How to find and build links
Despite what you may think, link building is a relatively straightforward task. That does not make it easy. In fact, link building may very well be the hardest part of SEO due to the amount of labour involved.
First, you need to find suitable link targets, approach them with an introductory e-mail (or call), follow-up with them, wait for the links to go live and then repeat the process over and over in the hopes that the links will eventually be recognised by Google and improve your rankings. They may. They may not. Google does what it wants. The entire process could take months.
It’s no wonder, then, that link building is typically an entry-level job in SEO, with most moving into other areas. It is the definition of boring grunt work. Unfortunately, unless you are in a very uncompetitive niche, it needs to be done.
The cold, hard truth
Sadly, there are no miracle cures to get you high Google rankings in the short term that won’t get you penalised in the long term.
That’s not just some blue pill delusion, it is the truth. the reason why agencies will go ahead and build a high amount of links of questionable quality quickly is the same reason people cheat in sports. Winning is great. And if you only have a client on a 6 month contract, it is very tempting to satisfy the need to win within those 6 months with shady links. If it works, the client will renew the contract. If it doesn’t, the client fires you, but hopefully you haven’t overextended yourself financially and you have other clients to keep you going.
Instead, it is much better to focus on quality links that will be valuable in the long term and use PPC for traffic until organic traffic picks up.
What constitutes a good link?
What constitutes a good link is that it:
> Sends relevant referred visitors that could convert into customers
> Builds trust with future visitors by being placed on a credible site
> Increases brand awareness with the target demographic
If a potential link doesn’t satisfy at least one of these criteria, they aren’t valuable for your business directly, and in the long term, as Google updates its algorithms, they are likely to be of little value to bolster search rankings.
Just to be clear: I’m not saying that if a link doesn’t meet these criteria, it’s worthless or it needs to be removed – a large number of links pointing towards any well-ranked site won’t fit these criteria. What I am saying is that you shouldn’t waste our time actively building them. 10 high quality links will be worth more than a thousand flimsy ones.
Your primary link building targets
What you first need to do is identify all the important websites in your industry. Are there industry bodies, perhaps a regulatory body, that have websites? Visit these website to see if they have a members section, press section or similar page and see if there’s a possibility for a link there. Just approach the site about including you in their members section if you’re not already – provided you’re actually a member! – and they should be accommodating.
The next step is to think about your business partners, like suppliers or, if you happen to be a b2b website, customers. If you happen to stock shoes from a particular brand, for example, it’s likely they have a website with official stockists listed. Have a look, see if you’re listed there and approach them about a link.
If your industry has some sort of well-respected directory style website that actually receives human traffic, such as tripadvisor for the hospitality industry, then, by all means approach them about a link, but otherwise steer clear of free and paid directories.
If you’re a business servicing local customers, like a hairdresser’s or café, do a search of local businesses nearby to see if any of them would be suitable for a link. For example, there may be a local gallery that has a link page that you could ask to be included in.
If your industry has some sort of well-read news website, such as Wired or Mashable, and you think you have an interesting story to tell, by all means approach them. Interesting is the key word here. The fact that you’re a family run business is not really all that interesting. The fact that you have launched a cool new smartphone app is. Approach them with news stories as and when you have something interesting to tell, but don’t try to get a mention out of them for mention’s sake. It’s unlikely to work and you’re likely to just annoy the staff who work in the site who will be unreceptive when you actually have something interesting to share. Don’t be the boy who cried “Link!“.
If your industry has a lot of of well-read and well-known bloggers, for example if you’re a fashion retailer, by all means get in touch with them about new releases or other interesting information. However, not every industry has this, and a lot of SEO agencies will try to shoehorn clients into some mummy blogger’s pages when nobody who is a potential customer of them be looking. Sadly, if your business conveyor belt lubrication, it is unlikely your industry has a lot of well-read bloggers who get their posts shared on social media.
Social media links
On that note, if you do have a social media profile, like facebook or YouTube, make sure these link to your website. These may not pass on actual link value in Google’s eyes, but they will likely refer traffic, and, frankly, that in and of itself should be enough reason to add links.
What about the old style of link building?
You really should not be focusing your efforts building links outside of these areas. Sure, you could try some older style spam links, but these are the links that are actually going to make a difference in your search engine rankings. Anything else is a waste of your time that should be spent on your product or service offering or your site’s user experience.