How to Make the Most of Your Backlinks

If you wish to be discovered through the internet, then you must have a solid backlink profile.

The problem? Not all backlinks are created equal.

Connections coming from sources that are high-quality and pertinent are much more beneficial than links from unassociated, arbitrary websites. Links from spam sites can actually hurt your website.

How do you make the most of your backlinks? It is essential that you closely monitor the elements that influence the value of backlinks.

Here is the information you should be aware of in order to benefit from backlinks.

What are backlinks?

How Do Backlinks Affect SEO?

As mentioned above, Google views links as votes. Google believes your pages and site are very important and pertinent if numerous websites are linking to them.

Google takes into account a range of factors when deciding where to place a website in its search results, and backlinks are one of those factors.

The reason is that when another website has a link back to your website it demonstrates that they perceived your content as captivating, intriguing, or enlightening. They were so enthusiastic about it that they chose to present it to their viewers. Google believes that what you have to offer is highly useful to individuals searching for information, thus making it more likely for them to be presented with your content.

Nevertheless, it is difficult to make an impact on how many links a different website includes on its pages. Remember when thinking about which links will be the most useful for enhancing the SEO of your website.

Google is made aware that your website has amazing material that people would be interested in reading if numerous reliable websites link to it. Therefore, it is probable that your website will be at the top of search engine results pages.

What Makes a Backlink Valuable?

More backlinks isn’t always better.

If you use unethical SEO techniques such as link schemes or grey hat SEO, Google will reduce your rankings or take manual action against you. What makes a backlink more valuable than another?

1. Location and Number of Links on a Page

Have you heard that the placement of a link on a page can affect the strength of a backlink? Sounds weird, right?

Google believes that the first link on a page is the most beneficial, thus it will gain the highest advantage from a back link. On top of that, the greater the amount of links on a page, the lower the individual link value.

This implies that if the only link on the page is yours, it will have more of an effect on your SEO than if it is one amongst a list of multiple other links on the same page.

2. Dofollow Vs. Nofollow Backlinks

Dofollow links are your basic backlinks. The HTML around the link will remain untouched if the website proprietors do not make changes to it, causing the link to always be a dofollow.

Dofollow links communicate to Google that the website that is linking to yours views it as a reliable and trustworthy source, helping to boost your rankings.

Google is instructed not to go through with passing on value (also referred to as link juice) for nofollow links.

Essentially, nofollow links will still transport someone from one web page to another, however the second website won’t experience any improvements in its ranking.

Why do sites use nofollow links? Connecting to sites with poor quality or low domain authority can reduce the rankings of the website linking to them. Google does not permit you to purchase links, so some websites employ nofollow links on sponsored articles.

Do not think that links with the nofollow attribute are not worth your while. Actually, they really assist in bringing people to your website and increasing the recognition of your company despite their ineffective impact on search engine optimization.

3. Domain Authority and Page Authority

Domain Authority (DA), devised by Moz, is a gauge that predicts how likely a website is to rank highly in search engine results. The value and trustworthiness of a site is determined by a score on a scale from 1 to 100, the higher the score, the more reputable the site is.

Page authority is the same metric, but it applies to a single page on a website.

It is not a precise field, and it is not a gauge that Google created – it is something that Moz devised. Nevertheless, machine learning is used to estimate the performance of a website in terms of its rank.

What does this mean for your backlinks? If a web page or domain with a highly trusted status links to your web page, then Google regards your web page to be reliable as well. That’s a good thing!

It’s comparable to recommending a friend for a job. If you are a hardworking employee and suggest someone else, your supervisor probably believes that they will be dependable and concentrated on their work as well.

TL;DR: Links from high-domain authority pages are more valuable.

4. Relevant Sites and Pages

Relevancy matters when it comes to recommendations. Let’s say you wanted to buy a new snowblower. You search the web and discover two reviews of the top snow blowers—one from a home improvement store and the other from a cooking blog.

Which one would you trust? Are you curious regarding the knowledge a food blogger has on snow blowers? The hardware shop, in contrast, is likely to have snowblowers in stock and will usually converse with purchasers about them. It is very likely that they understand the subject matter.

Google takes into account how pertinent a backlink is when evaluating its worth.

5. Quality of Other Links on the Website

Backlink value is not determined only by domain authority. The worth of a link is influenced by the quality of all other links on the domain from where the link originates.

It doesn’t sound fair, does it? It is not possible to dictate what actions someone else takes on their website. This is the case, however, there is an explanation for it.

Imagine if you were to get a backlink from a website with an impressive domain authority. Your ranking increases, website visits are abundant, and you can consider yourself to be a successful SEO specialist.

One day, the site that linked to yours suddenly became filled with spam. They put out material of poor quality and are linked to multiple scam websites.

Google no longer sees the website as reliable, consequently reducing the importance of the link. In other words, any website that has a link to a web page of dubious content will decrease the value of all of the other links on that website.

How to Get Backlinks

1. Reclaim Unlinked Mentions

It might be the simplest and most expedient way to produce superior backlinks to retrieve mentions of a brand that are not linked.

You should be monitoring who is referencing your brand, whether it be on blogs or in the media. You can complete that task with the aid of Google Alerts, which is convenient as well as free. If you would like further information about your mentions like the amount of times they were shared or the website’s trustworthiness, you can use resources such as BuzzSumo, Ahrefs Content Explorer, or Mention.

More often than not, you will find that the author has not included a connection to your website when they speak about your brand, product, or service. That’s the time you should give them a speedy message, requesting a suitable attribution link. This gives the publisher an opportunity to make the reading experience of their readers better by providing the possibility to click and discover more information regarding the brand mentioned. It’s a win, win.

This strategy involves being inventive in order to reclaim links to any aspect of your brand, such as activities you organize, workers names, research reports, etc.

Look for interviews that involve your organization’s leaders and request a connection to their profile page on your site. You may also look for any mentions of the studies or data that you have released and request for the accurate connection to the original source.

Stewart Dunlop, the founder of link building agency, LinkBuilder.io, explains why this method works so well:

Website owners and editors are being constantly contacted by link builders whose strategies for reaching out are of poor quality. Luckily, for those who make the effort to draft emails of top-notch quality and that have been carefully considered, this opens up opportunities for them.

The advantage of unlinked mentions is that the website you’re trying to contact has already mentioned your business, so it serves as a valid justification for why you’re reaching out to them. We have found that sending a courteous and amiable email is often all it takes for a successful link-building campaign, and our success rate for this approach is much higher than any other type of link-building technique.

2. Get Contextual Links

Have you seen how certain articles have extra sources either pointed out within the text or in a “Read more” part?

These connections that are included in the body of a report are referred to as contextual links.

The secret to obtaining links from relevant sources is to identify the ideal candidate to contact. You can locate relevant content to your promotion by looking through articles that already have a link to additional information.

For example, let’s assume you have a recent investigation into email marketing. Search for material that discusses marketing trends and suggests further reading.

Here’s how to find them using search engines like Google:

• marketing trends inurl:blog intext:”Read more”
• marketing trends inurl:blog intext:”Recommended articles”
• marketing trends inurl:blog intext:”Recommended reading”

When getting in contact with the author to suggest your investigation, you should recollect to refer to why your material is valuable enough to be featured. A compelling script as well as a bespoke email will create a strong impact.

3. Get “Best X” List Mentions

Today’s shoppers seek out every possibility before settling on a purchase. They commonly consult comparison sites or articles, like “The 13 Top Free Email Marketing Tools in 2021” to get an idea of what is suggested by other people.

To get an understanding of how widely sought after these Best X pieces are in your sector, you can use a keyword research utility to ascertain the monthly search rate. Ahrefs’ data reveals that there are over three thousand and four hundred searches for the question “best CRM for small businesses” every month.

Mentioning your product in lists of the top items of its kind is an amazing strategy for reinforcing your business, tempting more potential customers to try it out and, at the same time, achieving reliable backlinks.

4. Become a Source for Other Publishers

With your specialist knowledge and one-of-a-kind information, you can become a resource for other bloggers and reporters.

Every time someone quotes you, you’ll earn a backlink. This tactic has more advantages than just building high-domain authority links – though it does provide a big advantage in and of itself. By being regarded as a reliable source, you will also raise your company’s profile and generate referral traffic to your website.

It’s not as hard as you imagine, which is great!

Begin by signing up for HARO (Help A Reporter Out). This service, at no cost, links professionals (such as yourself) with bloggers and media personnel who are in need of sources.

This is how HARO operates — you will receive a daily email from journalists in your field that contains their queries. You can select the suggestions that are relevant to your business, then answer by email and include your qualifications.

Hastiness is of the essence here, given that a great deal of these authors receive numerous entries. If you act fast and are among the early birds to reply, there are greater chances that your input will be noticed and taken into account for the final work. If you are chosen, it is probable that you will be sent an email by a reporter or blogger to inform you that the piece has been published.

Backlink Value Conclusion

Backlinks are a cornerstone of SEO. However, not all backlinks deliver the same value. Having links on a page that are closer to the top and from sites that have a higher Domain Authority can improve your website’s search engine ranking in Google.

You can use this information to build higher-quality backlinks. Correctly implement your website and you can potentially experience an abundant amount of web visits and conversions.

Do you consider backlink value when building links? Why or why not?

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