Backlinks are like a popularity contest for your website, a measure of how many other sites think your content is valuable. They’re not just random links – backlinks act as endorsements, telling Google and other search engines that your site deserves attention. This is because backlinks help your website’s ranking in search results, essentially signaling trust and credibility.
Table of Contents:
- Why Are Backlinks so Important?
- Understanding Backlinks and Their SEO Power
- Link Building: Earning Those Precious Backlinks
- Finding and Fixing Broken Links On Your Site
- The Evolution of Backlinks: Understanding Their Shifting Influence
- Why the Future of SEO Belongs to Topical Authority
- FAQs about Backlinks
- Conclusion
Why Are Backlinks so Important?
Backlinks are like votes of confidence. Each link from another website to yours says to search engines, “This site has something worthwhile.” Think about it: if lots of other websites are linking to your content, it must be good, right?
This is why 200 known Google ranking factors include backlinks. Not only do backlinks boost your rankings, but they can also drive direct traffic to your website. Imagine someone is reading an article about gardening, and they click on a backlink leading to your post about choosing the best tomatoes.
You’ve just gained a visitor, and potentially, a customer. Backlinks create a web of connections that helps search engine crawlers discover your website. And, when your content earns those endorsements from other reputable websites, your site climbs higher in search results.
So if you’re serious about getting more traffic, boosting brand awareness, and dominating your industry, building backlinks should be your priority. Backlinks are an important part of any content marketing strategy.
Understanding Backlinks and Their SEO Power
Back in the old days (before 2017), you could peek at backlinks to a page using a nifty search operator – just type “link:” and the URL in Google. But Google decided to change things, probably because people were trying to manipulate search results.
It’s like finding out the secret ingredient to a competitor’s amazing dish, only to have them change the recipe. Although Google scrapped the “link:” operator, you can still check out your own backlinks through Google Search Console.
Add your site, then run a backlink report to see which websites have linked to you. Just remember, Google Search Console only gives you a limited view, not a complete picture. To dig deeper into backlinks and discover the hidden treasures in your competitor’s profile, you’ll need specialized SEO tools.
It’s like using a metal detector instead of digging with your hands – it uncovers more valuable insights. The more website backlinks you have pointing back to your site from various referring domains, the better. This is one way to determine the overall health of your backlink profile.
Not All Backlinks Are Created Equal
Like any good thing, there are genuine backlinks and those that might actually hurt your website. Think of it like trying to assemble a championship team – you want experienced all-star players, not rookies from the minor leagues.
| Good Backlinks | Bad Backlinks |
|---|---|
| From websites that are trusted by Google | From “spammy” or low-quality websites |
| Placed naturally within content related to your topic | Look like they were paid for or forced into the content |
| Come from different websites with diverse anchor text | Use the same keyword-rich anchor text over and over again |
A backlink from a well-established website, let’s say Forbes, holds more weight because Forbes has already proven its authority and domain authority. On the other hand, a link from a brand-new website or one that’s stuffed with irrelevant content could send red flags to Google.
Backlinks, at their core, are signals of trust. Each one tells Google whether or not to trust the source sending visitors to your website. You want to make sure that Google views your site backlinks as being high quality.
Link Building: Earning Those Precious Backlinks
You’ve got amazing content on your website. Now you need a strategy to earn backlinks that act like pathways leading others to it. You want people discovering your blog, not it being lost in a vast jungle of websites, never to be found.
Consider this: an industry study found that using your target keywords within the backlink’s anchor text is linked to better rankings. Imagine someone reading an article about “dog training,” and they click on a backlink that says “best dog training tips” – Google takes note of those relevant keywords. Your website backlink profile plays a major part in your overall engine optimization.
Leveraging Public Relations and HARO
Platforms like Help a B2B Writer and Featured.com act like dating sites, connecting journalists and bloggers searching for sources with experts like you.
By offering your insights and knowledge, you have the chance to earn those coveted backlinks from high-authority news sites and blogs. If you’re serious about building backlinks, check out Help A Reporter Out (HARO).
Backlinks obtained through services like HARO show that trustworthy sources vouch for your content. Just like real-life connections, digital connections made through these services carry significant influence and give your website the SEO boost it needs to get noticed.
Creating Shareable “Skyscraper” Content
Let’s say you come across an excellent article about making the perfect cup of coffee. Well, with the “Skyscraper” technique, you wouldn’t just create a good article – you’d make the *ultimate* guide to coffee perfection.
Maybe you’ll include brewing techniques for different types of coffee makers, comparisons of coffee beans from around the world, or even some delicious coffee-based recipes. It’s about making a good thing GREAT, standing tall amongst competitors, so it attracts those valuable backlinks. Doing this is one of the best building strategies.
The Sneaky Power of Broken Link Building
Imagine coming across a broken link while reading a blog. Frustrating, right? It’s like finding a door that leads to nowhere.
With broken link building, you essentially swoop in with a rescue mission. First, you need to find these broken links (those dreaded 404 error pages). This often happens on “resource” pages where website owners compile helpful links.
To uncover broken links, try Siteliner – it’s free for sites under 250 pages – or use a powerful SEO tool like Ahrefs. They’ve even got a helpful guide for broken link building. Think about this: backlinks are essentially pathways that connect websites. When a path is broken, you can offer an alternate route. It’s not just about earning a backlink – it’s also about being helpful to the website owner.
Unearthing Backlinks through Reverse Engineering
If you think your competitors are racking up high-quality backlinks, you don’t need to guess. Tools like the Ahrefs Backlink Checker, SE Ranking, and MonitorBacklinks are like your backstage passes to uncover their secret connections.
Want to discover websites that link to your rivals but haven’t linked to you yet? Explore Semrush’s “Backlink Gap” tool – it pinpoints opportunities you might have overlooked.
These services are the metal detectors of the digital landscape, pinpointing hidden opportunities and unveiling potential gold mines. Using tools to analyze your competition can reveal lucrative backlinks and give your website the advantage it needs in the online battle for search engine ranking.
Utilizing Content Types That Naturally Generate Backlinks
The best way to get people excited about your content is to write about what *they* want to read. But wouldn’t it be great to have a roadmap to creating the content most likely to earn backlinks? It’s a lot easier than just trying to figure it out on your own.
BuzzSumo actually analyzed 912 million online pieces of content and discovered what works. Turns out most content goes unnoticed, but certain types consistently draw attention. Think how-to guides and explainers – posts that offer step-by-step directions for solving common problems, “why” articles, detailed listicles, captivating infographics, and engaging video content, like “best” videos and comparisons.
Be sure to share content on social media to get it in front of a larger audience.
Web Directories – Still Relevant?
There’s been debate for a long time now, among people in SEO about how powerful web directories actually are. Directories have earned somewhat of a negative connotation due to spammy techniques that website owners used to abuse them.
However, submitting your site to relevant, high-quality directories still holds value in modern-day SEO, especially for local SEO. It’s a strategy you shouldn’t overdo, but it is worth pursuing because they give you backlinks.
Check out this resource that shares 21 directories that can give you that SEO lift. Each directory listed could potentially provide your website with a valuable backlink. Make sure to claim any business listings as well as consider press releases.
Making Sense of Nofollow Links
Think of nofollow links as the “shy” kids in the class – they’re there, they’re useful, but they’re just not super talkative. In basic HTML, they look something like this:
It’s the rel=”nofollow” part that hints to search engines: “Don’t pass too much authority from this link, okay?”. Back in 2005, search engines devised the nofollow attribute because too many people were using spammy links to boost rankings, kind of like trying to win a popularity contest with fake votes. By including a “nofollow” tag, they’re indicating those votes aren’t as authentic.
While nofollow backlinks might not be the superstars in SEO like those coveted “dofollow” links, they still have value, especially from credible sources. Google even states in How Search Works:
“Google uses [nofollow] attributes and other signals to better understand which links to trust.”
If you’ve got nofollow backlinks from trustworthy publications – those who have gained the Google seal of approval – it could be beneficial because those publications likely have quality “dofollow” backlinks pointing to their website. Imagine getting endorsements from someone who is already widely respected.
And even if a backlink says “nofollow,” people will still see it on the webpage. Think about this: when was the last time you checked the source code of an article *before* clicking a link? Chances are never, you probably just click the link. That’s why it’s beneficial for brand awareness. You can utilize backlinks within blog comments to reputable sites.
Finding and Fixing Broken Links On Your Site
Just like cleaning up cobwebs, fixing broken links is an essential part of website maintenance. Luckily, there are helpful tools that make this task easier, even if you have lots of pages to analyze.
Think about this – when people land on a webpage filled with broken links it’s a poor reflection on your brand and a sign of neglect, and visitors quickly become frustrated when they hit a dead end, like getting lost in a maze.
You want them navigating your site smoothly, not trying to get their bearings back after hitting an obstacle. This frustration not only leads to a bad user experience but can hurt your SEO. Search engine bots prefer smooth paths, clear directions, and a clean and tidy online landscape. The good news is there are ways to find and eliminate broken links.
Tools To Find and Fix Broken Links
SEO Spider, for example, will do the detective work for you, combing through your site for anything that doesn’t look right, kind of like having a digital exterminator sniffing out every hidden crack.
Even better, you can scan up to 500 URLs for free. If you need help discovering and removing bad backlinks, dive into this article on bad backlinks. There are lots of excellent tools available for tackling broken links on a budget.
The Evolution of Backlinks: Understanding Their Shifting Influence
It might seem like things in the online world move lightning-fast, but Google actually started building their empire back in 1998. At the time, their game-changing strategy – PageRank – calculated how important a website was by measuring the quantity and quality of backlinks pointing to it.
PageRank gave preference to backlinks from sites that themselves already had authority. That’s why website owners wanted tons of backlinks, hoping to hit the online jackpot and watch their sites skyrocket to the top of the search results, kind of like being the most popular person at a high school.
Although PageRank has changed significantly over time, its initial impact changed how people built websites. Think about this – even today, over two decades after PageRank was launched, Google filed a patent for it to ensure everyone understands how revolutionary its system was for analyzing backlinks.
Google recognized how easy it would be to try to outsmart their system so it devised strategies for measuring links objectively, factoring in topic and industry, making things much more difficult to manipulate. Backlinks still act as votes of confidence for a site’s trustworthiness but they also tell Google what your site’s topic is about so backlinks now play a much more multifaceted role than they used to.
Why the Future of SEO Belongs to Topical Authority
Instead of being stuck on the hamster wheel of constantly chasing backlinks for a few target keywords, the most savvy marketers, especially those using AI-powered tools, now aim to dominate entire topics, expanding their footprint across Google’s search results. Instead of competing with everyone else, they’re in a league of their own.
In Simplilearn’s advice for obtaining more links they recommend creating a “linkable asset”, meaning an individual page of content on your website that is helpful, unique, relevant, and stands out for being extremely thorough and comprehensively covering everything there is to know about that single topic.
Think about a “how-to guide”, a recipe with lots of photos or variations, even a product review. These types of content can be a good replacement for outdated resources.
Just like when Google released their now famous Reasonable Surfer Patent and research on topic-sensitive PageRank, Google has started to emphasize “topic clusters” as a sign that your site has genuine, recognized expertise and topical authority.
What exactly are topic clusters? It’s a grouping of interrelated web pages, strategically linked together around a central topic, with a “pillar page” that broadly covers the main topic and several “cluster” pages offering a deeper exploration of subtopics.
When lots of high-quality content within a certain category or niche on your website attracts relevant backlinks, Google takes note of those signals and then your site will attract even *more* high-quality backlinks within the same topical area. Having a strong backlink profile shows Google your content is high quality, which in return improves your website’s Google rankings.
It’s a bit like those small booths and tables that pop up along a high-traffic main street – attracting foot traffic, boosting your brand’s visibility, and multiplying your success, just like when Nick Eubanks shared about “SERP Monopoly”. Instead of narrowly targeting just a single result on Google, he figured out that you should dominate the *entire* search results page.
A Case Study in Dominating Search with Content
Imagine dedicating an entire month to producing a ton of blog posts on a single, hyper-focused topic. Crazy? Well, Alex Birkett shared his experience doing this when he decided to craft a 6,500-word guide on A/B testing.
To give his project even *more* reach he took it a step further and published a few “shorter derivative posts on Ahrefs Blog” along with visuals. Those Unsplash and Pexels photos ended up getting 35 million views, which resulted in his guide achieving “a first page ranking for the super competitive keyword ‘ab testing.’”
Leveraging “Sponsored” Attributes
Sometimes paying for backlinks can actually backfire, even hurting your site’s rankings. This has created distrust among website owners. Recognizing that publishers sometimes pay to include their links or sponsored articles in established publications, and that a simple “nofollow” tag might not provide clarity, Google released the “rel=”sponsored” tag.
When included in backlinks it lets everyone (especially those important search engine bots) know that it’s okay to trust those paid backlinks, a clear signal that it’s part of an ethical partnership or sponsorship.
Backlinks might not display visibly to the website visitor, but they’re essential ingredients in a strong website, especially from an SEO standpoint. Understanding how to acquire beneficial backlinks (without tripping any red flags in the process) takes some finesse but is well worth your effort.
You’ll be surprised at the difference just a few, high-quality backlinks can make on your website’s overall Google search performance. Always remember backlinks work in conjunction with the other aspects of your digital marketing strategy, such as keywords.
FAQs about Backlinks
What is a backlink example?
Imagine reading a post about dog grooming. Let’s say the post has a sentence recommending a particular brand of shampoo, with a hyperlink leading directly to the shampoo company’s online store. That hyperlink is a backlink.
How do I get backlinks?
Start by creating content that other people naturally want to link to, like detailed how-to guides, lists, or in-depth articles that are unique and cover everything about a single topic. Promote your content on social media. Reach out to websites that cover related topics. Consider services like HARO to offer your expertise to journalists and bloggers. Even though directories sometimes get a bad rap you can list your website on quality ones.
Do backlinks really help SEO?
Backlinks are essential in SEO because they function like digital endorsements. Backlinks build trust and authority for your website in the eyes of Google, driving up your rankings in search results. If lots of reputable websites link back to your site, Google believes your content is valuable and moves your website up higher in the search rankings.
Is it illegal to buy backlinks?
Google considers it against its Webmaster Guidelines if you try to pay someone to include backlinks on their site *just* to increase rankings. Buying ads is acceptable, especially with the new rel=”sponsored” attribute, which adds transparency.
A better approach for backlinks is to concentrate on building organic, authentic links by providing high-quality content that people in your field or topic naturally want to link to. Think about the last time you saw an amazing product you loved. It’s kind of like the difference between paid celebrity endorsements and enthusiastic testimonials from actual customers. Authentic backlinks that occur naturally are more valuable.
Conclusion
Backlinks are essential for SEO. This is because backlinks tell Google and other search engines your content is good. Backlinks improve rankings in search, get more visitors to your site, and build awareness of your brand, especially from reputable sources.
It’s about understanding how those signals influence search engines, and finding ways to genuinely build trust and authority within the vast digital landscape. To fully understand the total number of backlinks pointing back to your website you will want to invest in a backlink management tool or backlink management tool. Try to find a tool or freshest backlink management tool that allows you to see a lot of different metrics to help improve your overall backlink profile.