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Backlinks are a crucial component of any SEO campaign, but what type of links are the most valuable? And which should be avoided at all costs? We examine the best link-building strategies for SEO in 2023.
Write Something Worth Linking To
Backlinks work best when they offer the reader something valuable or unusual. This means they will stay on the page for longer – and possibly even share it themselves. Write a guest post that is entertaining and informative; offer insight or a new, unexpected angle – ideally backed up with some original data or research. This kind of content is far more worthy than linking to a page that’s purely promotional. For more tips on writing guest posts for SEO, have a look over here.
Focus On Quality Backlinks
Backlinks essentially act as a secret code to Google, as to how authoritative your site is. If you have numerous quality backlinks, it signals that high-authority websites value your content – and therefore Google should value it, too. If, on the other hand, the links are spammy and from poor-quality, thin-content sites, Google will deem your site to be low-authority too – and your rankings will nosedive. You can check whether a site might be deemed to be ‘thin-content’ by using this website word-count tool.
Check Domain Authority, TrustFlow, and Traffic
Just how do you measure quality?
Part of it requires a manual approach. A site with lots of spammy, poorly written articles and a poor design is unlikely to be successful. Similarly, relevance is also important. If you run a hotel in Italy, getting a backlink from a site selling office furniture in Spain won’t be much use.
Other aspects of it can be measured through a qualitative method using this tool to bulk check Domain Authority and TrustFlow.
Domain Authority (DA) is Moz’s algorithm. They state that “Domain Authority (DA) is a search engine ranking score developed by Moz that predicts how likely a website is to rank in search engine result pages (SERPs). Domain Authority scores range from one to 100, with higher scores corresponding to a greater likelihood of ranking.”
TrustFlow (TF) is Majestic’s algorithm. Majestic has configured TrustFlow to “represent the quality of links that point to URLs and websites.” Like DA, TF is on a scale from one to 100, the higher the better.
My favorite tool to measure traffic is Semrush as it estimates traffic from Google searches only. You can also see which country traffic comes from and which keywords. This helps you to identify whether a website you’re considering building a link from has local and relevant traffic.
Seek Backlinks From Experts In Your Area
Whatever the focus of your website, seek out the true authorities in that particular area: those unquestioned sites known to all the professionals in your field. A guest post from one of these renowned pages is worth 100 from a less distinguished site.
For example, let’s say your website looks at all-things baking and perhaps you want people to try out your cake recipes. A link from a gourmet food website or renowned food blog would send out a loud-and-clear signal to Google that your page was worth reading, and this would be reflected in your ranking.
A simple way to find these is to search for the keywords you want to rank for and see what blogs appear in the first couple of pages on Google.
The World Is Your Oyster
Don’t just concentrate on building backlinks in your own country, either. International backlinks to authoritative sites in other countries demonstrate the breadth of your own influence, too, provided links are in the same language.
Of course, it goes without saying that international backlinks are particularly important if you are trying to attract traffic from different countries. Focus on each country individually, building links to high-authority sites within that location. You should also research multilingual SEO techniques to ensure you target the audience of that country in the most effective way.
Dofollow Links Are Precious
A dofollow link helps your SEO because it shares the authority of the original website with your own – a process sometimes known as ‘link juice. A no follow link, on the other hand, will give you very little link juice, though Google does still take it as an indicator of a link’s value. This type of link is usually used when you link to a site that you do not want to be perceived as endorsing. Backlinks are dofollow by default, but sites can add rel=”nofollow” to the source code of a link if they want to make it nofollow.
Consider Your Anchor Text Carefully
The anchor text that you use is important. Those rich with keywords help tell Google what your page is about, as they also offer a description of the webpage they link to. While this carried even more importance in the past, because search engines weren’t as astute at working out the contents of a page, it is still significant in 2023.
That said, Google trawls anchor texts to check for spam. For this reason, try to keep them as natural as possible.
A range of anchor texts – some simply using the naked URL, others featuring keywords, some containing your brand name, plus some that are more generic (such as, ‘find out more over here, or ‘over on this site…’) have been shown to form the best strategy for SEO.
All things considered, while link building is a crucial component of your SEO strategy, not all backlinks are made equal. Our guide to help you navigate the link-building landscape of 2023 will help you steer clear of the pitfalls and have your rankings soar in no time!
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