Among the leading search engine optimization (SEO) factors for search rankings in 2021, links are considered among the most important, according to 17.4% of SEO professionals worldwide.
This result suggests that while other factors like on-page elements, content freshness, organic user behavior, and content depth rank higher in importance, links also contribute significantly to SEO success.
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Why is link building essential to succeed in your digital marketing campaigns involving search engine optimization? What are the strategies and tips for creating internal links and getting other websites to link back to yours?
In this article, readers, especially those running businesses online, will learn the importance of building quality links into websites as part of digital marketing. This article also discusses how you can build quality links internally and to other websites.
Why Is Link Building Essential to Your SEO Campaigns?
Links are an important element in your SEO because it’s one of the top criteria that Google considers in its page ranking algorithm. This consideration means that Google looks into the quality of your links as a factor in ranking your page.
SEO experts like Los Angeles SEO Experts say that external linking (putting links in your website that direct to other domains) is the third most important factor, after content and keywords, for optimizing a search.
On the other hand, 13% of search experts say link building is the most valuable SEO tactic.
Ninety-four percent of marketers predict that Google will still use links as ranking criteria in search algorithms within the next five years.
One study on web content found zero correlation between social shares and backlinks. This outcome suggests that highly-shareable content and content that people link to have little to no correlation.
Despite the benefits of link building to SEO, about 94% of all blog posts don’t have external links. Furthermore, only 2.2% of content has links from multiple websites.
Although the concept sounds simple enough, linking is a complex process. About 41% of SEO experts consider link building the most challenging part of SEO.
Because of such challenges with link building, marketers want to see the result of their SEO investment efforts bear fruit. Sixty-five percent of marketers measure link quality by observing their domain authority (DA).
DA is a search engine ranking score predicting how likely a website will rank in the search engine result pages (SERPs).
Aside from evaluating the DA, 48% of marketers use domain ratings, and 36% use page authority to determine link quality.
Page authority is similar to DA but measures how specific pages will rank in the SERPs.
Furthermore, 38% of marketers consider page rankings the top key performance indicator (KPI) when determining the effectiveness of the link-building efforts of the business.
Strategies to Help Ensure That Other Websites Link Back to Your Website
Adding links from your website to other domains is relatively easy. But how do you convince other websites, especially reputable ones, to link back to you?
Here are some ways you can place your website’s name on other sites and help increase your search engine ranking:
Outreach
A good link-building tactic involves reaching out to people and other entities in your niche and introducing them to your content.
Through outreach, your website doesn’t necessarily need to have content. But having relevant content means you’re already a few steps ahead. What you need to reach out and provide something worthy of a link is to have a product, service, brand, or personality.
But outreach doesn’t mean talking to anybody. Instead, consider these domains when reaching out:
- Websites that mention your target keyword or keywords in their articles
- Websites with pages linked to articles similar to the topic
Guest Blogging
Guest blogging involves creating content, such as writing an article, for another website within or related to your niche.
In other words, you’re not producing content you’ll upload to your website with guest blogging. Instead, you link to yourself from the content you created for that other website, which publishes your content in their domain.
While some sites advertise that they’re accepting guest blogs, consider looking for relevant sites that don’t advertise and pitch your offer. In most cases, such websites welcome guest blogs even if these sites don’t explicitly state that they do.
Community Site Link Building
Some individuals focus only on building high-quality links. But while this goal is generally a good thing, such links aren’t the only ones that comprise a natural backlink profile.
Building links from other sources like forums, message boards, and knowledge-sharing sites is also essential. Such sites are excellent places to market your website and build relevant links to help diversify your profile.
Tips for Building Your Internal Links
Aside from getting other websites to link back to yours, link building also involves linking your pages through internal links. You can interlink your pages by following these few steps:
- Keyword research: Utilize a keyword research tool that suggests relevant and popular keywords.
- Assign keywords to content: Group your keywords strategically and assign them to relevant content to build search-friendly information architecture.
- Link pages with targeted anchor text: Apply the keywords to your links by using these words to link to your content.
To know more about how link building and other SEO elements can help you succeed in your marketing campaign, consult a digital marketing agency or expert.
