Backlinks also known as inbound links, are a form of off-page SEO where you receive links from other websites that direct their readers to your own website. The business receiving the link is the one who refers to the link as a backlink.
Backlinks are different from outbound links (links from your website to an external site) and internal links (links from one page on your website to another page on your site).
Why are backlinks important?
Receiving the right backlinks to your website can be beneficial to your website trying to get up the search engine ranking pages (SERP’s). There are two main benefits:
1. Backlinks can drive traffic to your website.
If someone creates a backlink to your website from their website or blog, their readers might click through to your site via the link and you will benefit from referral traffic.
2. Back links tell search engines your website has authority on a certain subject.
The more backlinks your site earns from high-quality, high-authority sites the better your website will rank as the search engines see that you are providing useful information in regard to certain search queries.
Now you know what backlinks are and why they are important to your website. How do you build a backlink?
Backlink strategies
It can be hard to receive backlinks with so many websites and blogs out there. This is why a backlink strategy can be useful to get your site noticed. Then you can start receiving some high-quality backlinks and get your website moving up the search engine rankings.
1. Maintain a steady blog full of great content
As a website that consistently creates high-quality content people will naturally want to link to your website as you are providing useful information. This is seen as an organic way of generating backlinks.
2. Use outbound links to link to other blogs
A blog is seen as a social tool. The more you link to other sites the more likely it is one of these bloggers will return the favour and link to your own website. However, make sure this is done in a consistent and opportunity-driven way so that it isn’t obvious you are trying to get a backlink from them.
In addition, you can’t cover everything in your blog so outbound links are a great way to use external resources that you can’t fit into your content. This can result in higher quality content for your site and happier readers.
3. Create visual content
Readers are becoming more and more visual and with that the popularity of cartoons, content visualisations, charts and graphs are growing. They may take a little longer to create and may cost a little bit of money but when they are created other bloggers will refer to your site to use this content as they don’t have the time or resources to do it themselves. As a result, you will receive a lot of backlinks so they can use your visual content.
4. Be funny
Creating funny content spreads like wildfire. Think about funny inside jokes in your industry and capitalise on it with some humorous content that’s linkable. People like things that are different and funny content can do that.
5. Analyse your competitors backlinks
Search for and analyse your competitors backlinks, then find opportunities where you can get similar links. This is a great way to find high-quality link opportunities in your industry. We recommend doing this research weekly or monthly so that you get fresh links and make use of the opportunities before they go.
To help why not use a link analysis tool like Ahrefs or SEMrush to get a list of backlinks and see what posts are performing well.
Conclusion
So, by now you should know what backlinks are, their importance in SEO and how you can build a backlink strategy.
If you don’t have the time or the resources and are looking for a marketing agency to take on the task visit our SEO services and get in touch
