The Internet era has changed dramatically the whole world of commerce, bringing all the participants of the process closer than ever. Back in the day, a landline, an office, and word-of-mouth were the signs of any business reliability.
However, nowadays everything is different, as the level of trust in business is built within the online world. Considering the number of competitors trying to take the same niche as yours, it is important to build a sustainable strong position, which relies greatly on search rankings, website visibility, and authority.
Online dominance doesn’t come out of nowhere, it is a time-consuming yet consistent implementation of link-building techniques, as a part of SEO. What is link building, and what are the techniques to use? Let’s discover all the ins and outs of the process.
What is a link-building strategy?
SEO link building service is the process of inserting backlinks into the content of reputable sources. Backlinks are also called incoming, or inbound links. The more backlinks from reputable sources lead back to your website, the more points of “trust” you get for the search engine algorithms. Consequently, the more points you gain, the better your ranking in the search is.
Put simply, a link-building strategy builds your way up to the top of the first page of the relevant queries, enhancing your visibility and authority.
Why do you need to implement a link-building strategy?
- Network of your influence – link building promotes the company’s level of expertise and authority, which enlarges the reader’s audience and number of references.
- Brand development – link building targets a long-term existence and creates the foundation for brand awareness and recognition.
- Traffic boost – as there will be numerous websites with a high level of authority, referring back to you, you will market as a reliable and trustworthy one as well. The more trust you have as a source of information or service, the more people will reach you with relevant queries.
Obviously, if you represent a ‘company – unicorn’, which has super-new and ground-breaking content, everyone will refer back to you, without long-term plans for link-building. Yet still, the initial stage of existence will require a few steps to spread the rumors about your uniqueness.
What are the types of link-building techniques?
Link-building techniques are generally divided into two styles – white-hat SEO and black-hat SEO:
1. White hat Seo is a “good egg” technique to use when planning a long-term existence and high level of authority. It follows the guidelines of search engines, with no violation of rules. White-hat link building targets a lawful development and includes fresh and relevant content, linking with relevant sources, the natural density of links and keywords, relevant page titles and tags, etc. Basically, white-hat SEO implements all the techniques which maintain the website integrity, and its presence naturally.
2. Black hat Seo is the absolute opposite, a “bad egg”. It is typically built around low-quality content, keyword stuffing, link farming, usage of PBNs, cloaking content, etc. Black hat links perform against search engine regulations, and algorithms, as their intention is to manipulate SERPs. Such techniques are widely used across the network, yet its followers can be penalized, their ranking drops significantly, and such projects are typically short-lived.
3. Grey hat SEO – a combination of white-hat SEO with manipulative tactics of black-hat SEO. While it follows the guidelines of search engines, it still uses some questionable tactics for fast results.
The choice of link-building technique will define the future performance of the website and its company representative. When targeting a long-term influence on the market, there is nothing to choose but White hat SEO link building, as pure reputation is always the best choice.
White-hat SEO link-building techniques
- Blog posting
Blog posting is often called guest posting. It is a laborious yet rewarding tactic to use. The bloggers write articles related to the industry, inserting backlinks within the content. Guest blogging is efficient in many ways, as it helps to establish a particularly high level of expertise and attract more traffic to your website.
- Niche edits
Niche edits are as effective as guest posts, yet they are less time-consuming. The niche edits are also known as contextual or curated links. It is based on placing links within already existing content, using SEO-approved anchors. As long as niche edits are built around already indexed posts, it takes less time to put them to good use, unlike blog posts.
- Cover-it-all content
A lot of websites give obvious preference to quantity over quality, posting numerous short posts, just to keep the reader interested. Typically such posts have no informational loads, contain lots of watery phrases, and present no value for readers. Getting backlinks to such sources will be difficult, as it is taken as low-quality content.
Instead, it’s highly recommended to create long-form content, which will easily contain a few backlinks and an in-depth view into the matter. Such articles are worth referring to, as they cover practically every question or issue related to the topic.
Articles that are worth sharing are typically related to exclusive research, listicles (list posts), “how-to” articles, guides, etc. Make sure the content includes all the possible subtopics.
- Create infographics
Visuals are always a valuable source of information, as they present a simplified form of complex information. All the data is divided into sections, which contain specific figures, facts, and backlinks directed toward the main source of the information. Imageries are easily perceived by the readers, thus, they are shared more often than others, thus, there will be more traffic obtained from them.
- Social media
Social media platforms were initiated as the means for communication between people, yet now their functions extended, bringing together businesses and their potential customers. While managing social media profiles, every company directly communicates with its readers and gets feedback from them on a permanent basis.
Social media is also a source of short posts of updates and news, with backlinks to the main website. As there are a few different social media platforms, each of them can help target a different audience, with slightly different approaches to communication.
White-hat SEO link-building is the best way to set foot in the relevant niche and claim your existence. Its techniques help to establish brand visibility and set the proper level of search rankings. By hiring a link-building company, you choose the right path of development into the future.
