What Are Backlinks?
A backlink is a hyperlink on a website that links to another website. It’s called a backlink because it’s a link that points back to a website. Backlinks are also known as inbound links or incoming links. The opposite of a backlink would be an outbound link, which is a link that points off of your website to another one.
The Importance of Backlinks
Search engines look at backlinks essentially as “votes” for a website. The more websites that link to yours, the better your site will rank on Google.
However, it’s important to consider not just the quantity of backlinks but the quality. Google weighs some links with more authority than others.
You can use metrics like Domain Authority (DA) and Page Authority (PA) to predict how authoritative a website is. Both metrics are scored from 1-100, with 100 being the most authoritative. This scale is logarithmic, meaning it’s much easier to increase in score from 0-20 than it is to increase from 50-55.
If you are looking for a free tool for easily accessing these metrics for your website, we recommend checking out MozBar.
Link Building
The SEO Strategy of acquiring backlinks is called Link Building. Backlinks can be very time-consuming to earn, particularly for newer websites that don’t have an established web presence or online reputation.
Like many marketing tactics, link building only works with momentum. The more links you earn, the easier it is to get them. As you earn backlinks and build visitor loyalty on the web, your online influence grows exponentially. The concept of gaining momentum is what digital marketers refer to as the flywheel concept.
In mechanical engineering, a flywheel is a revolving wheel that spins, building off it’s own momentum, ultimately producing power to the system. But this kind of system doesn’t just power up automatically with a flick of a switch. Unlike an electric motor, a flywheel must be powered by an outside system for multiple revolutions before it can start producing enough momentum for it to be self-sustaining.
Go Earn Your First Backlinks
The very first backlinks are going to be the most difficult to earn, especially for new websites, but here are three easy strategies you can use to acquire your first link.
Just by searching for a few phrases on Google, you can take the results from the first few pages and build a spreadsheet of backlink opportunities.
1. Search for your brand name, domain name, and founders/exec’s names on Google
The first strategy will return pages that are talking about your company, your brand, or your people; and usually, a few of the sites will not be linking to your site correctly, or sometimes not even at all.
What a great opportunity! They already are featuring your company, but they forgot the most important part – the link. Make note of these sites and plan on reaching out to the site administrators to correct the links.
2. Search for your competitors on Google
In this strategy, you will perform the same process, but instead of using yours, use your competitors’ names. In these searches you will find websites that are featuring businesses just like yours, so the possibility of them wanting to feature you is very likely.
Again, make a list of these websites with a plan of action. You can reach out and say, “Hey my company does this too! Can you feature us?” This is a little more challenging, so don’t be discouraged when your conversion rate is lower for this strategy.
3. Search for your industry, region, and unique attributes on Google
The last tactic would be searching for sites that list companies and organizations by industry or region. Maybe you’re a screen printing business in Atlanta, GA, primarily focused on printing custom shirts for high school athletics. You can search Google for any combination of these phrases and see what comes up. You may be able to take advantage of these websites too. At the very least, you will know more about what I like to call “your niche on the web”.
The best part about this strategy is that it’s completely free. You don’t have to buy any tools or pay for any fancy software. You certainly don’t have to pay for an expensive SEO consultant.
You can do this by yourself using the tool you already have at your disposal: Google. For more insight on these exact strategies, I recommend watching Rand Fishkin’s Whiteboard Friday Video on The 3 Easiest Link Building Tactics Any Website Can Use to Acquire Their First 50 Links.
Now, go get those links.
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