Link Building Strategies

Link building is one of the most difficult parts of SEO, and it can get downright complicated. When choosing the links you want to utilize, you have to be cautious to ensure you’re using white hat tactics because penalties from Google are something no one wants.

To help make sense of it all, you should know that the goal of links is to show search engines how you relate to other pages when they are crawling and indexing your website.

When you want to rank with other trustworthy brands in your industry, then you’ll need your link profile to reflect that. Linking to spam or untrusted sites will hinder your rankings and suggest that you offer the same style of content and services.

Now that you know how link building can help you rank higher (which means more click-throughs) let’s look at a few strategies that can boost revenue and rankings.

#1: Start guest blogging for niche specific websites

SEOs have been on the fence about guest blogging for some time. You’ll read one article that says guest blogging is a waste of time and another that contradicts it. When you really get down to it, guest blogging will only help you when you choose the right websites to approach. When the stakes are high any ecommerce website solutions will be gladly accepted. After all, every little bit matters.

Find an authority within your niche that is relevant and will provide a quality link. You don’t want to guest post on a site dedicated to gardening if your e-commerce store sells car parts. You want to find a valid website within the automotive industry so that your connection makes sense to Google crawlers.

#2: Co-sponsor events with other websites

It can get lonely running an online business from one side of the computer. Making friends with sites that aren’t necessarily direct competition, but can help increase brand awareness, is an excellent way to get organic links and make a business connection.

Say you have an e-commerce store that focuses solely on selling juicers and accessories. And one day you’re doing a little research online and you come across a health website that’s focus is eating fresh and organic food. You notice they have a blog and reach out to write a guest post on beginner juicer recipes. Next thing you know, you’re co-sponsoring a sweepstakes event where you give away a juicer and the co-sponsor gives away a one-month diet plan.

However, if you don’t want to co-sponsor, you can always reach out and ask the website to sponsor you by displaying your brand’s badge on their site linking back to you. In some cases, the site owner will do it for a fee and others will ask you to reciprocate by having their identity badge on your site.

#3: Get customers involved

Getting customers to link to you is like getting them to wear your brand’s name on their t-shirt. You can design a contest for a free giveaway that will get people excited, engaged, and sharing it with friends on their personal blogs and social media accounts.

Say you run an online bookstore, and you decide to give away the latest version of Kindle Fire with all the bells and whistles. You would probably perk the interest of quite a few people. Your only requirement is that contestants write a short review of their favorite book that they’ve bought at the e-store and post it in the comments section.

You’ll find that people will start to share and link to your contest to spread the word on both social media and blogs. These links will be relevant, and you’ll have raised brand awareness. Plus, you can take the comments and reviews that you’ve collected to help you further your keyword research efforts and enhance the descriptions of the books you stock.

Don’t let link building stress you out. It takes time to learn and is considered an art form by many in the SEO industry. Your goal should be quality over quantity, so just take baby steps during this part of the website design optimization process until you get it right.