If you’re new to SEO, let me explain what a backlink is and how it can help. Backlinks are, quite simply, a link to your site that is published on another site. There are many ways to create high-quality backlinks. I will discuss some of them below. Search engines like Google look at links to your page that are placed on other pages to determine your site’s popularity as well as it’s importance.
Quality vs Quantity
Quality backlinks are an essential part of SEO. For years, I’ve been recommending link building to our clients as part of their SEO strategy. While we still recommend backlinks, the criteria have changed significantly following Google’s latest algorithm update. Not all links are the same. My experience has been that backlinks from high-authority pages are more important than links from high-authority domains. But also important is the content of the page where your link is placed. The most important change is that low-quality and non-relevant backlinks will not help and may even hurt your SEO. If you have a restaurant website, backlinks from sites about monkeys in India are not relevant and are of no benefit. By having a high proportion of your backlinks originating from non-relevant pages, Google and other search engines may penalize your entire domain.
Good Content
The single most important thing you can do is build quality content that viewers will want. Relevant content will simply rank better organically. Getting links from high-authority pages and sites is much easier when your content has value. The better your content, the more people will want to link to it. Google changes its algorithms often. However, one thing that doesn’t change is that Google prefers high-quality content.
Don’t Buy Links From Unscrupulous Sources
Don’t buy links. There are lots of services out there that will sell links to boost SEO. Beware of anyone selling shortcuts. Google has specifically said that “Link Schemes” or links intended to manipulate page/site rank are a violation of their webmaster guidelines. Even links placed with the best of intentions, if done incorrectly, can have a negative impact. White Hat SEO takes time and effort.
Relevant Anchor Text
Anchor text is also important. A link that contains important keywords will always have more weight. For example, if you want to link to a page about responsive web design, your anchor text should be “Responsive Web Design”. Anchor text that reads “Click Here” is not as effective. While you can’t control the anchor text other people use to link to your content, you can always control your internal links as well as the links you post yourself.
Important terms
DA – Domain Authority: The amount of trust assigned to a root domain. Typically determined by an algorithm as well as incoming links from other trusted domains and pages. It is a good way to predict the domain’s ranking potential. The Moz Domain Authority Checker is a great tool for checking your website’s DA.
PA – Page Authority: Similar to Domain Authority, except it’s used to predict the ranking potential of a page as opposed to the root domain.
Google PageRank: Named after Larry Page, one of Google’s founders. At one time, this was vital to websites’ rankings in Google’s search results. It was removed from the Google toolbar in 2016. Some SEO experts debate whether or not the principles are still relevant. My experience is that it’s still an important part of any SEO strategy.
PBN – Private Blog Network: A network of websites (usually High Authority) for the purpose of adding backlinks to help sites rank higher in search results.
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