
Create list content
Use blogger outreach
Add your blog to blog directories
Get manufacturers and distributors to link to you
Fix broken links on your site
Intermediate link building strategies
Build relationships with prominent people in your industry
Let people embed your content
Add a blog to your website
Become a curator for other people’s content
Add evergreen content to your website
Write helpful content
Get people who use your images to link back
Interact with the commenters
Advanced link building strategies
Build the definitive guide to a topic
Reverse engineer the content made by your competitors
Perform a survey on your website
Build a network of blogs
Beginner link building strategies
Here are a few simple SEO techniques that are simple to implement and capable of delivering quick results.
Ask the people you know for links
The average Internet user has multiple social media accounts, blogs, and websites. You can take advantage of this fact by asking any colleagues, friends, and family member with a web presence for links to your website. However, concentrate on getting links from relevant and reputable websites and social media platforms. If their website is completely unrelated to yours, don’t bother getting a link.
Blog comments
A few years ago, it was common practice to post links into blog comments in the hopes of accumulating more incoming links. This tactic no longer works as most blog owners mark links in comments as nofollow or flag those comments as spam. Google also considers these types of comments to be low quality at best.
However, there is still a way that you can use blog comments for link building. By consistently posting high-quality comments in a blog, you can bring yourself to the attention of the blog’s owner. This can help you build relationships with other bloggers and encourage them to post links to your valuable content within their blog posts.
Business directories
If you are a business, you can submit your website to specialized business directories. Look for directories that are specifically related to your business’ geographical location or industry.
Contact the websites that you send links to
If you send a link to someone else’s website within a piece of content that you create, consider contacting them and asking for a link in return. Tell them that you enjoyed their website and featured it. In many cases, they will be happy to return the favor with a link from their site or a mention on one of their social media accounts.
Ask for links
It’s a good habit to include details of your website and social media profiles in all of your communications. Add them to your newsletters, invoices, business cards and other real world promotional material. There is no harm in explicitly asking for links on these kinds of materials. It’s as simple as saying “Did you find our product or service satisfactory? Tell others about it by linking to us on social media or from your website”.
Create list content
Content marketing remains one of the best ways to generate links. If you create fantastic content, most Internet users are more than happy to link to it. However, one form of content stands out as being the most effective — lists. Internet users love reading articles like the 7 Best Ways To Train Your Dog To Fetch or 21 Incredibly Easy Ways To Lose Weight This Summer. Choose a topic that you are familiar with and write a massive page of list items. Promote it on social media and you will be surprised by how many links it can generate.
Use blogger outreach
Don’t be afraid to contact bloggers directly to ask them for a link to your content. This approach is particularly effective if you can identify a broken link or link to outdated content on their website. When you identify these bad links, create content for them and send the blogger a quick email suggesting they link to your page instead. If your content is high-quality, most bloggers will be more than happy to link to it.
Add your blog to blog directories
If you are promoting a blog, submit it to blog directories like Blogorama, Blogcatalog, Best of the Web, Spoke, and About Us. You can view a very long list of blog directories on this site.
Get manufacturers and distributors to link to you
Create a list of the manufacturers and suppliers that send you the products that you sell. Contact these businesses to see if they will add a link to your website on any of the “authorized retailer” sections on their websites.
Fix broken links on your site
Link building isn’t just about forming new links. It’s also about carefully managing the outgoing links on your website to preserve as much “link juice” as possible. Audit your business’ website to ensure that there aren’t outgoing links point at missing pages (404s). This is simple to do using a tool like Ahrefs.
Intermediate link building strategies
Next up, intermediate link building strategies. These strategies require slightly more technical knowledge or additional time to implement, but often deliver a lot of SEO value.
Build relationships with prominent people in your industry
Both virtual and real-world relationships can help you generate links to your website. The easiest way to develop a virtual relationship is to interact with a prominent person by sharing their content and social media posts. If you are also creating valuable content, they will be very likely to provide you with a link.
Another great way to build virtual relationships is to help people is by answering their questions on websites like Quora. You will quickly establish yourself as an authority in the industry and accumulate links from thankful users.
Build real-world relationships by attending trade shows, talking to other business owners, getting to customers and so on. Don’t be shy about asking for a link to your website, especially from customers who love your product or service.
Let people embed your content
Create plenty of “embed-friendly” content including attractive images, infographics, charts, videos, and graphs. Encourage users to embed this content by using software that gives them a quick way to copy different page elements. If you are using a platform like WordPress, there are numerous plugins which allow visitors to share snippets of your content in a few clicks (with proper attribution).
Add a blog to your website
If you aren’t already blogging — start now. By continually posting original content to your blog, you can attract a steady stream of incoming links from different sources. Blogging is an essential part of content marketing and remains one of the best link building techniques around.
Become a curator for other people’s content
People want to see the “best of the best” content without having to scour the Internet for hours. You can help them by curating online content to present the best articles on specific topics relating to your business. For example, if you are a personal trainer, create a curated list of the 10 best articles on weight loss for 2019 or the 25 most useful calorie trackers reviewed.
Add evergreen content to your website
Evergreen content is content that stays relevant, useful and valuable for a very long time. Topics like “How to get more Youtube views” or “How to write a compelling introduction for your blog” will most likely still be useful years from now. You can continually update this kind of content to ensure it remains relevant and accurate.
Write helpful content
Well written how-to articles and tutorials are very popular online. Users who need this type of content are typically very thankful after consuming it because you helped them solve or avoid a problem. This makes them very likely to link to your content or share it on social media. Writing a lot of this kind of content can also establish your website as an industry authority where Internet users go to have their problems solved.
Get people who use your images to link back
If you create your own high-quality images or infographics, it is fairly likely that other people have used them on their own websites. Perform a Google images search to identify the websites that are currently using your images, then send them an email asking for attribution in the form of a link to your site. Most webmasters will be happy to give you a link.
Interact with the commenters
People that write enthusiastic or detailed comments on your blog posts are usually very likely to link to you. All they need is a little encouragement. When you notice a positive comment, thank them and ask for a link from their website or social media profiles.
Advanced link building strategies
If you already have a website that ranks well but requires some innovative link building strategies to beat tough competitors, try these advanced techniques. Although they will take more time to implement, they have been proven to be effective.
Build the definitive guide to a topic
A definitive guide is one that contains everything you need to know about a topic. If you wrote the definitive guide for buying a lawn mower, it would contain everything from choosing between different types of engines to sharing tips to picking the right mower for a specific yard size. Making this kind of content does require a lot of hard work, but it can attract hundreds of backlinks.
Reverse engineer the content made by your competitors
The easiest way to become successful is to emulate success! Take a close look at the highest ranking pages produced by your competitors. Follow the formula they used to make their content, from the types of headings to the infographics, and embedded videos — but make it better.
Perform a survey on your website
This technique is quite effective for websites that already have a good amount of traffic. Begin by thinking of a survey question that is somewhat controversial or interesting. For example, you could ask a young audience if they believed Capitalism was a better system than Socialism. Add the survey question to your website and ask visitors to answer it.
Once you have collected the results, you can publish the results on your website in an article. If the survey response is quite interesting or unexpected, you will be able to find many sites willing to report on the results and link to your website.
Build a network of blogs
Reach out to other bloggers in the same industry to ask them if they would be interested in forming a small blogging network. Agree to occasionally share links and content with one another. Simply link to useful content pieces that the other blogs are posting (avoid swapping links directly).
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