A big part of the link building process is outreach.
Here are the steps you take to visit other websites and see if they link to you.
They may link to you for a variety of reasons, such as when you create a great content Or you’ve told them the link is broken and there is a new resource to replace it.
The thing is, when many of us think about link building, our default mindset often leans toward proactive link building using outreach techniques.
We tend to think of link building as something we do, not something that just happened.
That’s not necessarily a bad thing, of course, many of us spend a lot of time actively building links to add value to businesses through techniques like content marketing, digital PR, or broken link building.
For many businesses, this is a great use of budget and helps improve organic traffic faster.
The thing is, you don’t need to ask every link a site gets.
Aggressive outreach and campaigns are important, but for link building to drive the absolute best ROI, focus on how sites naturally have link value.
A link-worthy site gets links that you didn’t ask for, and you’ll still get links even if you stop doing outreach.
Sounds good, right?
For most of us, it takes effort to get a site’s link value enough to generate links at a good scale over a long period of time.
For others, it’s not that hard.
For example, when Apple launches a new iPhone, almost every technical publication on the internet will link to it!
The same goes for other big brands like Samsung or Amazon.
The sheer brand awareness they have, often combined with a truly unique and innovative product, means they don’t have to worry about getting links.
This is not the case for most other online sites, which in the UK and US are made up of over 90% of small businesses.
For many of us, we need to go the extra mile to make a website link-worthy.
Let’s look at a few ways this can be done.
The Role of Brand Building in Link Building
While branding teams and online campaigns are often located in teams far from SEO, it is important to understand the role of branding in link building.
If you’re working with a brand that’s fairly well-known in your industry or in general, you’ll be in a better position to generate links without asking.
Strong elements of brand awareness and affiliation can add credibility to your link building campaigns.
brand awareness It can also mean that writers, bloggers, and journalists will naturally seek out your content, data, information, and opinions when writing stories that may also lead to links.
This is less likely to happen with smaller, lesser-known businesses, and as a link builder, you may have to work harder to get a link.
This is an important distinction to understand because depending on the type of business you are in, your link building approach and strategy may vary.
For well-known brands, you can generate links you don’t need by adding linkable assets to your website or providing content assets to your PR team.
These assets can then generate links naturally without any direct outreach.
For lesser-known brands, you may want to invest more in content that ranks high for research-led keywords and try to establish them as an authority in their niche.
How to Create Content That Ranks Well and Links Naturally
One of the key ways a piece of content can generate links naturally over time is by ranking well in search results.
By doing this, more people will find the content, and in some cases, the people who find it will link to it from their own content.
This works especially well if you create content that can rank for keywords that indicate someone is doing research for something.
Some of the people doing this type of research will be writers, bloggers and journalists looking for information for their articles.
If they find your content and cite it, they may also link to it.
For example, if a reporter is writing a story about a dog, they might want to include some information about the dog’s name.
if they google [dog name statistics], This article by Rover Ranks well and is regularly updated with new trends and content.
If the article wasn’t ranking well and wasn’t regularly updated with new trends every year, it wouldn’t be as close to as many links as it is.
You can also look for opportunities to optimize this content for keywords that might indicate that someone is looking for data, trends, or statistics.
you can use it Basic on-page SEO to optimize keywords Include:
- [topic] data set.
- [topic] Statistics for 2022.
- Newest [topic] trend.
- [topic] quotation marks.
Anyone searching for such keywords can not only access your content, but also cite and link to it if they write an article or blog post on the topic.
How to build linkable assets into link building campaigns
One of the classic challenges of link building campaigns is when you get a lot of coverage but no links.
Someone might write about a campaign and mention the brand and campaign, but for some reason, they don’t include a link to your campaign.
Some publications don’t have a linking policy, but putting that aside, you should spend time at each event thinking about how to increase the likelihood that someone will link to you.
One of the best ways to do this is to think about what makes your campaign worth linking to, and take the time during the production process to create assets that might encourage someone to link to your campaign.
A strong, relevant story might be enough for a reporter to cover it and mention your brand, but in order to encourage linking, you might need something else, such as:
- unique image Add or illustrate the story, allowing you to request a credit link for the image.
- larger dataset Behind the story, allows people to click and read more about the story and data.
- profile page Provide information on your website for people from your company referenced in stories.
Even if someone doesn’t link to you the first time, building these assets will make it easier for you to connect with them and ask for a mention of your brand or turn someone into a clickable link.
The importance of building relationships within your industry
Building relationships is an often overlooked part of link building.
We tend to think about building a relationship when we need someone’s link, not before or after.
It really pays to use a method that really tries to build relationships with key industry contacts outside of the campaign.
For example, send them random feedback, tips, or information that might be useful to their story, regardless of the brand you’re working on.
Not only does it work for them, but it shows that you want to help them when you want something in return – that’s what a strong relationship is all about.
bring it back to link building, Build strong relationships with key contacts Being in your industry can mean you get links naturally because they already know your brand and the content you produce.
If they come across your content themselves, they may pay more attention and cover it, even if you haven’t been explicitly told.
Another possibility is that they search for content you may have made in the past to link to. If it’s still useful and relevant, they may be more likely to link to it because of their existing relationship with you.
All in all, it’s entirely possible to generate links that you didn’t ask for.
It does take some thought and planning, especially if you’re not a well-known brand and don’t have the natural credibility this can bring.
But even if you’re not a well-known brand, you should devote some time and resources to some of the above activities that may start moving you in the right direction, generating links that you didn’t ask for.
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