June 25, 2024
Links are a super important part of a successful SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) strategy.
Not only are links one of the three most important Google ranking factors (Google confirmed this long back) but they can also skyrocket your search engine rankings and increase organic traffic to your website. But in 2024, the landscape of link building has evolved a lot.
Today, keeping up with the ever-changing nature of Google algorithms demands coming up with new link-building effective strategies.
So what are the new and emerging link-building tactics?
In this post, we have covered the concept of links, types, and our favourite link-building strategies to use in 2024 to build high-quality backlinks from relevant & authority sites in your industry.
A link (a.k.a. backlink or hyperlink) is a clickable element that connects one web page to another.
Search engines like Google use links to crawl and index a website’s pages into its database.
Apart from this, links also play a crucial role in determining the authority and popularity of a website.
Research by Backlinko revealed that a website with a solid link profile directly correlates with higher search engine rankings.
In fact, the research even found that the #1 search result in Google SERP tends to have an average of 3.8 times more backlinks than search results between #2-#10.
That means the more quality backlinks you acquire from relevant & high-authority sites in your niche, the greater credibility and higher rankings search engines will give to your website.
In SEO, internal and external links are the two types of links.
An internal link is a link from one web page to another on the same site.
These links help users navigate within the site, find related content, and improve the overall user experience.
Internal links also help search engines understand the structure and hierarchy of a website and its content. When search engine crawlers visit a page, they follow internal links to other pages on the site to discover more content and index it for search results.
Internal links can also help to distribute authority and page rank throughout a website.
When a page has many internal links pointing to it, it signals to search engines that the page is important and relevant. This can help the page rank higher in search results and improve visibility for relevant search queries.
External links are often referred to as outbound links. These are links that point to pages on other websites.
Search engines consider the quantity and quality of the inbound links pointing to a website as a measure of its authority and relevance.
Therefore, having high-quality inbound links pointing to your website can improve your search engine ranking and help you boost traffic to your site.
However, it's important to note that not all inbound links are created equal, and search engines can penalise websites for having low-quality or bad links.
Building high-quality backlinks help to signal search engines that your content is original and trustworthy.
In return, search engines reward your website with higher rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs) for relevant keywords and search terms. A leading saas link building agency, like VH-info, specialises in helping businesses achieve this.
When other websites link to your site, search engines view those links as a vote of confidence (endorsements) for your content and a signal of your website's relevance and authority in your industry or niche.
That means if your site has a significant number of high-quality inbound links from relevant & high-authority sites, it's likely to rank higher in SERPs.
Apart from this, high-quality links from sites can drive traffic to your website.
When users click on a link to your website from another site, they're more likely to be interested in your piece of content, which can lead to increased engagement and conversions.
However, you must know that not all backlinks are created equal.
For example, if you build low-quality, spammy links or participate in link exchange programs, it will hurt your website's search rankings and reputation.
This is because participating in link exchange or buying links from sites is strictly against Google Web Master Guidelines.
That’s why it's important to focus on building high-quality, relevant, and authoritative inbound links to your website through ethical and effective link-building strategies.
Now that you know the types of links and their importance for an SEO strategy, let’s dive straight into the top list of link-building strategies that are ethical and can boost your search engine rankings & traffic.
Guest Blogging is nothing new. It’s over a decade-old link-building technique that is still as relevant and as popular as it was back in the day.
For the uninitiated, guest blogging is one of the most popular link-building strategies that involves writing blog posts for other websites and including a link back to your site within the content (highly preferred) or in your author bio.
However, since more SEOs and link builders implement guest post outreach as their primary link-building strategy, the effectiveness of traditional guest posting practices has vanished.
To be effective in 2024, it’s critical to focus on meaningful guest blogging. This means finding highly relevant and authoritative sites in your niche or industry and creating unique, original, informative, and engaging content for them.
Suppose you’re a content marketing agency and you want to build backlinks for your website.
In this case, you could search for relevant websites and blogs in your industry that accept guest posts, pitch them a couple of topics to choose from and write an engaging guest post that adds value to their audience with a natural link to your website.
The Skyscraper Technique was originally pioneered by Brian Dean, founder of Backlinko, back in 2015. Since then, his post has earned over 10,000 backlinks.
The best part? — the skyscraper technique is still relevant today as it was back in 2015.
So, if you’re not using the skyscraper technique to build backlinks to your site, you’re leaving too many (easy-to-win, high-quality) backlinks on the table.
The skyscraper technique is a game-changing link-building strategy that involves creating high-quality, informative, engaging, and evergreen content (often referred to as Linkable Assets) that's better than the existing piece of content on a topic and then reaching out to websites that have linked to that content and asking them to link to your content instead.
For example, let’s say that you want to build links to your blog post on "Top 10 SEO Tools for 2024."
In this case, you could search for top-ranking and evergreen content on this topic and create a better, more comprehensive, and up-to-date version of the content.
Then, you need to reach out to websites that have linked to the top-ranking content in Google SERPs, pitch your content as a better alternative, and ask them to link to your content.
Resource page link-building is another effective link-building strategy that is still relevant and works like a charm in 2024.
It involves finding relevant resource pages on other websites and requesting a link to your website's content.
For example, if you’re a fashion blogger, and you want to build backlinks to one of your latest content pieces on “10 Autumn Fashion Trends to Follow in 2024”, you need to find fashion-related websites, blogs, online magazines that have helpful resources on the “Autumn Fashion” related topic.
Once you have a list of websites you could target, you need to pitch your blog post “10 Autumn Fashion Trends to Follow in 2024” as a valuable resource that they should consider including on their “Autumn Fashion” related resource pages.
However, if you don’t know how to find websites with relevant resource pages in your industry, you can do so by a quick search on Google for “TOPIC” “for” inurl:links.html.
Performing this search query will give a list of resource pages targeted to a specific linkable audience.
Next, you need to create long-form and evergreen content that covers everything and is more comprehensive than the top-ranking content so that there are more opportunities for link placements.
Afterward, create a list of all resource pages by reverse engineering all linking pages to the top-ranking content on Google using an SEO tool like SEMrush or Ahrefs.
Finally, reach out to the publishers and owners of these resource pages and let them know about your up-to-date resource, and highlight how it will serve the needs of target audiences compared to what they’ve currently linked on their resource page.
Broken link building is another decade-old strategy that can help to acquire high-quality backlinks FAST.
For the uninitiated, broken link building refers to the process of finding broken links (dead links) on other websites and suggesting a link to your website's content as a replacement.
If you’re implementing the resource page link-building technique, chances are you will come across many links that are either pointing to outdated content or are simply broken.
When you notice any such links, create a Google Spreadsheet and make note of any broken links you find.
After that, reach out to the publisher or owner of that website, let them know about these broken links that you have found on their site, and give them replacements for those broken links one of the replacements is your content.
For example, let’s assume that you’re a food blogger and you want to build inbound links to your blog post on "10 Healthy Recipes to Try in 2024".
To build backlinks for this blog post using the broken link strategy, you need to find food-related blogs and websites that have broken links to healthy recipe pages and pitch them your blog post as a replacement.
Link reclamation refers to the process of identifying and reclaiming lost or broken backlinks to your website.
Here’s how it works. — First, you need to find the links that used to point to your website but are no longer working or have been removed. Then, you need to reach out to the website owner to request that they fix or add your removed link.
From an SEO standpoint, reclaiming your lost or broken links is crucial because having lost or broken backlinks to your website can hurt your search engine ranking and organic traffic.
This is because when a significant number of links to your website are either broken or removed, it can result in a decrease in your website's domain rating and visibility, not to mention the loss of referral traffic.
To reclaim lost or broken backlinks, you can either use backlink analysis tools to find lost or broken backlinks on your website.
Alternatively, you can also perform a manual search using your brand name or keywords related to your business to find broken links.
Once you've identified lost or broken backlinks, you need to reach out to the website owners and request that they fix or replace the link.
Connecting with journalists can be an effective way to build high-quality links to your website.
You can use platforms like HARO (Help a Reporter Out) or Terkel to find relevant journalists in your niche or industry who are looking for sources or quotes for their articles.
By signing up on these platforms, you can provide expert advice and get backlinks to your website.
To build a natural link to your website using this strategy, you need to create an account on both platforms and respond quickly to relevant queries from journalists.
For example, let’s say that you have a travel website. In this case, you can use HARO and respond to travel-related queries from journalists who are looking for travel experts.
By offering valuable information and insights that journalists need, you can get high-quality backlinks and boost your site’s domain rating and search engine rankings.
Unlinked brand mentions refer to the instances where there are mentions of your brand or website on other websites, but the mention doesn't include a hyperlink back to your website.
Unlinked mentions are common on the web and occur due to a writer's oversight, technical issues, or even intentional avoidance of linking to external websites.
But in terms of link building, unlinked brand mentions are an incredible opportunity to gain new backlinks quickly to your website.
All you have to do is, identify unlinked mentions of your products, services, brand, or website, reach out to the website owners, and request that they add a link to your website.
There are various ways and tools you can use to find unlinked brand mentions such as:
Once you've identified unlinked brand mentions, reach out to the webmasters or publishers of each website and ask them to add a link to your website on your brand mention.
Overall, Unlinked brand mentions are an incredibly effective link-building strategy because it help in building backlinks from authoritative websites without having to create new content or engage in extensive outreach efforts.
Participating in link roundups is another good strategy you can consider using for building links to your website.
For the uninitiated, a link roundup post is simply a blog post that lists high-quality content on a particular topic.
By participating in a link roundup post, you can get backlinks to your website and improve your website's authority.
To do this, you will need to find link roundup or expert roundup opportunities in your niche and then reach out to the website publishers to add your website to the list and give a backlink.
For example, if you run a blog on mobile application development, you can search for expert roundups in the mobile app development niche.
Once you find relevant expert roundups, you can reach out to the publishers and suggest your blog as a valuable addition to their roundup post by explaining how it will benefit their target audiences.
Link-building is undoubtedly one of the most effective ways to boost the SEO performance of your website.
However, link-building is both a time-consuming and challenging task, which is why it is highly recommended to use link-building tools to streamline the process.
Here are the best & our favourite link-building tools you can use to accelerate your link-building efforts.
Ahrefs is an all-in-one SEO tool that provides you with the data and insights you need to improve your website's search engine ranking.
One of the key features of Ahrefs is its competitor backlink analysis tool, which allows you to track your competitors’ website's backlink profiles and identify opportunities for link building. Another excellent feature is the automated backlinks reports, which show you which new links were found and which links you lost. These features make Ahrefs one of the best SEO automation tools for off-page SEO.
For example, you can use Ahrefs’ competitor backlink analysis tool to find and analyse your competitors' backlinks and reach out to the same websites to acquire a backlink to your site as well.
Apart from this, you can also consider using Ahrefs’ Broken Backlink Checker tool to execute the broken link-building strategy to build backlinks to your website.
To do this, you need to find broken links on other websites using the broken backlink checker tool.
Once you have identified a handful of sites with broken links, you need to reach out to these websites and suggest that they replace their broken link with a link to your website.
Buzzstream is one of our favourite link-building tools that help you manage your cold email outreach campaigns, track responses, and build relationships with people like bloggers, content creators, and influencers.
The tool is also equipped with a backlink checker that allows you to monitor your backlinks and find new opportunities for link building.
The best use of Buzzstream is finding websites in your niche that accept guest posts, pitch them a guest post topic, and provide comprehensive and valuable content that includes a link back to your website.
Linkody is a backlink tracking and monitoring tool that allows you to track your website’s backlink profile and those of your competitors.
It also helps to evaluate the quality and quantity of backlinks so that you can focus on building a healthy and strong backlink profile for your website.
Plus, Linkody even lets you identify and keep track of any lost backlinks and provide insights on the backlink profiles of your competitors to discover new link-building opportunities.
As a result, you can use this tool to easily execute an effective broken link-building & link reclamation campaign to build high-quality backlinks and improve your website’s SEO strategy.
Pitchbox is an all-in-one outreach and link-building tool that allows you to manage your outreach campaigns from one central platform.
With Pitchbox, you can connect with influencers, bloggers, and content creators in your industry, pitch them your content, and ultimately, earn backlinks to your website.
For example, let’s assume that you run a website that sells organic skincare products. To build backlinks to your website, you could use Pitchbox to find relevant beauty bloggers and influencers who would be interested in your products.
Once you've identified a list of potential targets, you can use Pitchbox to send personalised outreach emails to each blogger and influencer.
If a blogger or influencer agrees to review your products or feature them on their blog, they will likely include a link back to your website. This is one one-stop tool for launching a link-building campaign.
Moz is a comprehensive SEO tool that offers a range of features to help businesses and website owners build high-quality backlinks.
Imagine you run a website that sells fitness equipment. To build backlinks to your website, you could use Moz to find relevant blogs and websites in the fitness industry.
To do this, you need to Moz's Link Explorer feature to analyse your website's backlink profile and identify areas for improvement.
This feature allows you to see which websites are linking to your site, as well as the quality of those links.
Once you've identified areas for improvement, you can use Moz's Link Building tool to find new link opportunities by providing a list of relevant blogs and websites based on your target keywords and industry.
For example, you might search for "fitness blogs" or "fitness influencers" to find potential link opportunities. Moz will then provide a list of relevant websites and blogs, along with information about their domain authority and other key metrics.
Once you've identified potential link opportunities, you can use Moz's outreach feature to contact the website owners and offer to write a guest post in which you include a link back to your site.
Doing so can help to earn backlinks from relevant sites in your industry and improve your website's authority and search engine rankings.
Snov is an all-in-one platform that offers a range of features to help businesses and website owners build high-quality backlinks.
Here’s a quick example of how to use Snov to build backlinks for your website. Let’s assume that you run a website that provides online courses on digital marketing.
In this case, you could use Snov to find relevant blogs and websites in the digital marketing industry.
To do this, you need to use Snov’s Email Finder tool to find the email address of one or more potential link targets.
For example, you might search for "digital marketing blogs" or "digital marketing influencers" to find potential link opportunities. Snov's tool will then provide a list of relevant websites and blogs, along with information about their email addresses and other key metrics.
Once you've identified potential link opportunities, you can use Snov's Email Verifier feature to validate the email addresses of the website owners.
After validating the email address, you need to Snov's Email Campaigns feature to send personalised outreach emails to each website owner and offer something in exchange for giving a link back to your website.
As we said in the beginning, building high-quality backlinks is a critical part of any successful search engine optimisation (SEO) strategy.
Hopefully, our favourite link-building strategies and tools will help to build links to your site from authoritative and relevant resources in your industry.
But while you’re at it, remember that backlinks are not just a numbers game, they’re a reflection of your website's authority and relevance in your industry.
So, focus on providing value and building relationships with people who have websites in your industry to build high-quality backlinks and improve your search engine rankings & organic traffic to your website
