Everything You Should Know About Backlinks

Backlinks are the cornerstone of any SEO strategy. Without them, your web pages will turn into a remote document repository. The quality of backlinks also matters as they add to the credibility of a website through the eyes of the search engines.

This brings us to the question…

Why Do You Need Backlinks to Your Website?

Search engines, like Google, look at the backlinks going to your website as an indicator of the quality of your own website. Google gives more credit to pages with a higher number of incoming links. Additionally, the higher the quality of the backlink, the better. Having backlinks from highly credible and established websites are far more beneficial than having backlinks from very low quality websites. And in fact, if the websites are too low in credibility, receiving a backlink from them could potentially hurt your own rankings on Google.

This explains why many SEO professionals make a point to acquire backlinks when trying to achieve better rankings in Google.

Types of Backlinks

Backlinks have certain levels of influence on how your website is ranked in search engines. Here are some types of backlinks that will provide great results.

Editorial Backlinks

An editorial backlink is typically generated when when content from one website links to another in the form of a blog post. However, it doesn’t necessarily have to be in the form a blog post.  This type of backlink could be generated when another website has published content that mentions someone from your company or links to a piece of content on your blog, as a valuable source of information. Here’s an article by CopyPress that talks about how to get editorial backlinks. This link we just shared is a perfect example of an editorial backlink. They are receiving the backlink from us.

You can earn editorial links by writing and publishing high-quality content or by having great products and services that people find useful. As an example, the reason we shared the CopyPress link above is because their content was relevant and we believed it was high quality and worth linking too.

Guest Post Backlinks

Guest posts give you exposure to a new audience and allow you to obtain backlinks to your website. Let’s say you post content on a popular blog – you can get a substantial amount of traffic, and if the site is in your niche, then backlinks can be valuable too. 8 Types of Marketing Emails is an example of a guest blog post we allowed on our own website. And, in that blog post, the author includes links going back to their own website.

If you wish to contribute guest blog posts, try doing a Google search to find websites in your industry that allow guest blogging. Chances are, there will be a number of websites that give guidelines and requirements for being featured as a guest blogger on their website. If you’re interested in writing a guest blog post about marketing, feel free to look at the guidelines and requirements for becoming a guest blogger on Joshua Lyons Marketing, LLC.

Interview Backlinks

Interviews help generate sharable content. Let’s say you do a monthly interview with a leader in your industry. Then, share that interview transcript/video/podcast in an article on your own website. Once it’s published, let the interviewee know it’s live. Then, both of you can share that article with your followings. As this happens, you will likely see a number of backlinks that come from others who share links to your interview.

BONUS TIP: Make sure there’s quality content on every website you’re linked to. In fact, there have been times when someone offered to give a backlink to our website and we politely declined the offer. We did this because after doing a quick check, we could see their own website was not very credible by Google. We didn’t want their poor performance to tarnish our own rankings and reputation with Google. To learn how to have a high quality and credible website, read our blog post titled Everything You Should Know About Domain Authority (DA).

Wikipedia Backlinks

Wikipedia is the world’s largest online encyclopedia where users can structure and modify the content after they become a trusted moderator.

You can obtain backlinks from Wikipedia articles that relate to your niche to spread the word. Although most of the links are a no-follow (not typically considered as valuable to Google), they are still high-quality. One Wikipedia backlinking strategy is to identify topics in Wikipedia that are related to you industry. Then, find those articles and see where they could use more information. Once you find holes in the Wikipedia articles, write and publish the missing information in an article on your own website. Then go back to Wikipedia, edit their article so the holes you identified are filled, and create a citation going back to the supporting articles on your own website.

Webinar Backlinks

A webinar backlink leads people to a presentation held online in real-time. After the webinar is over, the organizers will send a link to watch the videos. Also, many companies will create a webinar in advance, and then play it as if it were a live webinar. In this situation, the company will sometimes go so far as to even create pre-made questions from the audience, and answer them on the recorded webinar, as if they are live.

How do you get valuable webinar backlinks? You should post the webinars as recordings so people can link to them. If it is a valuable resource, other people will link to them in their content as well.

Badge Backlinks

Badge backlinks can be issued to other websites and blogs in the form of award symbols. You can use this strategy to obtain links to your website if it’s suitable for your industry.

You will need to issue the recipient with some code to place on their website which features a link back to your website. These types of award/badge backlinks are popular with bloggers.

For example, you can have a list of the top sites and then give badges to each one. You will need to get creative here. Badge backlinks are hard to obtain, so they are not suitable for everyone.

Press Release Backlinks

Press releases alert media outlets of news about your company and its services. They are also a great source of quality, authoritative backlinks.

To get links from press releases, you need to write a press release and distribute it to media outlets with links back to your website in the release. It will also benefit your SEO when journalists scour the platforms for stories and republish them elsewhere.

Blog Comment Backlinks

These are the links you create to your website when you comment on other blogs. Most blogs have a comment section where you can fill in your name, email address and website address. Once your comment is approved, a link will often be generated, going back to the website address you submitted.

Blogs can often be abused by spammers so you should post genuine comments. Blog comments are also a great way to network with other bloggers, so there’s more to it than just getting backlinks.

Acknowledgment Backlinks

These links occur when a website mentions another brand with regards to a relationship which they might have with them. They typically don’t have much content surrounding the link, other than just a brief description of the business and relationship. An example would be Ropella. They have a page on their website that lists the various charities they support, along with a link to each of these charities. In this example, the charities are receiving the acknowledgment backlinks. Do you know of a website with an acknowledgements page that might be willing to add an acknowledgment backlink to your website? If so, you should probably contact the website owner.

Profile Backlinks

When you create an online profile for your business, you should include a link to your website from this profile, whether it be on social networks, business listings, or industry-specific directories.

Tools to Help You Get Backlinks

Today, there are many different tools to help you build backlinks to your website. Building backlinks used to only consist of reaching out to other website owners directly and asking for a link. Or, it was simply waiting and hoping someone links to your site. These days are long gone thanks to innovative marketers. So, when trying to build backlinks for your site, consider using one of the tools below.

SEOJet

If you haven’t heard of SEOJet, it’s a software that is built specifically for link-builders. SEOJet has a number of different features to help you build links easier and it’s an incredibly helpful tool. It can be difficult to find websites that allow you to create backlinks for them. So, SEOJet makes this process much easier and faster. Additionally, you can see how many quality backlinks you need in order to outrank your competition. Talk about a great tool!

Backlink Audit Tool From SEMRush

SEMRush is an expensive tool, but it’s very helpful for managing every area of your digital marketing. They have SEO tools, social media tools, content marketing tools, and more. In their SEO toolkit, they have a backlink audit tool that lets you know how your backlinks affect your site. This is incredibly helpful, as some backlinks can negatively affect your site. If you’re looking for a tool to help with all of your digital marketing, we highly recommend SEMRush.

SmallSEOTools Free Backlink Checker

If you want a free tool to show you where your backlinks are coming from and how they affect your site, the SmallSEOTools Backlink Checker is a great choice. Although this tool doesn’t provide as many insights as other tools, such as SEOJet, it’s still great for beginners. When first starting your backlink strategy, we recommend this one until you’re ready to pay for a superior tool.

What to Consider Before Obtaining Backlinks

Before you start your link building campaign, there are a couple other points to keep in mind.

First, assess your business needs. Who is going to read the content? What are the needs of the target audience? The links you choose should be aligned with your brand and goals.

Second, you should do a competitor analysis. Know what the competitors are up to. Using tools like MOZ or SEMRush, you will be able to see where your competitors are getting backlinks. If your competition can get those backlinks, why shouldn’t you? You probably stand a good chance of getting backlinks from many of those same websites.

Best Practices When Obtaining Backlinks

The process of building backlinks to your website requires hard work and patience. Also, you must be conscious of your link building strategy.

However, only high-quality links are needed to generate the best results. Here are the best practices to generate backlinks and increase your online presence.

Develop Sharable Content

More people will visit your website if you have great content. When visitors find useful content, they will share it with family, friends and coworkers. Social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook will also help to promote your content.

Whether you create an actionable eBook, well-researched blog post, or valuable infographics, when you publish your content across the internet, make it very easy for others to share your content. If you’re able, include a call to action that literally tells people to share your content.

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Stick to Your Niche

This is an opportunity to pitch guest blog posts and build a professional relationship in your post. According to Google, sticking with your niche can help you climb the ranks.

Make sure you take time to know your business and then come up with content that best suits your website.

Focus on High Domain Authority Backlinks

Choosing high-quality blogs brings more traffic to your site and helps you get higher rankings. Secondly, they open doors to many opportunities and create value for the readers.

Also, when you increase your domain authority, your site will rank higher in the search results. As you build links to your site, you should focus on quality over quantity. No matter the number of links you have, make sure they are coming from trustworthy sites.

Final Thoughts

If you want to boost your search results rankings, you cannot ignore the power of quality backlinks. They are a strong indicator that a site can be trusted by search engines like Google. Backlinking can be a very tedious and time consuming activity. If you want to do backlinking but don’t have the time, hire a company that can help. And, if you’d like us to help, let us know by sending a message through the contact form below.