Backlinks are in important part of a business’ SEO success.
Backlinks are links that point to another website. They can also be referred to as ‘inbound links’ or ‘external links’. Backlinks should be incorporated as part of your SEO strategy. They help increase your website’s visibility, traffic and credibility.
Why are backlinks important for SEO?
Backlinks are a crucial for SEO. Search engines see backlinks as a validation, by other websites, of your site’s content. As such, pages with authoritative backlinks tend to rank better on search engine results pages (SERPs). Greater visibility means more traffic to your website, and more conversions.
However, not all backlinks are created equal. Some backlinks are unnatural (toxic), or flagged as spam. These may be problematic for your business. Google is cracking down on bad links and imposing SEO penalties for sites containing them. Consequently, your site could experience a decrease in visibility and traffic, and cost you potential sales.
How can you check your backlink health?
To keep your site reputable and optimised. find and disavow bad links. Undertake a digital audit that includes a backlink analysis. Do so on a regular basis to maintain your digital efficiency. Backlink analysis involves a comprehensive review of your website’s backlink profile. Analysts will assess your site’s link performance and identify issues that may be affecting its search engine ranking. Issues include missing, broken or compromised links.To
How can you build your backlinks profile?
Once any toxic or problematic links have been eliminated, focus on increasing the number of high authority backlinks.
There are different types of backlinks. While some backlinks are more powerful than others, it is strongly advised to create a diverse backlink profile. Types of backlinks include:
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Sponsored Links – Also known as affiliate links, sponsored links involve paying a business or influencer to promote your business via a piece of content, such as a product review. Ensure that the link uses the “rel=”sponsored” attribute to help Google identify it.
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User Generated Content Links – UGC links appear in conversational contexts such as on forums and blog comments. Because UGC links are not necessarily trustworthy, it’s important to use the “rel=”ugc” attribute to help Google identify it.
- Editorially Placed Links – Organic links that a site shares without your knowledge. This type of link commonly comes in the form of a recommendation and places your business in a position of authority to support the piece of content containing the link. Google ranks editorially placed links highly.
- Links to government authorities and institutions – Websites with a .gov or .edu suffix are the holy grail of backlinks. This is because they are highly trusted sources. As such, they offer seriously powerful status when it comes to boosting your domain authority.
Tips to build government backlinks
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- Engage in conversation, and comment on blogs or forums. It is critical to always provide a quality comment and a link to a relevant page or article on your website. A poor or unrelated comment or link will look like spam. and be detrimental to your reputation.
- Get listed on a resource page. For instance, many councils have local business directories.
- Offer to guest post for a related government organisation.
- Try to include external links to relevant .gov and .edu organisations. While this doesn’t create a backlink to your website, it helps signal to Google that your content is helpful, reliable and of good quality. Try interviewing a relevant official, writing about a social issue, and creating a partnership with a government organisation.
Monitor and maintain
It is vital to the overall optimisation of your digital presence and SEO strategy. Regularly scrutinise your backlink health and remove toxic backlinks. Work towards adding more quality backlinks that boost your brand’s credibility and drives quality traffic to your website. Click to learn more about how your website can undergo backlink analysis.
Make sure your online business is preforming at its peak by checking your backlink setup . If you feel there could be improvements and you would like an independent point of view then contact us at IDA.
