Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is a very complex subject to tackle. There are many different avenues to use to help increase your rankings in the search engines and to properly do it takes time and effort and the worst part is that the algorithms vary from search engine to search engine and can change daily. It may seem overwhelming but there are some tried and true methods that can be used to help move your webpage up the search engine listings to get your site in front of more eyes. One of the most important is backlinks.
What are Backlinks?
Backlinks are links to your site that are found on other sites. These links generate organic traffic to your site which is highly valued by SEO algorithms but if these links are found on more authoritative websites so much the better. When a search engine like Google crawls the web it tries to figure out how websites are connected to one another and backlinks are considered to be one of the most important factors with SEO, if not the most important.
How Can I Get Backlinks?
- Create authoritative content that stands out. Backlinko.com recommends that you go to Google and search for a topic, read the first few pages and then create something better. This will take time and a lot of effort to truly stand out but it can be done and when it is completed it has to be promoted. If you included a product or service from another company let them know and they might promote it themselves giving you valuable backlinks and organic traffic.
- Be an authority. If you are an expert in your field publish authoritative content which will lead to others linking to your site. If you want to expedite this there are services that link authorities in a field to reporters and bloggers and some like Help a Reporter Out (HARO) are free to start. By making yourself available as an expert it will generate organic traffic as well as backlinks.
- Find outdated or expired links. Broken links hurt SEO rankings so scour the web in the field that you want to be an expert in. If you find outdated links or broken links contact the site and inform them of that. Don’t forget to include your site as well as something to replace the link with.
- Know which types of posts tend to perform better. BuzzSumo.com analyzed one million posts and found that most posts are ignored. Some types of posts performed quite well. List Posts, Quizzes, How to and Why posts, Infographics and Video posts are generated backlinks at an above average rater. The later study by Backlinko confirmed this. These posts generated more activity and interaction so it is no surprise that these excelled when it came to backlinks.
- Be THE authority. People like one stop shopping and that is no different when it comes to Internet authority. No one wants to go to one site for one piece of information and another for another piece. So, publish a Complete Guide or Ultimate Guide. This can be extremely difficult to do, it will be a long piece of information and it may be hard to find a topic that has not been exhaustively covered with other complete guides. What makes it hard is every aspect of your topic will need to be covered. It is a Complete Guide after all…And don’t forget to promote your guide. Find authority websites and let them know that your guide exists and they might just include a link to it on their site.
- Have some Guest Articles. By having a guest blog writer you are promoting their website and they will do the same for you. You are scratching their back and they are scratching yours. This opens your site up to a potentially new audience and it creates valuable backlinks and organic traffic. Several blogs do accept content from guest contributors and can be found easily. By becoming a contributor it also adds a nice line to your or your website’s resume.
- Use Internal Links. If you have built a large content library chances are you have past articles that you can refer to. Internal links can help to build your SEO slowly and can potentially bring users to other parts of your site, especially newer readers.
Building good backlinks takes time and effort. This is not something that can be mastered quickly and the process can be quite frustrating but keep in mind that your competitors are engaging in these processes as well. If you need help Nicely Done Sites is here to help you. We can do work in content creation as well as SEO optimization to help your website move up the search engine results. If you are not appearing on the first page of the search results you have work to do and if you are at the top of the results you need to stay there. Either way, we are here to help.