You have your blog up and running, now you need to start building links to it; what are the best strategies for that?
We have some strategies to help you with good link building strategies to help you get the best links for your blog.
Why are links important?
Search engines crawl the vast World Wide Web looking for pages that relate to each other, the way the search engines determine this is through links. Since the 90s the algorithms that the search engines run on have become sophisticated and no longer treat all links equally.
Today the search engines can determine not only a website and its pages popularity based on the links coming to them from other sources but also on things like trust, authority, and spam. Sites that are trusted link to other sites that are trusted giving them an authority instead of being labeled spam.
Due to this algorithmic search and the analysis of links, it is important to grow good links in order to form good pull, notice, and circulation from the search engines. How to do this is to use SEO link building for search engine ranking that will result in traffic to you site.
You may wish to read up on links and search engine algorithms here.
What types of links are best to use?
In order for the search engine algorithms to consider your links to be trusted and authoritative you must use the right kind of links.
Yes there are good and bad links and you as the blog owner must make sure that you get the good links to your site or the search engines will tag your blog as spam.
The three best links are;
Natural –these are links given by other sites that want to link to your content because it is in their industry or niche and provides a value to their readers. These types of links require you to write good content that provides a value and get the word out about it.
Outreach –these are created by emailing bloggers or sites that are in your niche or similar to your niche (places that have something in common with yours), as well as submitting to directories. You need to explain why including your link in their site is advantageous to them and their site as well.
Self-created –these are simple comments, feedback, or user profiles. These are the lowest rank links but for some sites can be helpful. Today, these types of links should be pursued cautiously as they can be considered a spam.
Understanding blogs are tools
It is a common misconception that blogs are good for SEO. The truth is just because you have a blog does not mean it will bring you links and traffic if you do not know how to use it. To understand more about using blogs as a tool read further here.
The strategies to building links
Link building is one of the most significant things you can do for your blog and earn off-site links that are SEO friendly.
Making any page more SEO friendly is easy with these 10 simple edit strategies.
Follow the strategies we are providing and you should be well on your way to better ranking with the search engines and link building.
Create content that provides value, is SEO friendly, and of course not plagiarized. Use keywords that are important to your area or industry and gives value and information to the reader.
Submit to both blog and RSS directories, these will give a positive signal to both search engines and those users who compile lists of similar topic blogs.
Do not forget directories for regular websites; while yours may be a blog the directories do not always discern the difference. You need to make sure the directory has a relevant topic area that your blog will fit in as a useful source of information; be sure to submit it to that topic area for inclusion.
Press releases by wire services should contain a link to your blog which can hold the actual press release as well as other useful information and tutorials on your product or service.
Always ask for a link back to your blog from media sites that write a story about your product or service, or at least for reviews. While many of these sites have a no link out from their story policy many also leave it up to the writer and editor; If you do not ask you will never get a link back to your blog so be sure to always ask!
Conduct backlink analysis on your competitors and see who is linking to who and what information. If you find several who link to several of your competitors ask them to link to you as well since they are linking to several competitors there is a good chance that they will also link to you.
Do not forget social media! This is important when done correctly. Put a link to your blog in your social media profile and bios. This is especially important when doing guest blog posts. This includes social sites such as YouTube and LinkedIn.
Make sure that your email signature contains a link to your blog as well. Anytime someone forwards your email the people they forward it to also see your link. If one person follows that links and finds your blog informative and value packed they will tell someone else and possibly post it to social media. Never consider your link in your email signature or in profiles or bios on social media as a weak or nonexistent link. It only takes one person to mention it to their friends who then mention it to their friends and so on. Granted you are not going to get 20,000 instant followers or links from this but each one can grant you one more and after time this builds up.
Use Op-Ed pieces in the mainstream media and of course optimize the title and include a link back to your blog where you have many other articles on the topic that are informative and have value to them.
Offer a widget or simple graphic with a link in it to your blog which will allow other to link to you easily and effortlessly. This will get you more links than if you make them do all the work to link to you.
Graphics, when you use graphics, make sure to optimize them with keywords and alternate link if the graphic does not work. You want the search engines to make the connection to your site and graphics.
Conclusion
Understanding links, how the algorithms work, and how you should build your links for proper SEO is an absolute must in today’s market.
The better you understand it works the better your links will work for you in garnering you higher ranking in the search engines.
Also always remember you need to continuously be adding properly SEO articles to your blog keeping it current and relevant. Do not forget about evergreen content either.
You're reading Best Link Building Strategies for Your Blog, originally posted on Kikolani, authored and copyrighted by Ethan Dunwill.
Recommended Posts
The Ultimate Guide to 160+ Business and Digital Marketing Conferences in 2016
Never Run Out of Blog Post Ideas: 25 Content Marketing Resources