quality matters just as much as quantity when it comes to backlinks
Posted: Tue Dec 17, 2024 4:26 am
You can create the best content from your perspective, but it's a competitive landscape, and Google takes into account many other factors when ranking pages in the SERPs. One of them is... how authoritative (or trustworthy) the provider of that content is.
You may think "authoritative" is subjective, but Google has a fundamental way of measuring it: backlinks.
What are backlinks?
A backlink (also called an inbound link) is a link that comes from office 365 database another website to yours. Visually, the link could be placed in a text, in an image, or as a button; as long as the source is a different website, all of these connections count as backlinks.
In SEO, backlinks are very important because they are one of the most important ranking factors for all major search engines.
Why are backlinks important?
While there are 200 known Google ranking factors, backlinks count as one of the most important for Google search.
That’s because a link to another website is more than just a link—it’s a vote of confidence, a recommendation, a way for publishers to say to their readers, “Here’s a source I trust. Check it out for yourself.” It
’s incredibly difficult to get that kind of endorsement, especially for small businesses or startups. But if you want to boost your SEO performance, you need to make sure you’re consistently earning high-quality backlinks to your website—better and faster than your competition.
Plus, Gabi Theard, CMO at Trujay, says, “A link-building strategy doesn’t just increase your SEO score and visibility on Google. It also shows readers where your business ranks in relation to other brands, and reminds them that there is, in fact, a human being behind the screen. Backlinks can demonstrate a relationship between two sites and how each site is working to help the other grow.”
"In addition, backlinks help readers get the greatest degree of information that answers their questions."
►High quality backlinks
Keep in mind, though, that not all backlinks are created equal. If you think of a backlink as a vote of confidence, it only makes sense to also assess the credibility of that vote.
In the past, tactics like link farms, PBNs, and comment spam allowed blackhat SEOs to build up vast backlink profiles and successfully game the system. However, these blackhat link building techniques no longer work because Google has gotten smart about them. In fact, too many “unnatural” links can even result in a penalty for your site.
In other words,
Earning high-quality backlinks is probably the most challenging part of SEO. You’re going to want links that are:
► Authoritative: The site has an authoritative backlink profile (lots of votes of confidence), drives a lot of traffic, and even ranks well in the SERPs. Additionally, .gov and .edu sites tend to carry more weight, as do industry-leading sites.
►Relevant: The referring page addresses a similar topic or niche. E.g. If your tech company's homepage gets a backlink from a blog post about "how to play golf," this wouldn't be considered a relevant or quality backlink.
►Unique: You'll get an advantage if the site refers to you but not your competitors. Otherwise, it can be nice to have the backlink, but it's a game changer.
►Natural: The link is not sponsored, the anchor text is not branded or spammy, and the referring page has a natural number of links.
As an SEO strategist who focuses specifically on link building at HubSpot, I’m no stranger to the challenge of finding high-quality sources that link back to your site. To help you improve your company’s SEO ranking, I’ve curated this list of creative and unique ways to earn backlinks.
You may think "authoritative" is subjective, but Google has a fundamental way of measuring it: backlinks.
What are backlinks?
A backlink (also called an inbound link) is a link that comes from office 365 database another website to yours. Visually, the link could be placed in a text, in an image, or as a button; as long as the source is a different website, all of these connections count as backlinks.
In SEO, backlinks are very important because they are one of the most important ranking factors for all major search engines.
Why are backlinks important?
While there are 200 known Google ranking factors, backlinks count as one of the most important for Google search.
That’s because a link to another website is more than just a link—it’s a vote of confidence, a recommendation, a way for publishers to say to their readers, “Here’s a source I trust. Check it out for yourself.” It
’s incredibly difficult to get that kind of endorsement, especially for small businesses or startups. But if you want to boost your SEO performance, you need to make sure you’re consistently earning high-quality backlinks to your website—better and faster than your competition.
Plus, Gabi Theard, CMO at Trujay, says, “A link-building strategy doesn’t just increase your SEO score and visibility on Google. It also shows readers where your business ranks in relation to other brands, and reminds them that there is, in fact, a human being behind the screen. Backlinks can demonstrate a relationship between two sites and how each site is working to help the other grow.”
"In addition, backlinks help readers get the greatest degree of information that answers their questions."
►High quality backlinks
Keep in mind, though, that not all backlinks are created equal. If you think of a backlink as a vote of confidence, it only makes sense to also assess the credibility of that vote.
In the past, tactics like link farms, PBNs, and comment spam allowed blackhat SEOs to build up vast backlink profiles and successfully game the system. However, these blackhat link building techniques no longer work because Google has gotten smart about them. In fact, too many “unnatural” links can even result in a penalty for your site.
In other words,
Earning high-quality backlinks is probably the most challenging part of SEO. You’re going to want links that are:
► Authoritative: The site has an authoritative backlink profile (lots of votes of confidence), drives a lot of traffic, and even ranks well in the SERPs. Additionally, .gov and .edu sites tend to carry more weight, as do industry-leading sites.
►Relevant: The referring page addresses a similar topic or niche. E.g. If your tech company's homepage gets a backlink from a blog post about "how to play golf," this wouldn't be considered a relevant or quality backlink.
►Unique: You'll get an advantage if the site refers to you but not your competitors. Otherwise, it can be nice to have the backlink, but it's a game changer.
►Natural: The link is not sponsored, the anchor text is not branded or spammy, and the referring page has a natural number of links.
As an SEO strategist who focuses specifically on link building at HubSpot, I’m no stranger to the challenge of finding high-quality sources that link back to your site. To help you improve your company’s SEO ranking, I’ve curated this list of creative and unique ways to earn backlinks.