Link building has been one of the most important ranking factors since the beginning of Google.
However, a lot has changed over the decades, thanks to Google that has been changing its algorithm.
Google, through its constantly improved algorithm, wants to find out about the relevancy and quality of the backlinks your site has scored.
It means, you need to be very mindful about which sites you are getting the backlinks from.
If the site is not relevant or does not look like a credible one in the eye of Google, your backlink from the site will create a negative impact on your site rank.
So, here comes the billion dollar question!
How would you know, if it would be okay to get backlink from a particular site.
Grab a cup of coffee or something, and give this article a thorough read.
The mystery will be solved!!!
12 Types of Backlinks to Boost Your SEO
Below are some of the different types of links that you should try to get to boost your SEO, as well as your ranking.
While some of them may not directly impact your ranking but can help to drive relevant traffic.
Guest Blogging
Yes, you read it right.
The good old guest blogging has been an effective strategy to get quality backlinks.
However, it’s important to know how to do it in the right way.
Getting backlinks from high-quality, relevant websites is crucial since those websites are already ranking on the search results and can attract constant traffic to their sites.
It means if you can get backlinks from those sites, they will also continuously send traffic to your pages which they are linking to.
One of the best ways to get a backlink from those sites is by writing a high-quality, relevant guest post for them.
A relevant article based on a keyword they are ranking for can add more value to the link, thus improving your site’s search ranking.
How to Earn Them:
First of all, you need to manually outreach and find some quality blog sites that are relevant to your niche.
After doing proper keyword research, create an outstanding content that no publisher can reject.
When your article is ready, approach them with a well-written pitch, explaining how your content is going to add value to their sites.
Once you convince them to publish your content, you will eventually see the traffic coming to your site. To know more about guest blogging, check out this amazing guide by Brian Dean.
Editorial & Contextual Links
An editorial link is a form of citation on other websites, indicating the original source of the data they use in their content.
On the other hand, a contextual link can be found within the body of an article with the idea surrounding it.
Both the links are extremely powerful since they are highly perceptible to the audiences, thus can send a significant number of qualified traffic to your site.
That traffic can improve your domain authority that influences your overall search rankings.
Besides, it creates a good brand impression since your brand is cited by those websites.
How to Earn Them:
Start by creating value-driven, evergreen, and useful content that is tailored for your target customers and researchers.
Do proper keyword research to make sure your article performs well in the search results.
The better you perform well in the search results, the more traffic you will get.
Those high numbers of traffic can ensure you get some qualified websites linking to your page.
Try to build a relationship with your readers, as well as other publishers with your content.
Doing so will help in your sharing process and attract more linkers to your site.
Also, don’t forget to share your content through outreach and social media.
Links from Reviews
Another sought after opportunity that can significantly improve the ranking of your website.
If your site or a webpage gets linked to a positive online review, more and more potential customers will know about your services/products.
As a result, you will end up having some new customers.
Besides, authentic reviews can improve your website’s reputation, thus strengthening your brand image.
When you have an excellent brand image, you will start getting a massive amount of traffic to your site, which will eventually improve your ranking.
How to Earn Them:
You can create a referral commission system or affiliate program to make the bloggers review your products. However, in order to make the affiliate program successful, you need to do it strategically.
You can get a good number of traffic from their site and those bloggers will get some commission offered by you when someone purchases your products or signs up for your service.
It’s a win-win for both!
To get some experiential reviews, you can actually opt for a personal level blogger outreach.
Find out some expert-level product reviewers and pitch them with your products or services.
Make sure your email has both personal and professional touch to make them actually review your products.
Links from Social Media
Integrating your site with social media is an effective way to get a huge amount of traffic.
However, the process is often overlooked since there are too many platforms.
Social sharing can help many people to find amazing contents, hence it’s crucial to have strong social media brand pages.
Platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Linkedin, etc. let you generate huge amounts of traffic every time you share any content (both new and old) from your site.
It’s easier to build a relationship with your customers through social media channels, which eventually creates new linking opportunities.
Those brand pages also help the search engines to determine your authority, thus adding some extra weight to your ranking.
How to Earn Them:
Based on the platform you’re using, create some social media campaigns, and promote your content through social media.
You can add social sharing buttons to your content and make sure they are visible to the readers.
Interact with those who share your content and turn them into your followers.
Do not forget to promote your social media profiles on your website.
It will encourage your visitors to follow you and get updated about new content or products.
However, do not use similar approaches while sharing on different social media platforms.
For example, you should be a bit careful while using Reddit since the users there don’t like to be sold to.
Interviews
A powerful marketing aid that can easily pass higher link value to your website.
Giving interviews can create a brand image for you that can increase the conversion rate of your site.
Besides, when you give interviews, the content published on a website will be solely about you and your business.
As a result, it will be easier to attract relevant readers to your website.
Also, interviews can help improve your rankings in branded search results since you eventually become popular.
How to Earn Them:
Focus more on content marketing.
The more you produce and share value-driven content, the more audiences want to know about you.
Also, do not forget to mention on your site, as well as in your social media profile that you’re open for an interview.
You can pitch some expert-level bloggers to get interviewed.
There are some websites that publish interviews on a regular basis. Create a nicely written pitch and send them an email to let them know your interest. However, do not push them and make sure your pitch doesn’t hamper your integrity.
Links from Newsletter
Getting featured in a newsletter can be a great way to attract new audiences to your website.
There are popular blogs that have thousands of subscribers.
If you can get featured in any of those newsletters, chances are you will get a massive amount of traffic with a single link.
Besides, the content that gets featured in a newsletter can attract more natural links from some of the subscribers, increasing your chance of ranking higher on Google.
And the best part? You might also end up getting some enquiries from a number of potential clients.
How to Earn Them:
The first thing that can secure your chances to be in a newsletter is a well-written and high-quality content.
Bloggers tend to pick the best quality content to make sure those can cope up with the quality they have been maintaining for their audiences.
Those blogs have a good number of loyal subscribers, hence ensuring quality is their utmost priority.
Once you’re done with your content, find some good blogs with a good email list.
Write a nice and professional email, pitching them to have your content featured in their newsletter.
You can also grow your own email list and feature content from some of the good blogs in exchange for featuring your site.
Links from Contributions
If you look into the popular blogs and news sites regularly, you will see there are articles published in the column section from a particular writer or blogger who regularly writes for different blogs and news sites.
These writers are known as contributors and they write for popular sites for scalable and effective link building.
Writing for several popular blogs helps them to demonstrate expertise, thus creating trust among the readers.
It can improve your author rank and eventually attract a huge number of audiences to your own website.
How to Earn Them:
If you’ve been guest blogging for a while, it’s time to make a permanent relationship with those publishers by becoming a contributor for them.
Find out which of the blogs are sending you a high amount of traffic.
Approach them with more and more content and eventually become a staple member of their community.
Do some research and find the top publishers in your niche.
Apply to those sites to become a contributor.
Make sure your content is high-quality and authoritative enough to be a good fit in their column section.
.Edu, .Gov, & .Org Links
Links from such sites can be extremely valuable for your SEO since these sites tend to have high domain authority. Besides, these sites are highly trusted by the search engines, hence getting a link from them can help improve the authority of your site.
Unlike .edu and .gov, .org sites are easier to earn. However, each of them is powerful enough to increase your chances to rank higher on Google.
How to Earn Them:
You can earn links from .edu sites by offering sponsorships, scholarships, posting a job opening for recent graduates, etc. You can also create resourceful content that is helpful enough for students or for those who are doing research.
Earning .gov links will be easier if you focus on helping the veterans from armed forces by offering them scholarships, discounts, and training.
To get links from .org sites, simply volunteer in some charity programs, or organize your own.
You can also offer your services pro bono for those who are in need to get featured on such websites.
Links from Press Coverage
One of the most effective ways to get viral traffic is to be mentioned in a popular news site.
Press mentions can help your brand look more powerful to your target audiences and make it easier to convert them into your regular customer.
Besides, getting viral through those news sites can help you acquire some natural links from high-quality websites.
You will also find it easier to pitch to other publishers due to your strong background.
Press mention is great for your brand image and offers you high SEO value and helps you to build trust among your readers.
How to Earn Them:
Getting press coverage is a bit difficult.
You need to put some extra efforts to be mentioned in a news site.
You need to do proper research to create a media list and find the journalists that cover news relevant to your niche.
Once you make the list, collect their email address, and contact them following the best email marketing practices.
However, there’s also an easy way.
You can opt for tools like HARO (Help a Reporter Out).
It’s an amazing tool that lets you help the journalists who are looking for sources to cover their stories.
Links from Webinars
Running webinars is one of the most famous ways to earn great links, particularly if you’re creating recordings for future use.
And why not? Afterall creating valuable resources for others has always been a great way to earn good links.
Whether the recordings are going into your blog or some other blogs, other people may wish to link to them, which you can use for blogger outreach in the future.
How to Earn Them:
You need to be a bit creative to build a successful webinar content.
Once you’re done with your content and presentation team, record your webinar and host it in a suitable time.
Don’t forget to upload your slides to Slideshare and check on your attendees after at least 24 hours of launching.
Final Thoughts
If you have read thus far, you know
While there are some other ways for link building, some of them are quite notorious due to their malicious practices.
Opting for PBNs, link exchange for money are some of the practices that were quite popular even a few years ago.
However, Google has become quite smart, hence those shortcuts don’t work anymore.
Link building is a long term process and can be done by exchanging value. You must prove that you’re worthy before you get links from a reputed and highly authoritative site.
The above-mentioned links are some of the most effectives to boost your ranking in the SERP.
However, to create a perfect backlink profile for your site, try a good mix of each link.
Sujan Sarkar is one of the co-founders of OneLittleWeb. He leads the agency with over a decade of experience.
In 2018, he founded OneLittleWeb, driven by a vision to fill a void in the industry, providing top-quality SEO and backlink services.
His impressive track record includes crafting over 25,000 backlinks for more than 1100 clients, generating over 1 billion in traffic. This has earned him a significant presence in the SEO realm.
He successfully leads a dedicated team of 65+ SEO professionals, focused on helping SaaS and Enterprises scale their organic traffic.
Sujan firmly believes that the best backlinks are not paid for but earned through high-quality content and strategic relationships.
Every day, he works tirelessly to position your business at the forefront of your customers’ minds, striving to elevate your brand’s visibility and authority.
His daily inspiration centers around securing client features on top-tier publications like Forbes, MSN, BBC, Yahoo, and many more. He leverages the right SEO strategies to achieve this mission.
