Link Building Complexity: Is It Right for Your Business?

Link building is the process of creating backlinks to a website. Backlinks are links from other websites to your website. Link building can be a time-consuming and tedious task, but it is worth it if you want to improve your website’s traffic, search engine ranking, and authority.

Link building can be a great way to promote your business and improve your website’s search engine ranking. However, it’s important to make sure that you’re doing it right, or you could end up doing more harm than good. There are a few things to keep in mind when link building:

– Make sure your links are high quality and relevant. Links from low-quality websites will not help your website’s SEO.
– Don’t overdo it. Too many links can actually hurt your website’s ranking.
– Be careful with link buying and directories. These can be spammy and will not help your website in the long run.

Quality content is engaging, informative, and easy to understand for your site visitor. Google evaluates quality on a number of factors. Here are some important elements:

Comprehensive – Thoroughly covers what users search for about your business product or service. It answers a question with detailed, clear explanations. 

Consistent – While each page needs to focus on one comprehensive topic, all the sections of the text connect to the main topic, and the conclusion follows the logical progression of the content. That means don’t throw in extra content; create a different page about a separate topic. 

Actual – The content is factual and current, so it is up to date on details. 

Reliable – the content is true, providing supporting evidence for any claims made. 

Engaging Headline – The headline relates to the content, promising a deeper explanation. Headlines that are cute or catchy but don’t relate to the content are called clickbait and are considered deceiving. 

Format Variety – Different formats reinforce the information for site visitors. In addition to text, there can be infographics, tables, formulas, pictures, videos, or audio.

Design – Design helps your customers and search engines clearly understand your topic. Things like easy-to-read typeface (fonts), white space on the page, subheadings, and short paragraphs all contribute to content that is easy to consume and understand.

Quality information presented in an easy-to-find and read format encourages consumers to read and share the link with others.

If your business is new and you don’t have much authority yet, you can take steps to increase links to your website naturally. You need to take action to help others discover your website.

First, you want to share a link to your website to encourage others to consume your content. You can build a list of link-building prospects that are related to your business and who will be willing to share a link to your website.

Some first steps are natural extensions of your marketing efforts.

• include a link in your email signature
• include a link on social media profiles
• include a link on your YouTube channel and in the
• description for every video
• share posts on LinkedIn with a link back to your website
• include your link in printable resources like PDF guides and ebooks

The second steps involve reaching out to people.

• mention authorities in your content; then let them know and ask them to share the link with their audience
• if you are in retail or e-commerce, reach out to manufacturers and suppliers and ask them to add your business link to their list
• get your business listed in local business guides
  sponsor local sporting events
• ask for interviews on podcasts related to your business
• reach out for text interviews on other websites as a resource in your industry
• get a link from your local Chamber of Commerce

You can get links to your website that do not contribute to your ranking. However, these links can still bring traffic to your website. 

The technicalities are beyond the scope of this article, but in general, links from these sources tend to be nofollow:

• Blog comments
• Social media (for example, links in Facebook posts or
• YouTube video descriptions)
• Links in forum posts or other forms of user generated content
• Certain blogs and news sites (like the Huffington Post)
• Links from “widgets”
• Links in press releases

And these popular websites use the rel=”nofollow” tag on all of their outbound links:

• Quora
• YouTube
• Wikipedia
• Reddit
• Twitch
• Medium

Be aware of the difference that these links do not contribute to ranking but bring traffic. As the importance of links for ranking diminishes, this distinction will become less of an issue for your website.

Google frowns on paying for links to your website just to get links. The search engine considers these links spam. In some cases, Google just ignores these bad links, but using these links can result in your website not being indexed and so not showing up on the web. 

So if someone approaches you, telling you they will get you hundreds of links, run, don’t walk. Get legitimate links.

If all this sounds like daunting work, you can use tools to help you connect with the right people and organizations. 

There’s no denying that link building is a complex process. But if you want your business to succeed online, it’s absolutely essential. Links help build authority for your site, which in turn can lead to increased traffic and conversions.

Of course, all of this depends on using the right link building tools. There are a lot of different options out there, so how do you know which ones are right for your business? Here’s a quick rundown of some of the most popular link building tools:

– Majestic: Majestic is one of the most popular link building tools on the market. It offers comprehensive data and analysis, making it perfect for businesses that want to track their progress and identify new opportunities.

– Moz: Moz is another widely used link building tool. It offers a suite of helpful features, including keyword research and competitor analysis.

– Ahrefs: Ahrefs is a powerful link building tool that helps businesses find and assess backlink opportunities. It also offers valuable insights into your competitors’ strategies.

– BuzzSumo: BuzzSumo is a great tool for finding content that’s already popular online. This can be helpful for identifying potential link building opportunities.

There are many types and varieties of link building tools, both free and paid. Tools can help you focus on various aspects of your link building strategy. We encourage you to research tools, what they do, and how they work to see if that fit into the goals you have for your business.

Depending on the tool, you can perform a variety of searches for possibilities and data about links to your website.

Here are some of the functions you can find:

• potential contacts for specific link requests
• data about the contacts
• customer relationship management (CRM) to keep track of who you contact and the results of your request
• competitor links so you can evaluate if those sources are right for you
  monitor links to your website

Of course, there are more. That is why we suggest researching which tools are appropriate for your link building campaign.

As you design the strategy for your link building campaign, you need to set goals of what links you want. Establish what type of links you would want as targeting different mediums—native, editorial, directory, and blog, etc. Once your main goal is set, use tools that can help you reach your goal.

Link building tools are designed to help you build your link profile over time.

There are various types of goals to consider:

• Links to your homepage
• Links to “deep” pages (such as product or category pages)
• Links containing your brand/company name
• Links containing the keywords you’re targeting

You may want to start with one goal in mind, and then branch out as you refine your link building techniques and skills. Which type you choose will influence your outreach selection. For example, a contact may be open to linking to your product more than an article with specific keywords, or vice versa.

Links from other sources are a valuable tool for building authority and trust for your business. As you can see from this introduction, who links back, how you earn the links, and what target page you want for the link all influence your strategy for gaining valuable backlinks.

In addition, link building takes time. So with all your effort, you need to be patient to see results. Start with the smaller steps, choose a campaign, keep track of the results, and monitor your links.

As you can see from this brief introduction, link building is complex. The benefits of bringing traffic to your website grow over time.

One answer to creating a link building strategy is to use an experienced digital marketing agency. Their experience and expertise can set up a strategy that is right for your business, helping you avoid the pitfalls of poor link building tactics.

At Erfolk, we can help your business get discovered online and help you build backlinks that give you authority.

Learn how we can help. Schedule your free consultation now.