How to Build and Manage Your Backlinks
A Backlinking Guide for SEO’s & Businesses
Most people wonder what backlinking is until they have to design a website and get it rankes to start receiving traffic, leads and sales. Backlinks can be easily defined as incoming links to a webpage, or one website pointing to another website via a “backlink“.
Simple, so why so much discussion confusion over backlinks in the business and SEO world? Read on…
When a web page is linked to another page, this is what’s called a backlink. Link Building a major factor in the ranking of any web page, in fact, it can be one of the primary reasons that one website … outranks another.
his is what’s called a backlink. Link Building a major factor in the ranking of any web page, in fact, it can be one of the primary reasons that one website … outranks another.
In the past, a page that had a lot of backlinks was ranked higher on major search engines, and this still holds until today. However, Google now knows & understands more about how your links are created and really has cracked down on link schemes or PBNs (private blog networks). Keeping a clean backlinking profile has never mattered more than it does today. So what does that mean, “a clean backlinking profile?”
Coming Clean on Links – A Clean Backlinking Profile
With out getting overly technical backlinking should always have one principle in mind before acquiring a link, and that principle is this, “Would I Want This Backlink if Google, Didn’t Exist?” simply put, is the backlink going to send in traffic from a source that would be willing to actually buy or at the very least be interested in my products or services? If the answer is, No don’t build that link.
In the past and especially in something called Black Hat SEO, web spammers would use link schemes, to sell a lot of useless links to businesses that wouldn’t send any relevant traffic to the site, but would help them rank quickly. Google caught on, updated their search algorithm and now those days are Long Gone. End of Story.
The above quote comes from Eric Ward the author of the “Ultimate Guide to Link Building” and I have personally trained with him on proper backlinking strategy and recommend his material for link building on Amazon.
Nowadays, not all backlinks are measured the same and there is a lot of technical aspects that goes into how Google measures each new link built. Things like Domain Authority, When the Link was placed, and how many other links are on that page besides yours to name a few. If you are wondering just how important backlinks are to your SEO campaign, you can read this Ahref’s Blog Post about On-Page SEO Factors and Link Metrics and which one matters most to Google.
Backlinking Factors VS On Page Factors & Their Importance in Google
Google also looks at how relevant that link is to your own business, to ensure that it makes sense in the first place. Otherwise, the link will be quickly removed and discounted, So please don’t go out and spend your money on backlinks that have no real value to your site, say getting 10,000 bookmarks from microsites that have no value in sending in a REAL leads or SALES for your business, because its a total waste of money.
How Digital Agencies Build Backlinking Campaigns for Businesses.
Link Building The Right Way.
Backlinking is mostly used in search engine optimization (SEO) in order to increase the rank or position of a single page of a business website in Google or other search engines.
How you build out your backlinking strategy will make or break your business online as they are a few pitfalls if done incorrectly, namely Google Pengiun. There are different types of backlinks, but before you set them up for your site, you need to make sure that you have a few things in place.
As a Digital Agency we recommend that your on-page SEO is in good order and each page has a specific target in the way of a Keyword that you would like it to rank for, from there you should be able to get some authority links to that page and if you have created content of value, you may even start getting your links for free. If someone else shares or links to your content, that can make your backlinking day much easier.
Considerations for a Proper Link Building Campaign
- Both Natural & Keyword Rich Anchor Text in your Backlinks (More on this later)
- Trusted Sources / Backlinks from High Authority Domains
- Relevant Sources / Backlinks that will bring your not just traffic, but Leads
- Expert Sources / Backlinks that are Shared Socially on a Large Scale
- A Complete Backlinking Goal Schedule & Implementation Plan
- Backlinking Velocity / Increasing the Volume of Backlinks Monthly
- Planned Link Structure or Backlinking Map (Tiered Backlinking)
- Diverse Mix of Backlinks from Different Domains
Backlinking is only successful if you have quality backlinks from quality sites and you have set up some goals, link maps, and strategy. The backlinks should also be a good mix of contextual in-page text links, infographics, blog comments, images, URL and other forms of advertising like Paid Display Ads for example.
Having a good mix of rich media backlinks and keeping your anchor text profile natural is a must, meaning that you are not repeating the same anchor text in your links over and over. It is the equant to on-page keyword stuffing and it will land you into hot water and a poorly ranked website.
As you can see, Backlinking is a time-consuming task, and it can also be costly because most authority domains worked hard to get the rank they built through time and they usually get compensated in the way of selling links to others. Noticed I said through time, as backlinking and SEO is an investment in your business through time and most business owners see results over the 4 – 6 month time period in the way of true lead results.
To combat these two challenges, you must be able to know how you can get ONLY the most relevant backlinks that have real lead traffic and high authority. Businesses today are using backlinking services to get their site ranked quicker and get their share of the leads that comes from being at the Top Of Google. The kind of traffic that converts into direct sales.
Since backlinking is so time-consuming … some 3rd party companies have come up with backlinking management software for SEO professionals in order to streamline the process and really keep track of your link strategy all while avoiding Google Penalties. Awesome!
Link Prospecting Software – Where to Find a Better Backlink
Citation Labs has come up with an online link prospecting tool called, well… Link Prospector. Link Prospector is known to work within two minutes, and it is an in-house automatic prospector. It was designed to enable content marketers and link builders organize and find new link opportunities.
This would help give any content the required “Link Juice” it needs from relative websites all over the internet. You might already be getting some links if you are a pro at content marketing, but most businesses need the help of link prospector, you get the chance to speed up your workflow finishing up with less time than you could have.
With Link Prospector, you just have to enter the key phrases and types of link sources you are looking to build and link prospector will find thousands of results from higher authority websites within a few minutes. After this, you just have to single out your preferred or top prospects and export them easily to CSV.
Link Prospector helps you to take full control of your query parameters giving you finer and better-filtered results to fit your exact needs. It has features like the keyword combiner tool that builds massive query lists fast, and this means you get results faster and the results are more precise. Incorporating them into your workflow becomes easier and faster. With link prospector, exporting and integrating data into other 3rd party tools also becomes easier.
Backlinking is important to your business in that it helps improve your site rankings. If your content gets organic links from other sites, that content will rank higher in the search engines. Your main aim should be to create links to individual pages/posts (Deep Links) along with the ones leading to your homepage.
This will significantly increase your organic ranking on the major search engines.
Link Building Management Software
The companies that are offering link management software like SEOJet use proven link maps gathered from many experiments looking at number one ranked sites in Google to help create a natural linking profile for your business and a link structure that you can follow, all while keeping track of your links.
SEOJet provides you with link map management software that will give you tiered link plans to help you dominate the SERPs for all your clients or your main business website.
The software has been proven to increase SEO client retention because it produces incredible results, therefore, increase rankings within a short time. It also uses white hat methods to protect your customers from algorithm changes as it helps to keep your anchor text profile looking natural and clean. As a link builder for many company websites, I would say it solves 4 very important aspects of building my link campaigns.
- Gives Me a Link Map to Follow and Outlines What Pages to Link to First
- Created a Tiered Backling Structure to Ensure, Rank, Power and Authority
- Ensure that I am using the proper anchor text for contextual links
- Keep Track of what pages have links and what to link to next (Major Advantage for SEO Experts)
I have personally am using the software to help manage my day to day link building efforts and Im starting to see what a benefit a tool like this has over trying to keep track of things by other methods. For me that was excel spreadsheets and this is a way better option to get a quick view of all your campaigns quickly.
Can’t I just Buy Backlinks?
As noted, backlinking is time-consuming and most business just don’t have the time to utilize the tools above and build links all day long. Often the tendency is to do a Google Search to buy backlinks and with out a strategy in place and they are really paying to harm their rank.
Getting backlinks for your site or a blog is not as easy as it sounds. The simplest and easiest way of getting backlinks for your blog is writing excellent articles. People will want to link to them naturally. The only way you can do this is by writing a good article through lots of research and practical and factual examples, this too can be a daunting task.
So business owners and even people actively doing SEO and Backlinking for others have only 2 options, build the links themselves with the proper tools or trust a link building service to build them for you. We do use some link building services like TheHoth or FatJoe from time to time and usually use them on a tier 2, link basis. That is, we ourselves at SEOBANK build all the main links to a website first and then start backlinking those backlinks in order to get more juice to them and rank the main website.
The danger here is not in using the services, they build an ok backlink, the problem is that there is no overall strategy or link map in place when ordering the links themselves and if you tip the scales enough, bye bye rankings.
Let me show you what I mean…here is an example of a warning from SEMrush about an e-commerce website business that was randomly sending in mass links to its main page of the website with no anchor text strategy.
Notice it is warning the business owners of a potential Google Penalty? It also states in a very real way, “avoid a lot of time and money wasted” in the future by not buying and sending in toxic links with no thought put into the anchor text or running a clean backlinking profile.
Let’s Hope they listen, well actually they called us and we listened for them and cleaned up the profile, QUICK.
Why did they call us? Well, to be truthful with out the proper SEO tools, they had no idea what was affecting their rank…so they Googled SEO Agencies and found us online. It wasn’t their fault really, they just wanted links, but guess what… the website wasn’t doing so hot in the SERPs and what you don’t know can hurt you. Knoledge is power, especially in the SEO world.
Lets take a look at building out a link structure that not only will work for you, but you can be sucessful utlizing this kind of strategy…
Example of a Tiered Link Map
The above picture comes directly from the link management software SEOjet and we build links much in the same manner here at SEOBANK, again we use the software and you should structure your links in a way that will help you keep your site at the top of the major search engines like Google.
Link Maps, Natural Anchor Texts and keeping a clean link profile are a MUST, and trying to do that with out some type of backling tools is difficult, sure we have the disavow tool inside of Google Search Console, but by that time it might already be too late. The tool is used to remove toxic links from your link profile but Google will notify you after you got hit with a penalty, so the tool at best is damage control.
Getting high-authority backlinks is a major piece of Google’s algorithm because they are a deciding factor that now separates business that truly cares about Building Quality, Rank and Authority and those that don’t.
Recently, Google has started rolling out data refreshers and new updates to identify and penalize low-quality websites that use spammy link building techniques to game the search results.
Both the link management software and link prospector can help build non-spammy links that provide value to the original content. Link building is done primarily for search engine optimization purposes, but it is also beneficial for several other reasons. Always remember, would I build this link if Google didn’t exist? A link should always be to get more sales, not spammy traffic or to increase your bounce rate. Who wants that?
The link management software like SEOJet, link prospector, and link services like TheHOTH will help you stay out of the danger of a penalty if used correctly.
This means you are thinking out of the box when it comes to backlinking. Converting visitors to clients while at the same time increasing the rankings of a website is the main reason why backlinking is used in SEO. Improving the organic position of the website is the primary focus of backlinking, but it is not the only factor that is used when evaluating the performance of link building. Link building efforts can also be proven to be successful if the rankings of a site are improving and at the same time referral traffic is driving a significant amount of traffic to the website that converts to sales.
This means you should start thinking out of the box when it comes to backlinking. Either you want to hire a professional company to manage your link profile or you take a serious investment in educating yourself to do it right. Paying money to get things wrong is costly.
Converting visitors to clients while at the same time increasing the rankings of a website is the main reason why backlinking is used in SEO. Improving the organic position of the website is the primary focus of backlinking, but it is not the only factor that is used when evaluating the performance of link building.
Link building efforts can also be proven to be more successful if all elements are in line with an overall SEO strategy starting with proper keyword research, flowing down into On-page Optimization, creating great content and getting that great content A BETTER LINK with the right anchor text.
