Pointers To Get High-Quality Backlinks
The online domain is extremely competitive and defeating the competing brands requires a lot of hard work and firm efforts. There is no escaping from the fact that “backlinks” are a HUGE part of SEO!!
72% of SEO experts think backlinks are a vital ranking determinant, and quality backlinks will boost organic rankings and traffic from search engines like Google.
Search engines essentially view each link to a site as a vote of trust in the quality of your content.
After all, if a site is willing to quote you as a source or send their users away from their own website in favour of one of your pages, you must be contributing something of value.
What are Backlinks?
A backlink, also known as ‘inbound link.’, is a link that comes from other websites into your site. A backlink is placed in different forms- an image, text, or a button that links to your site.
Acquiring high-quality backlinks is the most challenging part of SEO. Backlinks should be:
- Unique
- Natural
- Authoritative
- Relevant
Techniques to Get High-Quality Backlinks
#1 Claim Unlinked Mentions
Brand mentions are the ultimate building blocks for the online reputation of your business. However, these also serve to be a source of quality backlinks on reputed websites. In most cases, authors do not include a link back to your website when they talk about your product, service, or name. These are called Unlinked brand mentions.
With such mentions, you are already halfway towards earning a backlink. It is the easiest way out there to attain access to high-quality backlinks. Therefore find the contact information of the person who is mentioning your brand in articles, blogs, and news and courteously ask them to include a link.
If you wish to attain access to high-quality backlinks, claiming unlinked mentions is the easiest way out there. Some tools can send alerts whenever there is a brand mention; tools like – Mention, BuzzSumo, Semrush, Google alerts can help do the job for you. In most instances, authors do not include a link back to your website when they mention your product, service, or brand. Claim unlinked brand mention by sending them a quick note to request link attribution.
#2 High-Quality Content Creation
The content on your site has a huge significance on your website’s capability to draw backlinks. Your content helps other sites decide whether they want to link to you. It is a reflection of your product/service and the company as a whole.
But the question is can you create quality content–
- Find the content piece that has performed well and gained attention in your industry. To do that, you can use a tool like Google to search for topics and find the traffic coming to that topic using Semrush.
- Write content that is to times better than the already present article by following simple steps-
- Use an interesting headline for the article. The Coschedule Headline tool is a great tool that helps to generate eye-catchy headlines.
- Create content with your own unique point of view
- Extend the length of your content (Google shows a preference for lengthy content)
- Make sure that the user experience of the page on any device is perfect.
- Communicate with your high-quality content
#3 Analyze Competitors’ best backlinks
Competitor analysis is an important step in any link building campaign. Doing a bank link analysis on a competitor helps you to understand their link profile, strategies and resources
This step can give you a list of potential link opportunities you may be missing and can also help you with your own link building strategy.
Several tools can help you with backlink gap reports- Semrush backlink tool can help you acquire backlinks.
You can enter five domains to access, the first domain is your own, and the rest four domains can be your competitors. Once you add all the domains in the tool, it generates a report, and you can see all the backlinks your competitors are getting.
After analyzing the complete report you can try to replicate backlinks which means you can get backlinks using the same method your competitor used.
Sample template for the outreach:-
Subject: Question about [Website Name]
Hi [Your Name],
My name is [Your Name], and I happened to read your article for [target audience]:[add their resource page link ]
I work with [your company name], that [short description of your company does and can offer]:[target page link that is relevant to their resources page]
I can see a lot of our competitors happen to link to this article. It would be really appreciated if you could also mention us as well in the article.
It will be an excellent addition to your page and provide a lot of value to your visitors.
Let me know if there’s anything else I can help you with.
Thanks,[Name].
#4 Be a Source for Other Publishers
As you use your unique data and expertise, you can consider becoming a source for other journalists and bloggers. HARO helps you find those opportunities to get those quality backlinks. By using HARO, you give quotes to journalists that need expert information to write stories in return; the journalist will link to your website as a return favour.
Every time someone will quote you, your website will earn a backlink. Thus, you can easily increase brand awareness when you become a trusted source while driving referral traffic to the website.
To Begin with, Sign up with HARO, and you receive emails with queries from writers in your chosen industry. You can choose the questions to answer and respond via email.
In the given aspect, speed plays a vital role. This is because most journalists and bloggers wish to obtain maximum submissions. Therefore, when you become the first to respond, you have a better chance of being observed and selected for the final submission.
#5 Business Association Links
If you are a member of any business association, like- the Chamber of Commerce or a specialist industry body, then you can earn a link to your site.
In order to get new backlinks from the association, you can look for organisations in your industry that are offering links to their members.
You can start by making a list of all your business associations and their websites and look for their members’ pages on the website. If you do not see your mention in the member list, then you can contact them and request the addition. Once you become a member of the organisation, you can always request a backlink.
#6 Contact Journalists
Journalists are usually regarded as the most reliable influencers in today’s digital technology. A message from the journalist about any product or service is considered more genuine when compared to other sources.
Journalists and bloggers are flooded with emails to pitch them information that might not add any value to the readers. This is why outreach emails do not generate any valid response. To attain backlinks from journalists, you can take an individual from any company. You can ask the individual to offer views on a particular set of topics. This can allow you to reach out to a journalist while receiving links in return.
You can also try to connect with them on their social media channels and commenting on their editorial. Slowly they would start recognizing you as a fan and see you more as a client with benefits. This will get better results when you ask for a favour.
#7 Circulate press releases.
If you have a piece of interesting company news that nobody else can talk about? It could be the opening of a new store opening, a new product launch, Client onboarding, or a new partnership; use that as the foundation of your link-building campaign.
Commence by drafting a press release that includes your news. A press release should include the five W’s :
- What – are you announcing?
- Who – who is announcing the news and who is the audience
- Where – is the news happening? (i.e. your website, or a city.)
- When – the news happened
- Why – why is this news important
You should include a backlink to your site in the press release. This will enable an editor to discover about the brand behind the news and remind them to include it in their published article.
Most PR databases offer a feature where you can send your press release directly from the software.
Compile a list of events that are to happen in your company. Follow the actions above to commence building high-quality backlinks to your site.
#8 Broken Link Building
A broken link is a link that does not work and results in an error page. This occurs if a link points to a web page that is moved or deleted.
The user experience will faint when they click on a broken link. Broken Link building is a super effective link building method that can help you to get many backlinks from high authority sites.
Steps attain a link using the broken link strategy-
- Search for target websites with broken links. The hurdle with this tactic is to find broken links. Multiple tools can help you find broken links like – Ahref, Siteliner, Checkmylinks etc.
- Notify the site owner that the link is not working
- Offer a piece of content that is high-quality in place of the broken link.
After you have identified a target website with a broken link and have your content piece ready, you need to work on an outreach campaign.
Below is a template that is very handy for a broken link outreach campaign.nBroken Link Email template:-
Subject: Re: Blog post title
Hey (name of blogger),
I was looking for a few resources on {topic/keyword} and came across your exceptionally informative guide: {title of the post}.
I saw that one of the resources you cited on {topic/keyword with broken link URL} no longer exists. I have recently created a well-researched guide on {related topics} for you: (insert link).
It will be a great addition to your post.
Either way, keep up your informational articles.
Regards,
#9 Guest Blogging
“Guest posting” is the method of offering free content to other websites or blogs in change for a backlink to your own site.
You can place the link in the Author Bio section or in the body of the blog. This is a popular linking building technique and works in favour of both websites- one site will receive valuable content, and the other will get free exposure in front of a new audience and also high-quality backlink.
Steps to attain backlink using guest blogging technique:
- Identify the site you want to contribute to. A good starting point can be known industry publication in your niche, or another option is finding out your competitors guest blogging sites. If a site is publishing your competitor’s blog, then they will accept your blogs too. Search for reputable, industry-leading sites by typing any of the following variations into your search bar:
- INDUSTRY + “write for us”
- INDUSTRY + “contribute”
- INDUSTRY + “submit”
- INDUSTRY + “guest post.”
- Prepare to pitch for Guest Blogging Post- Enquire with the site owner about contributing a guest post to their website. Then, submit a pitch based on every sites guideline. Site owners receive many pitches in a day so make sure that you follow their requirements in your pitch.
- Place the link in your content to make sense, and use anchor text for the link that refers to its content, and not your brand.
After submission, check the site every day till the blog gets published as bloggers not always inform you when the editorial is live and if you don’t check often, you might miss it. If there are any readers’ comments, answer them
#10 Post Ultimate Guides
An ‘Ultimate Guide’ serves to be a content form that is designed to serve as the best and the most comprehensive report on any given topic. It is aimed at covering ample information that the readers do not need to go elsewhere. Based on SEO ranking factor studies, long-form content tends to perform better in Google than short articles. An Ultimate guide covers all aspects of a topic in one place and will be like the go-to place for the topic; people will want a link to the guide if they write about the topic in their blog.
Here are two examples from our own blog:
Conclusion
We always think that link building is the hardest part of SEO, that is why we have this list of tactics that will help you achieve high-quality links for your business.
The tactics I shared above will work for all websites. You just need to execute them. Also, you have to be consistent in using these strategies. Whatever the target may be, you need to chase it with great consistency to stay ahead and sustain what you have already achieved. The benefits of consistent, planned link building are immense and last for a very long time.
So, make a calendar and perform these tasks a couple of times a week.
I hope this blog is helpful and you find some excellent link opportunities.