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How much does Link building play a role in SEO?

Link building

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

In general, you can boil most “white hat” link building strategies down to two simple steps:

1. Create for something notable (and therefore worthy of a link)
2. Show it to people who own websites (and thus can link to it)

Why Link Building Is Important for SEO

Link building is most important because it’s a major factor in how Google ranks web pages. Google notes that:

In general, webmasters can improve the rank of their sites by increasing the number of high-quality sites that link to their pages. The site is promoting wind turbine equipment that we sell. We are competing with another wind turbine equipment manufacturer. One of the ranking factors Google will look at in determining how to rank our respective pages is link popularity.

To provide a general visual understanding of why link building is important, it is very basic. It omits key factors including:

• The trust or authority of the linking pages.
• The SEO or content optimization for the respective sites.
• The anchor text of the incoming links.

For a more in-depth explanation of how PageRank is calculated, read through these resources:

• The original Google PageRank paper
• An in-depth discussion for the formula behind PageRank
• The Wikipedia page on the subject

The most important concept to understand is that, as Google said that more likely to have your content rank higher for keywords you are targeting if you can get external websites to link to your pages.

Three Types of Links                                                                    

When planning your link building strategy, it is most important to know the different types of links.

The most important types of links to know are below.

1. Links from Users

Utilizing user-generated links as a tactic for link building isn’t the ideal route when you are looking to up your SEO strategy. In the past, Google penalized those who tried user-generated linking.  User-generated links are sometimes created with the intent to promote your own work. They are also generally lower in quality than other link building methods that Google prefers. 

2. Nofollow vs. Follow 

Nofollow links are typically used when you want to link to other website but do not want to tell Google to crawl that site. To designate a link as a nofollow link, you will need to add the attribute rel=’nofollow’ into the link’s code. Nofollow links will inform Google that the link shouldn’t pass PageRank. 

3. Natural Links from Other Blogs/Sites

Natural links occur more organically from the readers who come across your website including a link on their blog or website without being asked. With this link type, you do not ask other webmasters and users to give backlink. Most natural links do not live in sponsored and paid content and without tracking parameters. They are usually added within another blogger’s and webmaster’s content with the intent to provide value to their readers. That means you are more likely to see natural links in blog, videos, posts, images and other product listings on someone’s website.

Having the natural link back to website is by all means considered a ‘good link’ and has been dubbed one of the safest link building techniques. Natural links are also one of the best or most efficient ways to promote your blog and your website.

How Does Link Building Work?  

The best way to boost your authority through link building is to earn backlinks from credible, high-quality websites. If you have tons of backlinks but they are from spammy, irrelevant sites, they probably won’t help you rank any better.

There are many ways to acquire backlinks, including:

• Guest blogging
• Social media promotion
• Manual outreach
• Pursuing competitors’ backlinks

We'll get into specific strategies shortly. 

But keep in mind that backlinks aren't everything—first and foremost, you should focus on creating useful, high-quality content. 

When investigating ways to improve your rank, harnessing the power of link building can be a challenge for beginners and experienced professionals alike. However, it can be one of your most powerful tools for organic success.

How to Successfully Build Links 

1. Earn Links 

Link earning requires a great amount for effort but gives the highest reward. So, be prepared to invest time and resources into earning links. You will land links that competitors will struggle to replicate. To gain a true competitive advantage through links, you should adopt a strategy that will allow you to earn editorially placed links. 

The best way to get other sites to create high-quality, relevant links to yours is to create unique, relevant content that can naturally gain popularity in the Internet community.

You can use the Backlink Analytics tool to get some idea of what your competitors’ backlink profiles look like. Navigate to the Competitors tab to start your research and use this information to find opportunities for your own site.

To the next, plug in a competitor into the tool to view the following:

• Use the Anchors Report to find the most common anchor text used of their backlinks
• Use the Indexed Pages Report to check which pages of your competitor’s website earned the most backlinks
• Use the Referring Domains Report to see what domains are linking to their site and if they have recently won/lost any backlinks

2. Request Links

That can take a lot of time and effort with little reward but can be much more effective with the right tools.

If you are interested in getting a back-link from a particular website you know could help boost your website and page’s authority, chances are need to contact the website owner directly to make it happen.

But before you start requesting backlinks from all over the internet; keep some little things in mind:

• Craft a well-written email before you start contacting site owners is helpful
• Take the performance or credibility for the other website into account
• Links you request should be from a website relative to your niche
• To find prospects and manage your campaign, you can use our Link Building Tool

3. Manually Add Links

When adding links yourself, they have typically in complete control for the outcome of the tactics, as opposed to relying on a journalist and other third party to link to your site. Manual link building refers to placing links yourself, whether in a blog comment, on, a guest post on another site, and in a press release. These tactics are also known as manual link building. But keep in mind - links are in control of usually are not the highest quality. 

This method of link building can drive benefits like referral traffic or help to position you as a thought leader. It can also help you build your brand by interacting with users within your niche. Nevertheless, adding links on your own will not directly give a significant competitive advantage. As with quick-win tactics, a strategy based around traditional link building is likely to be one that competitors can easily copy.