Link Building Blog: A Guide to Creating High-Quality Backlinks

Link building is a crucial aspect of SEO, and creating high-quality backlinks is essential to improve your website's visibility and credibility.

To start, it's essential to understand that low-quality backlinks can actually harm your website's ranking, so focus on acquiring links from authoritative sources.

A good starting point is to identify relevant websites and blogs in your niche, such as industry leaders and influencers. Research their content and see if there are opportunities to collaborate or contribute.

By guest posting on other websites, you can increase your chances of getting high-quality backlinks.

SEO is a way to get your website to show up in search results when people look for things online.

Google's search algorithm considers many factors when ranking websites, but 8 of the top 20 relate to backlinks.

Getting other websites to link to your website is called link building, and it can make your site seem more trustworthy to search engines.

BBC.co.uk has backlinks from over 1 million domains, including reputable sites like cdc.gov and microsoft.com.

Having a strong backlink profile can help your website rank higher in search results.

Acquiring backlinks naturally over time is possible, but proactively building links can give you a competitive edge in search.

As long as the links are the right kinds, they can help your website seem more authoritative and trustworthy to search engines.

Link building is still important for SEO in 2024, and it's essential to understand the fundamentals. Building links is a lot of work, but having some basic knowledge of how it's done can help you see if the person you hired is doing a good job or not.

There are four fundamental ways to build links, which can be categorized into four buckets: adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links. Earning links refers to creating and promoting something so noteworthy that people would link to it naturally.

Here are the four types of content that tend to generate the most links: BlogsInfographicsCase studiesOther types of content (not specified)

High-quality links are still the best way to determine the quality of a webpage, and backlinks remain Google's go-to ranking signal. However, Google now focuses on link quality, not just link quantity, thanks to updates like Google Penguin.

Link building is a crucial aspect of SEO, and understanding its fundamentals is essential for success.

There are four fundamental ways to build links, which can be categorized into four buckets: Adding links, Asking for links, Buying links, and Earning links.

Adding links involves manually adding your link to other websites, while Asking for links involves sending emails to website owners to ask for a link. Buying links, on the other hand, involves offering compensation for a link. Earning links, however, requires creating and promoting something noteworthy that people would naturally link to.

Google's PageRank Algorithm revolutionized the way links were used to determine webpage quality. Nearly 20 years later, links remain the best way to determine quality.

A high-quality link is now more important than ever, and Google focuses on link quality over quantity. But what exactly is a high-quality link?

Here are the four fundamental ways to build links:

Creating world-class content is key to earning links naturally. It's a crucial step in link building that many marketers and business owners overlook.

To create linkable assets, you need to come up with an idea that has good potential to earn backlinks. This can be a tool, research report, or in-depth guide that provides value to your audience.

Four types of content tend to generate the most links: industry surveys, studies and research, online tools and calculators, and awards and rankings. These types of content are often cited by other websites and can drive significant traffic to your site.

A great example of a linkable asset is Semrush's blog post on content marketing statistics, which has backlinks from over 2.5K domains. This is because it's a useful source to cite when writing about the importance of content marketing.

To create a linkable asset, you can start by brainstorming ideas based on the types of content that work best for link building. Consider surveying your industry, calculating meaningful statistics, or creating a free online tool that solves a problem for your audience.

Here are some specific ideas to get you started:

Remember, even the best linkable assets need to be promoted to attract links. People can't link to things they don't know exist, so make sure to share your content with relevant audiences and engage with them to build a following.

Backlink value is determined by several factors.

Some backlinks are more valuable than others, and ones acquired using spammy practices can be harmful.

The value of a backlink can be affected by its source, with some links coming from high-authority websites being more valuable than others.

Backlinks acquired using toxic practices can have no effect at all or even harm your SEO.

Building high-quality backlinks is crucial for improving your website's search engine rankings. Most online businesses have branded accounts at major social networks, as well as listings at major business directories and review sites. These profile pages contain a link to their website and Google clearly pays attention to them.

To identify links that are actually worth building, you need to know what makes a good (or bad) link. A good link is one that is from a high-quality website and is relevant to your business. A link from a spammy website, on the other hand, can actually harm your website's credibility.

There are four fundamental ways to build links: Adding links, Asking for links, Buying links, and Earning links. Adding links is when you manually add your link to another website, but this type of link tends to have little to no value in the eyes of Google.

To build high-quality backlinks, you need to create linkable assets that have good potential to earn backlinks naturally. A linkable asset is a piece of content that is strategically crafted to attract links, such as a tool, research report, or in-depth guide. For example, Semrush's blog post on content marketing statistics has backlinks from over 2.5K domains.

Here are some types of linkable assets that tend to generate the most links:

Before you start a link-building campaign, there are several things you should have in place to supercharge your campaign. These include identifying relevant prospects, streamlining the outreach process, analyzing competitors' backlink profiles, finding domains that link to your competitors but not to you, and monitoring your link building results and identifying potentially harmful backlinks.

Link building can be a time-consuming process, but it's worth it to improve your website's visibility and drive more traffic. You can start by creating a target site list using SEO tools to discover websites linking to other sites within your niche. Filter the referring domain to match your desired criteria, such as domains with a specific DR and monthly traffic.

Some effective link building tactics include guest posting, original research and data, and creating a Skyscraper content that reveals new data from industry studies, surveys or original research. For example, a list post can pack a ton of value into digestible, bite-sized chunks, and when BuzzSumo analyzed 1 million articles, they discovered that list posts generated more backlinks than other content formats.

Here are some specific tactics to consider:

Building links can be a time-consuming process, but there are several tactics that can help make it more efficient. One of the most effective tactics is email outreach, which can be used to reach out to bloggers and journalists without ending up in their spam folder.

According to Example 3, email outreach is a crucial part of building white hat links in 2024 and beyond. To make email outreach more effective, you need to research the content and audience of the websites you're reaching out to, develop relationships with editors, and deliver great content.

Guest posting can also be an effective tactic, but it's not as simple as it used to be. According to Example 7, guest posting has become too spammy, and some red flags that can make guest posting spammy include paying someone to publish the post, using exact match anchor text, and publishing on a site that exists solely to publish guest posts.

However, if you publish a mind-blowing guest post on an authoritative, relevant site, it can still help you rank. To make guest posting more effective, you need to research the content and audience of the websites you're reaching out to, develop relationships with editors, and deliver great content.

Here are the 9 best tactics for building links:

1. Email outreach

2. Guest posting (done correctly)

3. The Skyscraper Technique (creating amazing content that people want to link to)

4. Link inserts (placing links to your website into existing content on another website)

5. Release a widget (embedding interactive software displays that direct users to linked pages)

6. Earning links (creating high-quality content that people want to link to)

7. Creating a target site list (using SEO tools to discover websites linking to other sites within your niche)

8. Using "Link Intersect" to uncover likely linkers (finding sites that link to more than one of your competitors)

9. Getting easy links with link reclamation (turning unlinked mentions into links with a gentle nudge)

These tactics can help you build high-quality links that will improve your website's search engine rankings and drive more traffic to your site.

NoFollow, Sponsored, and UGC Attributes are used to identify links that don't pass ranking strength to the linked page. These attributes can be found in links that the publisher doesn't want to endorse, were paid for by the linked site, or were placed by users.

The rel="nofollow" attribute is used to identify links that the publisher doesn't want to endorse, and Google is likely to respect the publisher's wishes. This attribute is used to prevent the spread of spam or malware.

The rel="sponsored" attribute is used to identify links that were paid for by the linked site, and Google ignores these links because they aren't genuine endorsements. This attribute is used to disclose paid relationships between the publisher and the linked site.

The rel="ugc" attribute is used to identify links that were placed by users, and Google ignores them because they're too easy to manipulate. This attribute is used to prevent the spread of spam or malware in user-generated content.

Here are the different link attributes and their descriptions:

These kinds of links are unlikely to help your rankings, but they can still drive brand awareness and referral traffic.

Podcasts and interviews are a great way to build links. They're less resource-intensive than guest blogging, requiring only enough talking points to fill the allotted air time.

Forecasts by Statista show a 47.8% increase in U.S. podcast listeners between 2024 and 2029, with 32 million people expected to listen to podcasts.

As a guest, you get a link to your website, which can drive traffic and boost your online presence. The CEO and co-founder of Freemius earned backlinks to the company's homepage, feature page, and social media account by appearing on the Mastermind podcast.

Sponsoring podcasts is another way to get prominent logo placement and a link to your website. WP RSS Aggregator got a link to their homepage by sponsoring a podcast.

Zapier creates blog posts and resource pages to educate its audience about integration partners, showcasing the potential for link building through podcasts.

Link building strategies can be divided into four fundamental ways: adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links.

There are many different link building tactics out there, and some can be very effective, while others no longer work and will waste your time.

Here are the four main categories of link building strategies: Adding links – manually adding your link to another website.Asking for links – sending emails to owners of relevant websites and asking them to link to you.Buying links – offering money or other compensation for links.Earning links – creating and promoting something noteworthy that people would link to naturally.

Industry Insights can be a powerful link building strategy. Relevance is key, so focus on creating content that's directly related to your niche. This could be a report on industry trends or a benchmark study. For example, McKinsey's State of AI survey report generated 3.6 thousand backlinks.

To create a similar report, identify the most relevant and up-to-date statistics in your industry. You can also curate statistics from various sources, like Sprout Social did with their Instagram stats post, which has 5.6 thousand backlinks from medium to high-rated domains.

Industry Insights can help establish your authority in the industry, but it's a resource-intensive strategy. To make the most of it, update the content regularly to keep the information current. This way, existing backlinks will still be valuable.

Here are some types of Industry Insights content that can attract backlinks:

Remember, the goal is to create content that's relevant, informative, and valuable to your audience. By doing so, you'll increase the chances of getting high-quality backlinks from authoritative sources.

There are four fundamental ways to build links, which can be broadly categorized into adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links. These are the core strategies that most link building tactics fall into.

Some link building strategies work much better than others. You'll want to focus on the tactics that are most effective today, according to our observations.

You can use email outreach to build white hat links, but it's essential to avoid ending up in the spam folder. This can be a challenge, especially when reaching out to massive sites.

There are three battle-tested strategies for building lots of quality backlinks. These strategies are worth considering if you want to build powerful links.

Most popular link building strategies fall into one of four buckets: adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links. These categories help to clarify the different approaches you can take.

Here are the four fundamental ways to build links, summarized in a list:

It's worth noting that building links is a lot of work, and it's often easier to outsource it to an experienced link builder or agency. However, having some basic knowledge of how it's done can be helpful in evaluating the work of others.

Link building is a crucial component of SEO, and building high-quality links can drive relevant traffic to your website and increase your domain authority. Building links is a long game, but it can help build a link profile that dominates the SERPs.

To build high-quality links, you need to research and content audit your website. This involves understanding your target audience, creating high-quality content, and identifying relevant referring domains.

There are four main buckets of link building strategies: adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links. Earning links is the most effective strategy, as it involves creating and promoting something so noteworthy that people would link to it naturally.

Before you start a link-building campaign, make sure you have a solid understanding of your website's internal linking strategy. This involves reviewing internal links and anchor text to avoid over-optimization issues and ensure accurate indexing.

Here are some key considerations for a successful link-building campaign:

To avoid wasting time on ineffective link building strategies, focus on what works today. According to our observations, some of the most effective link building tactics include email outreach, guest blogging, and creating high-quality content that attracts links naturally.

Internal links are just as important as external links, and a well-executed internal linking strategy can help search engines understand page relevance and page value. Use anchor text variations to avoid over-optimization issues and add more internal links to content within the same topic cluster to help search engines understand the relationship between pages.

Link building tools can make the process of acquiring links much faster and easier. There are many free tools available, such as Ahrefs' Free Backlink Checker, which shows the top 100 links pointing at any website or URL.

Google Alerts is another useful tool that notifies you whenever a specific word or phrase is mentioned on a newly published page, which can be a great way to source relevant link prospects. You can also use Ahrefs' Site Explorer to see all links of any website or URL, and sort and filter them by important SEO metrics.

Some other popular link building tools include Ahrefs' Content Explorer, which helps you find thousands of relevant websites for link requests and guest posting, and email outreach tools like Pitchbox, BuzzStream, and GMass. These tools can help you send personalized emails at scale, making it easier to connect with potential link partners.

If you're considering buying links, be aware that you shouldn't pay for SEO links that can influence your rankings. This is because paid links that aren't qualified with the rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow" attribute can violate Google's link spam guidelines.

The rel="sponsored" and rel="nofollow" attributes tell search engines to ignore these links, which is a good thing. This way, you can pay for link building services from a freelancer or agency without risking penalties.

However, it's crucial that the sites hosting your backlinks don't receive any form of payment. This includes money, products, services, and anything else of value.

Here are the consequences of buying unqualified paid links:

Releasing a free tool is a great way to generate backlinks and attract traffic to your website. This approach has been successfully used by many SaaS companies, including Surfer, which created a free SEO Chrome extension that led to a ton of high-quality backlinks.

A free tool, like a calculator, template, or widget, can provide real value to users and make your website an attractive link-building opportunity. For instance, a domain name generator can be a useful tool that people will want to link to.

To make the most of this strategy, you'll need to create a valuable tool that users will want to share with others. Once the word gets out, other websites will start linking to your tool without you even asking. This approach requires an initial marketing campaign to get the word out, but the results can be well worth the effort.

Here are some examples of free tools that can generate backlinks:

Link building outreach is a crucial step in getting your content noticed and attracting high-quality backlinks. This process involves reaching out to website owners or editors and persuading them to link to your content.

To find prospects to reach out to, use Semrush's Link Building Tool, which analyzes your competitors and keywords to suggest potential sites. You can add your competitors and keywords to the tool and click "Start Link Building" to get a list of prospects.

You can reject prospects that aren't relevant or don't align with your goals. To do this, click the trash can icon next to the prospect's name. For prospects you do want to reach out to, click the "To In Progress" button and they'll be added to the "In Progress" tab.

Once you've added your prospects to the "In Progress" tab, you can contact them via email using the tool's connected email account. Simply click the "Contact" button next to the prospect's name and customize your email to make a specific pitch.

Here are the four main buckets of link building strategies:

Asking for links involves actively contacting website owners and persuading them to link to your content. You can use Semrush's Link Building Tool to find high-quality prospects and manage the entire process of link building.

To build powerful links with email outreach, you need to create a target site list by analyzing powerful websites in your niche using SEO tools. You can filter the referring domains to match your desired criteria, such as domains with a specific DR and monthly traffic.

To connect with site editors, use an email finder tool or LinkedIn to get their email address. Then, send a personalized email with a link or guest post request. Email tends to convert better than LinkedIn messages.

Unlinked brand mentions are a low-hanging fruit of link building. You can monitor mentions using social listening tools or Google News alerts and prioritize websites by domain authority and traffic to find high-quality link building opportunities.

You should be aware that black hat link building is easily spotted by Google if it goes against their Webmaster Guidelines. Black hat link building is a risk that doesn't justify the reward, in my opinion.

To avoid Google penalties, it's best to only build white hat links. Minimizing exact match anchor text can help, but it's more about building trust with your audience.

A squeaky-clean link profile is key to avoiding manual penalties. This means avoiding shady links and having a transparent link building strategy.

Black hat link building is easy to spot: it goes against Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

The risk of black hat link building doesn't justify the reward, in my opinion.

You can spot black hat link building if the links are against Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

I personally don't recommend black hat link building.

You should know the penalties that Google dishes out, whether you're a white hat or black hat search engine optimization.

Google's penalties are a result of black hat link building that goes against their Webmaster Guidelines.

Building white hat links is key to avoiding Google's Penguin algorithm. You can minimize exact match anchor text to dodge Penguin, but it's more about trust.

The easiest way to avoid Penguin is to avoid shady links altogether.

To have a squeaky-clean link profile, you need to build white hat links.

A manual penalty can be triggered by an algorithm spotting a website gaming the system.

You can recover from a manual penalty by disavowing links and filing a reconsideration request.

A backlink gap analysis can reveal websites linking to your competitors but not to you.

This can be done using Semrush's Backlink Gap tool, which allows you to add your domain and your competitors' domains and click "Find prospects."

The "Best" tab shows domains that link to all your competitors but not to you, making them the strongest backlink prospects.

You can click the arrow next to the number of backlinks to see details about the backlinks from a particular domain, including the anchor text and target URL.

To get the most out of your link building efforts, you need to analyze your competitors' backlinks. Analyzing competitor backlinks helps you replicate link building tactics that work for your rivals. You can use Semrush's Backlink Analytics tool to do this.

Enter a competitor's domain and go to the "Indexed Pages" tab. This report shows a table with all of your competitor's pages sorted by number of referring domains. Click through to the top-performing pages and look for patterns in topics, style, length, and format.

For example, if your competitor's most-linked pages all contain videos, you might decide to incorporate video into your content marketing strategy. This could lead to more backlinks and improved link building results.

A backlink gap analysis is another essential step in link building. This analysis reveals websites linking to your competitors but not to you. If a site links to a competitor, they might be willing to link to you too, especially if you create superior content.

To do a backlink gap analysis, use Semrush's Backlink Gap tool. Add your domain and your competitors' domains, and click "Find prospects." The "Best" tab shows domains that link to all your competitors but not to you. These are the strongest backlink prospects.

Here are some key columns to focus on in the backlink gap analysis:

By analyzing your competitors' backlinks and doing a backlink gap analysis, you can identify areas for improvement and create a more effective link building strategy.

Julie Adams' blog, Our Beautiful Planet, saw a 194.1% boost in organic traffic after using The Skyscraper Technique, which involves creating amazing content and using email outreach to build backlinks.

The Skyscraper Technique works so well because it's just as much about building relationships as it is about building links. People won't link to your content unless they know it exists, and they won't know it exists unless you tell them about it.

Matt Lawry, an ecommerce site owner, used content to generate links to his site, specifically publishing an amazing piece of Skyscraper content on Australian Gin: The Ultimate Guide.

Matt's content generated links from authority sites, which boosted his search rankings for a keyword that directly results in sales for his ecommerce site: Australian Gin.

Using email outreach, Matt was able to promote his content and get links from the right people. He sent personalized emails, which is a key part of building relationships and getting links.

Matt's ecommerce site, which was focused on gifts, was able to build links and improve its search rankings despite the challenges of link building for ecommerce sites.

Link building is a long game, and it takes time to generate results. You won't see results from a new campaign for 3-6 months.

Two primary factors affect this timeline: competition and domain authority. It takes longer and more campaigns to outcompete rivals in competitive industries, and websites with strong backlink profiles experience faster gains.

Link value tends to increase over time, and a strategic campaign generates results. We worked with a client for a high-volume keyword, and within four months of running the link-building campaign, we took the domain from no clicks to 85,000 monthly clicks.

Don't be discouraged by the time it takes to see results. With a solid link building strategy and consistent effort, you can achieve significant gains.

Here are the factors that affect the timeline of generating results from link building:

There are four fundamental ways to build links, but some work much better than others.

You can learn about these methods and discover which ones are most effective for your strategy.

Some link building tactics are more advanced and require a bit of experience to pull off, but they can be incredibly valuable.

Here are nine specific tactics you can use in your link building strategy, which will give you a solid foundation to build upon.

Link building is the process of getting other websites to link to pages on your website, and its purpose is to boost the "authority" of your pages in the eyes of Google so that these pages rank higher and bring more search traffic.

There are four fundamental ways to build links, which can be categorized into four buckets: Adding links, Asking for links, Buying links, and Earning links. Adding links involves manually adding your link to another website, while Asking for links involves sending emails to owners of relevant websites and asking them to link to you.

Buying links is similar to Asking for links, but you offer them money or some other form of compensation. Earning links, on the other hand, refers to creating and promoting something so noteworthy that people would link to it naturally.

You can think of links as votes, and when other websites are linking to your page, it tells Google that your page is somehow important. The more high-quality backlinks a page has, the higher it tends to rank in Google.

Here are the four buckets of link building strategies:

It's worth noting that building links is a lot of work, and many digital marketers and business owners eventually outsource link building to a professional. However, having some basic knowledge of how link building is done can be incredibly useful in evaluating the work of a hired link builder.

If you want to build powerful links, you need to use email outreach in 2024 and beyond. This is because email outreach allows you to build white hat links without ending up in the spam folder.

To reach out to bloggers and journalists, you can use email outreach to ask for links. However, if you want to reach out to a massive site, it can be a pain to comb through their list.

There are four buckets of link building strategies: adding links, asking for links, buying links, and earning links. Earning links is the most desirable, as it involves creating and promoting something noteworthy that people would link to naturally.

Let's take a look at Case Study #1. Julie Adams' blog, Our Beautiful Planet, was struggling to get links, despite publishing great content. She tried The Skyscraper Technique, creating something truly amazing, like a comprehensive guide to a popular topic. This content was so good that it landed her a handful of links from authority sites in the science space.

The Skyscraper Technique works well because it's not just about building links, but also about building relationships. People need to know that your content exists and is worth linking to. Julie used email outreach to promote her content and build these relationships. This approach is key to success in link building.

Here are some key takeaways from Julie's experience:

By using these strategies, Julie was able to boost her organic traffic by a remarkable 194.1%. This shows that with the right approach, link building can be a powerful tool for driving traffic and growth.

Running a successful link building campaign requires a strategic approach. To increase the number and quality of links to your website, you should have tools and practices in place. Fortunately, you can achieve this in four steps.

First, you need to identify link-building opportunities. This requires organized effort to prospect for links. You can achieve this in four steps, which include researching potential link partners, crafting personalized emails, following up with your outreach efforts, and tracking the results of your campaign.

To build white hat links, you need to use email outreach. This means reaching out to bloggers and journalists without ending up in their spam folder. You can use tools to help you with this, but it's also a lot of work.

Here are the four steps to run an outbound link building campaign:

Remember, building links is a lot of work, and it's essential to have some basic knowledge of how it's done to see if the person you hired is doing a good job or not.

To track the performance of your link building efforts, it's essential to use relevant metrics. You can measure link performance using 5 key metrics, which will help you identify opportunities that drive traffic to your site.

Tracking your link building efforts is crucial to ensure you're on the right track. Running monthly link building audits, such as those recommended by Semrush's Backlink Audit tool, will help you monitor earned links, lost links, and overall backlink quality.

To get the most out of your link building efforts, track your links and benchmark progress. You can use online tools or a simple Google Sheet to track the types and number of links you're landing.

Measuring the performance of your link building efforts is crucial to understanding what's working and what's not.

Tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) helps identify link opportunities that drive traffic.

To track your link building efforts, run monthly (or more frequent) link building audits using tools like Semrush’s Backlink Audit tool.

Use the tool to monitor your site’s Authority Score, which increases as your backlink profile strengthens.

Small increases in Authority Score can represent a lot of work and links.

Tracking backlink performance ensures your link-building efforts pay off.

You can use online tools or a simple Google Sheet to track the types and number of links you’re landing.

A Google Sheet template can help you organize your link tracking efforts.

Create a script to check links are live, making it easy to monitor your links for free.

Link building campaigns take time to yield results, so give your efforts enough time to work.

To calculate the ROI of your link building campaign, figure out how many leads a content piece can generate for your business vs how much it’ll cost to rank that particular piece of content.

To accurately measure the effectiveness of your link building campaign, you need to benchmark against the search engine results pages (SERPs). This involves understanding where you stand on the SERPs for the keywords you want to rank for.

You can use a link-building tool to get an estimate of how many backlinks are required to rank in the top 100. For example, our backlinks tool says you need 1.4k links to rank in the top 100.

To realistically rank for a keyword, you want a Domain Rating (DR) similar to sites in the top five results. If your DR is significantly lower, you'll have a hard time ranking for the keyword.

Counting the number of 50+ DR links from unique domains with do-follow links can give you a sense of the number of links you need to secure for the campaign.