Backlinks are key but not Without Linkable Assets

 

Many people ask, as what is the secret of securing quality backlinks. Always my answer to this question is dedication, research & analysis, creativity couple with social skills, communication skills and persistent in your effort will lead you to acquire quality links. And for that you must have linkable assets at your website to attract inward links.

If your website assets are valuable for the audience of linking website, the webmaster of that site will link to your website. Here the catch point is that you have to market where necessary. Nothing will move if you try to remain in silos. Your valuable assets on your website need to be marketed and noticed, only then your valuable content will yield fruit. For that you have to come out of silos and interact with the communities.

Furthermore, Link acquisition has always been a part of any marketing campaign by the businesses. Because links bring traffic and remain a ranking factor as well.  Links are important for multiple reasons, like;

• Humans (user experience),
• Web (www) to function,
• Internet usability,
• Google search,
• Search ranking,
• Bots to crawl,
• Marketers,

The slogan of “More Links = More Ranking” is accompanying with the need for relevant and useful backlinks. Google is constantly improving its algorithm and finding the ways to cut through the clutter, hence bringing up the most relevant results in search for better user experience. So is the web, evolving with every single day. It is transforming from a source of information to a place where people produce, consume, share, interact and grade the value to the content, if they find it useful.  So you have to keep pace with it.

Little About SEO:

SEO is optimizing the website and its content for the search engine to crawl, index and rank, to bring the website in the search results. The categories of SEO are:-

• Technical SEO, facilitates the bots to crawl the websites. It includes the Domain         Architecture, Robot txt, Codes. Redirects and technology part.
• On-page SEO, presents and makes the bot to understand the topic, its intent           and relevance. It includes, URL, Title tag, header tag, Alt txt and meta tags.
• Off-page SEO, refers to the backlink, reveals to the bots as how other                     websites are looking at its relevance in the industry. If other webmasters find             something useful for there readers, as a result, they will link it to your site for           the benefits of their customers. This link is called backlink or inward link (IWL).         Which is taken as a vote from other websites and ultimately contributes towards         higher in ranking.

Therefor, all these categories are crucial for the website. Although You can’t optimize the website without on-page SEO and technical SEO but On-page SEO and technical SEO are well in your control whereas for off-page SEO (link building) you have to reach other websites for sending positive signals to your website.

Role of Backlinks in Search:

There are direct methods of search like, searching by URL (which you may not be able to remember hundred of thousands of websites) but web offers two convenient paths to present your content to the audience:

• Referring from other sites (Through the Backlinks)
• Through search (As the Backlinks improves the ranking, your chances of                 coming in search become bright)

Consequently, backlinks become the only way to perform both the above actions. Referring from other websites is straight but backlinks have a role in it, to play. Due to backlinks, ranking of your website improves manifold, hence your linked page appears higher in the search results. This is what the ultimate aim of any SEO is.

Backlink Strategy:

Strategy is vital for any task, so acquiring backlinks are not exception to it. Analyzing the website is the first step in this journey, far that we find the unique situation of the website. Most importantly, for online visibility websites need to address following three categories and these all go hand-in-hand:

• On-page SEO
• Technical SEO
• Off-page SEO

Every aspect of these SEO is important in its own perspective. Without proper technical SEO, it is not possible to scale next, as, till the time bots don’t crawl, you can’t be indexed, and if not indexed, you can’t be visible in the browser. Even a very well designed website while covering all the aspects of on-page SEO and off-page SEO is of no help. Therefor every kind of these SEO category has its own role in the eyes of search engine.

Here we will focus on Off-page SEO (Backlinks) factor only, as what all to be considered and done to get backlinks.

Backlink Strategy considerations

Link building (Securing Link) is an important and decisive aspect in off-page SEO. Although, the skills of marketing, sales couple with the know-how of psychology will add color to your link building effort. Whenever preparing backlink strategy answer to the five “Ws” What, why, who, where, when and one “H” How.

• What’s the backlink?
• Why backlinks are necessary for online businesses?
• Who should need the backlinks?
• Where the backlinks exists?
• When to have backlinks?
• How backlinks are established?

How to Create BackLinks:

• BackLinks are very strong ranking factor, so imperative for SEO,
• BackLinks are the source of audience development as other site is                 referring their audience to your website,
• It works as a marketing tool on some body’s website in favor of your             website,
• Humans and search engines both take the links alike, as both take links      as signal of trust, relevance and authority,
• Links make the navigation easy for audience to move from one domain        to another or from one page to another, hence improve the user                    experience (UX).

Whether we are building a new website or analyzing the existing website, backlink strategy has to be made. Crafting backlink strategy for new website has different considerations, as you out rightly describe the methods of inward links. In contrast, for existing website, things are little different. In case of existing websites, with the help of tools you find out as which sites and pages are already linked to your website. Once you have explored these links, you need to understand the quality and quantity of these inward links. Some of the famous tools to find out the backlinks are:

• SEO Powersuite
• SEO spyglass
• Raven Tools
• Majestic
• Ahrefs
• Moz Site Explorers
• Cognitive SEO

Perform the Backlink Analysis

To perform the backlink analysis, look into the following aspects and use excel sheet for easy review:

• Referring domains and pages
• Total number of referring domains
• Relevance of the referring domains and quality
• Total number of back links
• Which pages on your website receive backlinks
• Anchor text profile ( keywords/phrases)
• Number of unique domains,
• How many links from home page
• What are the page ranks of linking page,
• What is the age of each linking website

After reviewing, once you have understood your website’s backlink profile, you can make a knowledgeable decision to adopt appropriate tactics and use different methods to have backlinks or to remove inappropriate links (inappropriate links some time harm more than benefit).

Most important point to consider is that the page of your website being linked is very important and this is your web asset. This page has to be in line with your goals. Above all, linkable asset is a content, worthy of links that is relevant and useful.

Characteristics of linkable Asset, Worthy of Backlinks: 

• Offer value to the reader,
• Build the customers and clients,
• Have relevance to be worthy of links,
• Be able to create brand awareness,
• Be Compelling,
• Offer answers for the commonly asked, searched questions and phrases.

What people Consider in linkable assets:

• People will not link to commercial content,
• Your content has the tendency of social shares, brand awareness and           monetization.
• Ability to increase organic search traffic.
• It uses the industry key words.

People link to your “Linkable assets”: Because;

• It offers solution/remedy for a specific problem,
• Uniqueness of handling the beaten topic with different angle,
• Association with the topic under discussion and it backs up the view            point of linking page,
• Interesting for the audience of linking page.

Benefits of Linkable Asset:

• It attracts the referral traffic through backlinks,
• Attracts organic traffic to other pages on your website when you                   internally link other pages on your website.
• Your brand exposure.

The best linkable assets could be:-

• Infographics,
• Online tools and techniques,
• Calculators and responsive apps,
• Awards and Rankings,
• Guides & Tutorials.

Consequently, website cannot come up in search results without backlinks and linkable assets are the only reason to bring inward links, no other way. Acquiring links requires relevant and valuable content. With link building you market your brand, product, or website to your audience. So, for SEO link building should remain your priority #-1 marketing strategy. All the domain authority and page authority pass on to your website by the linking website, brings traffic and improves ranking of your website.