Link building is still central to SEO but has undergone massive changes that every marketer must be aware of. The quality of links is more important than ever before over quantity which means that the old link building technique that revolved around gathering lots of links regardless its quality does not work anymore. Although it is not clear whether link building is the top-ranking factor, there should not be any doubt about its supreme importance which has gone stood the test of times.
Good content is essential to earn high ranks in search results and the most critical factor that Google considers to ascertain the quality of content is the backlinks. Backlinks are like votes in favor of the content, and when other websites show interest to link with yours, Google considers it as a merit point for the content quality and rewards it by ranking it better. But all this will happen only when you gather the right types of links because poor quality links can attract Google penalty and upset your dreams of improving ranks.
What are good links?
Among many features that constitute link quality, the easiest to understand is that the link must be entirely relevant for the website. It means that the links must come from such sites that share similar interests as yours. For example, if your website is about tourism and travel, you should get links from websites belonging to the same niche or some other niche closely connected to it. Moreover, you must accept the link only when you are sure about the quality of that website. Poor quality websites cannot provide good quality links.
Although the stress must be on gathering links organically, you can also ask for links by building relationships. Avoid clandestine link building techniques of gathering links from public networks and blogs that accept do-follow links which are hotbeds of spammers.
For more information and guidance on link building, you can look up the website Rankingbyseo.com to interact with SEO experts. Perusing this article should help to gather some useful techniques that can work well.
Here is what you can do to improve your site's ranking.
Build real relationships
Good links come from real people, and you must focus on building real relationships with website owners, webmasters and influencers to see your link inventory grow. Relationships are crucial for the survival and growth of the business. When people are more acquainted with you, gathering links become very easy. By building relationships, you can establish your authority and attract more links because people would take interest to stay in touch with you and links would flow even without asking.
Good relationships begin by giving something good to others so that they feel like reciprocating your goodness and links start flowing in. First, find good people by scouring the social media with whom you want to connect, or you can find them from blogs and forums where you start participating in discussions and get known to others who would be willing to stay connected to you. The process takes time but is a proven method of gathering quality links.
Request for backlinks
To keep things simple, you can approach websites and bloggers for links if you find that they have already shared links with sites of your size and authority. Such links need not necessarily be embedded in the content, and you can aim for a contextual link. An alternative to this is to ask for links on any relevant page or the resource page. If you approach websites for relevant links without being spammy the chances of getting a favorable response is always high. If the page with which you want to link provides value to their audience, many links could come from the extended network.
Publish well-researched content
With link building in mind, you must pack value in the content of your website that attracts links from other high-quality sites. Publish well-researched content in the form of reports, e-books and articles that convey good value to the audience and bears testimony to the quality of your website. When there is real research behind the content, it not only makes the content credible but also speaks volumes about the website quality that becomes a valuable source of information and others would like to link to it. Websites that want to link to great content would come forward to link to it. Although it is not easy to create researched content, once done, it turns to be highly remunerative in acquiring links.
Case studies attract quality links
Case studies published on websites are a great way to attract quality links and guaranteed to prove successful. Besides driving more links, case studies drive more business toward you. Approach your customers, vendors and partners and seek their concurrence about working with you in publishing case studies on their websites. It is a great way to showcase the best of your products to customers by citing cases that prove how the product helps to solve their problems or improve their lives. The interaction paves the way for earning backlinks.
Use Infographics for backlinks
Guest blogging is a proven technique in link building, but there is another equally strong method of attracting links that often does not catch the eye. Using infographics is a great way to leverage your link building campaign by gathering links from trusted sources. The similarity between the two methods is that it involves making others agree to publish your content. Infographics have the power to take your link building to a whole new level. Ask the websites that approach your infographics for a link.
Use blog comments strategically
Unless you are using blog comments for stuffing and spamming, you can make use of the comments for promoting your content, diversifying your anchor text and creating a natural backlink profile. Find relevant blogs of high quality and get your comments approved by the blog owner after gaining their trust about your good intention of acquiring backlinks.
Keep updating the techniques by aligning with Google updates from time to time.
Guest post courtesy of Trudy Seeger