Build backlinks

There are two types of linking that you can influence yourself (OnPage):

Link profile as a basis for evaluation?

In the early days, it was obvious that Google puts a lot of emphasis on the link profile through the PageRank algorithm. Meanwhile, Google is no longer so transparent and there is no information about how exactly backlinks are evaluated. The PageRank itself has also not existed for some time.

Backlink building can strengthen the authority of your website and at the same time your brand, additionally backlinks are an important factor in the E-A-T rating (Expertise-Authority-Trust) of your website. So you can think of links as being a vote for you to get a good ranking, as you are thus considered credible and helpful.

However, the respective "voice" is not of equal value, since one source, for example, is not as authoritative and well-known as another. A "high quality backlink" consists of various important factors, as you can see from the next point!

Glossary: The most important terms in link building

If you deal with link building, then you will be confronted with various technical terms. In this guide, we will also use these terms and therefore I would like to counteract any question marks that may arise in advance. You can read more terms in our SEO lexicon (click here).

Backlink analysis: what should be avoided?

Build backlinks without having to fear anything? It's not quite that simple! Of course, there are also things in the backlink building, which should not happen under any circumstances. You should not accept every link and therefore perform a link profile analysis at regular intervals.

What are bad backlinks?

Bad backlinks are from websites that work against your actual goal. You should not use the following websites:

• Websites without added value
• Too many external links
• No reference to the actual topic
• Sells too many backlinks
• Gives only backlinks, no "actual" content (short content)

Over time, you'll get a feel for which websites are more and less suitable. In the beginning, you'll have to rely more on SEO tools and guides (like this one).

Which websites are bad link sellers?

Every website shows signs of whether it is a professional or a bad link seller. This also determines the price. Criteria by which you can determine whether a site is suitable for a backlink to you would be, for example:

• Is the website a (Wordpress) default theme?
• Do all categories of the website fit the "actual" theme?
• Are topics treated only superficially? Or are there specialized articles?
• Are the articles shorter than 500 words?
• Does internal linking happen among the content?
• Does the site look like it was created by a machine?
• Do the articles frequently link to Wikipedia?
• Are companies possibly being discredited?
• Are link texts set conspicuously "hard"?
• Is there a foreign address in the imprint?
• Do the contributions have interaction? (Comments, Likes, ...)
• Does the website have active social media profiles?

If you can answer "yes" to all or part of the questions, you should take a closer look at the offer or leave the website, as it may do more harm than good.

However, all these points should always be seen in context. Just because a website has a foreign imprint or hardly any interaction does not mean that it is a dubious website and therefore a bad link seller.

You should always avoid websites if they are only there to sell guest posts (read: backlinks). Focusing only on these offers because of the price is absolutely not sustainable.

Build backlinks - but the right way!

Link building is a marathon and not a sprint. There is absolutely no metric that can show you when you will see the first successes. It always depends on which niche you are in and whether you already have a "brand", because an expert status helps you immensely in link building.

Overall, backlinks require a lot of patience and especially time to find the right links. Furthermore, high standards should be set, which are considered within the entire SEO strategy. The focus will always be on qualitative content and never on low-quality content, which may even come from a text spinning generator.

Competitor link analysis

If you find a website on position 1 in the search results, then this website has done a lot right. You can look at what the website owner has done to rank on this position. It should not be an imitation of the competition, it is about using the approaches and creating a perhaps even more coherent overall concept.

You can consider the following factors:

• How many backlinks (referring domains) does the website have?
• Which backlinks have been set?
• Does the website have links that you don't have?

Regarding the third point, you can rebuild the links according to your strategy. In principle, it is important that you are also listed where your biggest competitors are listed. Google interprets from this that you belong to the "community".

This topic is so important that tools have also been formed from it. One such tool is the Backlink Gap from SEMRush, Majestic SEO Clique Hunter or Ahrefs Link Intersect. Also with our Backlink Plattform you have the possibility to check the backlink gap to your competitors in the future.

Build guest posts

Via the organic Google search you have the possibility to discover new websites, which would like to link you. You can search for "keyword + guest post" (or "guest article"). Most of the time you can also find such sites with "become a guest author".

These sites offer you a place for a professional article, but you have to write a high-quality article for it. Such methods are also used by the competition. Overall, however, it depends on the particular niche. Here, you should make sure to publish only on websites that already have traffic, are relevant to your website's topic and have good SEO metrics. Then you should definitely not miss this opportunity.

Create yellow pages

Business directories and web directories are the first step to improve your visibility. In principle, it is recommended for every company to be listed in these directories, because this may also lead to you generating organic traffic from them and perhaps even new customers.

The following directory types are relevant:

• Local directories
• Business directories
• General web directories

You should be careful with the general web directories, because such links are often considered as spam. Use only well-known and reputable directories here.

How can I build backlinks?

Build backlinks without investing any time or money? This is only possible if content is created that offers a high degree of added value. This in turn means that it must be texts, graphics or videos of excellent quality. That's hard! But there are various possibilities, which we would like to show you now.

Create infographics for link building

A linkable asset is content that is worth linking to. This content is created solely for the purpose of being linked to. This content usually revolves exclusively around "informational keywords". For these keywords, the focus is on information. The user's search intention is to be educated about a topic and less about buying a product or service.

Linkable assets would be, for example, statistics that have been graphically prepared and are thus willingly linked or even published on another website. However, these statistics should be relevant - secondary information should not necessarily be shown in them. The linkable asset should trigger an "aha" effect, so to speak.

Infographics make the content more exciting and "unique" because not every website has that. The chances of linking become much higher with it.

Since we also want to build backlinks with this post, you can find a matching infographic to our blog post here (as we just showed you too). Definitely worth linking, right? ;)

If you are a publisher yourself and also write on the topic of SEO / marketing / business or similar, feel free to include the graphic on your page! You can simply copy the code below and paste it via HTML.

<a href="https://seo-galaxy.com/backlinks-aufbauen" target="_blank"><img src="https://seo-galaxy.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Preview-Infografik.png" width="500"></a><br/><span style="font-size: 12px;">(via <a href="https://seo-galaxy.com">seo-galaxy.com</a>)</span>

Publish technical papers

Surely you will present content on your website, which should also be linked. That is, content that has been created over time, for example, in the blog. For this to happen, you should always ask yourself whether this blog article even offers a solution or is worth sharing.

It is therefore necessary to develop a content strategy, whereby content is delivered that is expected by the target group:

A perfect example of this is our post "30 statistics that show link building is not to be neglected". Here we list 30 SEO / backlink statistics that have been compiled from various sources, including studies, surveys & Co. Such a post is a linkable asset and is gladly linked as a source / support to various theses - and we are happy about it!

Creating this content is easy, but later updating this content again is a big challenge. Content is created once and then very often "left" for months and even years. That's why it's important that you review and update this content at regular intervals.

Find your own content

Content from you may have already been shared without you knowing it. This is always the case when there is no linking. Images, infographics or your YouTube videos may have been shared without "thanking" you with a link. You should search for your content on the internet and make the owner aware that he should link after all - another free backlink!

Mostly, the content is given with source information like "Source: SEO Galaxy", but just without a link. You can find such links by searching Google for "brand -example.com -instagram.com -pinterest.com". This will show you all the websites that have mentioned your website or brand.

Check metrics of the landing page

Whether a website is eligible for link placement should be determined by checking the metrics. That would be first and foremost the authority. At Ahrefs, there is the already mentioned "Domain Rating", which gives you a first assessment of whether the page is strong enough.

Now you have to check if it is a "link slinger". Your link should not be one among many, but should have a certain quality. You can also analyze the outgoing links.

The analysis will also show you which pages have been linked - maybe even erotic or gambling pages? Maybe this does not fit to your website topic and would be "Bad Neigbouhrhood".

Another indicator for the success of a website is the traffic. With SimilarWeb you can check if the linking website has traffic. If the website has no visitors, then linking is less helpful - especially for the future. You won't get the "correct" visitor numbers from these tools, but you will get a fairly reliable estimate.

Favor blogs, newspapers and the like whose reputation is not to publish paid guest articles. The harder a backlink is to get, the more valuable the backlink is.

With small and new blogs you will almost always be able to publish content, but with blogs of brands or celebrities it is an art. The text must be so good that it would be very difficult for the responsible people to reject it.

Get free backlinks: How does a text really get published?

A text will only be published if it is really good - unless the webmaster does not attach importance to this. Low quality content should not be your focus. Use these three factors to drastically increase your publication rate:

Acquisition via e-mail for article publication

Outreach mails are sent to get a link on the desired website. In a previous paragraph, I already pointed out that GMass can be used to send outreach mails on a wide scale. Now it is a question of how the "correct" e-mail is written. The main point here is to make the e-mail as personal as possible.

Finding the right timing

Timing is important when sending e-mails, because e-mails that are sent in the morning are usually lost. The inbox of an editorial office is often full of all kinds of inquiries or feedback from readers. These are processed first in the morning.

Around noon, we have found that this is the time with the best response rate. Mail tools like GMass have the option to send emails at a certain time first, so you can prepare everything in peace.

Create reference to the website

If it is a well-known website, then it enjoys corresponding authority. The operators of such a website do not like to receive cooperation emails. So you should first make sure that your name is familiar. This is possible if you comment on the articles on the website, become active in their social media channels or give feedback via email. Especially for smaller websites, this is very effective.

Do not use contact forms

It is not easy to find the right contact, but you can find a contact form on every website - but you should not use it. You are then one request among many.

If possible, you should contact the right person directly. You can find these people by researching XING or LinkedIn and also by using an email address finder such as hunter.io.

Contacting - if then, perfect!

In the first contact via e-mail, you must provide a certain added value, because otherwise the possible cooperation becomes just one request of many. You could give feedback on an existing article that is not necessarily complete or note that a link in the text no longer works and you have a suitable replacement.

On the other hand, you can also indicate your expertise and offer to expand the article, as you can provide another perspective. It is important here to already send concrete suggestions or in the best case already send the extension.

Experience has shown that it can take up to five working days before a response can be expected. You should therefore not ask after one day when you can expect an answer.

Email personalization

If an e-mail looks like it could apply to anyone, then it is easy for the operator to simply delete this mail. If you want the mail to be read and responded to, then you need to convince with individuality in every request. We recommend that you create an e-mail template that you can then personalize. The most important components are those listed here:

The point is to personalize the research and explain credibly in the message what the concrete added value is for the publisher at the end of this cooperation. You should also go into why this particular publisher deserves an email and not the competition, which probably consists of hundreds or thousands of websites.

Important in this regard that it comes to social proof. You can describe what the article might look like for this site. A sympathetic email with suggestions will enhance the request and every publisher will thus be happy to answer your email.

Content and formats as a selling point

If you want to place an article on a website, then you are basically selling a text. It is different if you want to pay the operator (keyword: link purchase). The sales argument without payment is therefore the content.

What does that mean in this case? You have to have better content than the competition currently has. This is not an easy task and certainly not little work. The content must both convince the operator and have the chance to be ranked on page 1.

For this, you need to look at what text content performs. Boring are typical articles with introduction, main part and conclusion. There are other possibilities with images, diagrams, checklists or even templates for download and online tools. This content can be easily linked.

Case studies and research findings

If you have the opportunity to publish your own case studies or research results, then you are sitting on a gold mine, so to speak. Surveys from large companies or results from a successful marketing campaign generate interest and thus potential for plenty of backlinks.

Otherwise, they are also lists that are frequently clicked. In case of publishing results, for example, you can choose the title "My 5 findings after this successful marketing campaign" or something similar. If you search for such lists in a search engine, you will surely find a lot of inspiration.

How to place a backlink perfectly?

Already written the article? Then you can now find a smart link placement.
First of all you have to consider the following:

A smart place would be if the link at the same time literally catches the eye and cannot be skimmed. It may be a good idea to place the link within a list. Lists are always read and surely you will find a point in which you can link to your website.

Bad and good link text optimization

Poor optimization of link texts always exists when the link is set inappropriately. The link text should contain the relevant keywords, but it is harmful when permanently linking with the same anchor text or the same type of anchor texts. The solution is to vary the anchor texts and also add natural words instead of just the brand name, for example.

Suitable anchor texts for this article would be:

• Build Backlinks
• shows this backlink guide
• at https://seo-galaxy.com/backlinks-aufbauen
• Tips to build backlinks
• this link building guide from SEO Galaxy

How long does it take for a backlink to work effectively?

Link building is a task of patience, even when it comes to when the first effects from it can be determined. When does a backlink have an effect? You will always find different information about this. Our experience shows that it is very difficult to give a general answer to this question. Individual factors play a big role, especially the crawling of Google itself.

If your website is already in the top 10 for a frequently searched keyword and your website also has a generally high visitor volume, then it will be crawled more often than a website that is in 90th place, for example. Thus, a backlink is also included in the evaluation faster than a backlink from a website with few visitors and a target URL with even fewer visitors.

In our experience, a backlink takes effect in a period of 14 days - 60 days, where ranking increases can be seen.
A complete effect and unfolding of the backlink can be seen in a period of 90 - 120 days.

Important: The effect of a backlink depends very individually on the industry, search volume, website traffic and also crawling.

Biggest jumps with non-optimized link profile

If the link profile looks like it has never been optimized, then it is safe to assume that the jumps will be large. In the back search results, jumps of 10 to 20 places per day can be possible. However, at the latest when reaching the top 15, the jumps will be smaller. This is where the strong websites can be found, which also have plenty of qualitative links in their link profile.

Volatility in search results

In many niches, something changes almost every day - here, fast-moving is a hallmark. It's about showing that your website is the best user experience and visitors perform actions on the website and get their solution to the search query.

In other niches, trust is again more important than any other factor. A well-known lawyer can almost sit back due to his long-lasting activity and optimized link profile, as no one will take away the number 1 position in local search results anytime soon.

Use trust

Trust is the foundation of any website! People trust Google not to land them on a website with illegal content. Google does not want to gamble with the good reputation and has therefore introduced E-A-T. It's about keeping a clean slate and never putting Google's trust at stake.

But how is trust gained? It is already done with the basic information:

Especially the third point is relevant, because content with many professional sources and on a current status always ranks better than content with sources, which everyone uses. This in turn shows how important backlinks are for your own ranking.

Keeping published content up to date

The users' search intention is to get the latest content. News portals must therefore deliver new content every day and cannot afford to take a break for a few days or weeks.

In the case of an entrepreneur for recycling, on the other hand, fast-moving topics do not exist. An article published now will probably still be current in a year's time. Passages may need to be updated to current machinery or the like. However, it is not as explosive as it would be for news portals.

A news portal will get more backlinks (the quantity is important here), the recycling entrepreneur in turn needs especially qualitative backlinks.

Comparison to the competition: What can you do better?

SEO backlink building is also about how strong the competition is - this should be regularly compared and also observed. If the competition has a large stock of quality backlinks, then a single top backlink for your website will have little impact. In this case you should continuously set backlinks - but this should be done sensibly and professionally and best with the help of a link building agency like SEO Galaxy.

What are the most common mistakes?

The most common mistakes in link building result from ignorance. With this link building guide you are very well advised, but you could still make mistakes, because this area is extremely extensive and depending on the industry also one or the other information varies. Therefore, we have summarized here which mistakes are made most often.

Direct link exchange

The direct link exchange was a very common method in former times, which is no longer in demand nowadays, because it has only disadvantages. Google deals with it openly: Reciprocal linking is to be avoided, which is stated in the webmaster guidelines. The behavior will be penalized and that even if both sides enjoy a high authority and both deal with a similar topic.

Poor selection of link sources

If websites are selected for the OffPage strategy, then it should be ensured that these also fit compellingly to the own project.
There are mistakes, which are to be avoided in principle. These include, among others:

• Website without added value and looks "listless", posts have a maximum of 350 words.
• Websites which have been created only for link building.
• Website has particularly many links, these are then considered a "link farm".
• No thematic relevance (not even close).

Backlinks from non-indexed pages

There are websites that have been removed from the index because there is a virus on them or because there is content on them that violates valid law. A link from this page is not only toxic, but also leads to the fact that this link has no influence on the ranking.

Making sales growth predictable

For projects that have already existed for some time, money keywords have developed in the top 5 or top 10. If this strategy works, you can now generate a predictable revenue and buy backlinks.

For this method, you need to know the respective search volume and visitor numbers, find out the current conversion rate and create different situations.

For example, if you are currently listed in 5th place for a money keyword, you will receive 50 visitors to the website per month, three of whom will become buyers and generate a total of 600 euros in sales.

In comparison, position 4 receives 100 visitors from this search volume. Since you know this, you will now try to buy a content link at a price of, for example, 1,000 euros, so that you can generate twice the traffic and with it twice the sales.

Now you have done it - you are on position 4, you get 100 visitors from this keyword and six of them become buyers - a turnover of 1,200 euros results.

But if you now see that positions 1 and 2 account for over 900 visitors, then you will want to reach this goal. After all, the amount invested in content links pays for itself quickly. You know how much you have to invest and how much revenue the optimization of the Google ranking will bring you in the next few months.

Build backlinks for the backlink - Secret professional strategy

The effect of backlinks can be multiplied by building backlinks for the respective guest post in turn. For the so-called tier-2 links, especially favorable content pages, forum links or press links are used. With these links, the tier-1 links can then be strengthened.

Build social proof

There are countless websites and online stores - but which ones are really trustworthy? Of course, only those that are also talked about. Mentions or professional articles should be listed as a reference on your own website. All this strengthens the trustworthiness so that a customer would be more likely to buy.

Conclusion about building backlinks - when do you start?

Anyone can build backlinks with these strategies! It's worth it, as the results of hundreds of our customers show. Link building is one of the most powerful strategies, which is why you should certainly consider this method for your business.

But not everyone can implement these strategies, because maybe time or even know-how is missing. As a company, you can buy the time of an agency so that experts take care of this matter. With SEO Galaxy you have the #1 backlink agency on your side!

Backlinks allow you as an entrepreneur to grow further and maybe even predictable, while you do not leave your competitors the place in the search results. You as an entrepreneur are even obliged to build up the company further - we help you with our SEO Galaxy platform or our full service with a clean, sustainable and successful effect!

Register now & get started!

Backlinks that bring your ranking to the top.
Rank #1 on Google with SEO Galaxy.

FAQ

Register now & get started!

Backlinks that bring your ranking to the top.
Rank #1 on Google with SEO Galaxy.