Link building is the technique to get other websites to link to your content. These links from other websites are seen as ‘positive votes’ or ‘endorsements’ for your website; the more quality links you have, the better your pages will rank.
The number of external links to your website is still the strongest ranking factor in Google’s algorithm as of 2022, high-quality content on your website being the second factor.
You can rank for low competition keywords without backlinks, using topical authority and good content, but you will not be able to rank for competitive keywords. In general, the more competitive your niche, the greater the number of links you will need to compete.
If you want to dominate your competitors, you have to invest in link building
Advanced Link Building Tactics
I offer an advanced link building service to ensure your website gets high-quality links.
My link building service can be purely ‘white hat’, depending on your niche and how aggressive you want to be.
Freelance Link Building Service (Off-page SEO)
I work on a freelance basis, so no large agency overheads making my prices very competitive. My freelance link building service is used by SMBs, brands and super affiliates. My service can also be used by digital agencies on a white label basis.
Link building prices can be on a per-link basis or on an hourly rate if you have good content and just need professional outreach.
Link Building in 2022, what’s working?
Link building has had a rocky road over the last couple of years with Google really cracking down on link building that is manipulative, but what tactics are viable for 2022?
It’s not about making links look natural, it’s about generating real natural links from amazing content. The key terms are ‘link earning’ and building ‘evergreen assets‘ that attract links.
I advise clients to move away from the idea of link acquisition and start thinking about building linkable assets. Content that deserves links. This type of link building also makes it difficult for competitors to mimic. A good natural link profile is very difficult to replicate.
Once you have some good linkable assets, link building becomes easier through proven techniques that I employ.
Blogger Outreach
Outreaching and networking with related websites and highlighting your content to them.
Niche edits/Page Inserts
The ‘niche edits’ (curated links) market is mainly dominated by sellers using hacked sites or PBNs, but you can still get good niche edits that work with custom outreach. I prefer to call these types of backlinks ‘link inserts’ and only place them if they are a natural fit on a page and provide value to the reader.
Digital PR
We build high-end content on your site then outreach to top tier media outlets. Our aim is to get these big news sites to cover your story/post themselves and link back to you. This works very well for well-researched pieces that include interesting data and visuals, gathered from either a client’s website or from conducting research surveys.
Broken link building
Thousands of pages exist on the internet that are not regularly updated. Websites will link to other sites and not check if they are still live or relevant to their users. If we find a page linking to a 404 page, we simply email the webmaster and show them a better page to link to.
Resource page link building
Contacting webmasters and asking them to link to pages that will be helpful to their visitors from their resource pages.
Cross-linking from guest posts
Writing guest posts for high-quality websites and linking back to your content from the post.
Brand Monitoring
Monitoring a brand’s mentions across the internet using custom tools. If we find unlinked mentions on a page, we contact the webmaster and ask them for a do-follow link.
Image link building
For certain industries that use their own images, we will make the images free to use under the creative commons license. Once other bloggers use the images, we then make sure they have linked back to the original source.
Link Building FAQ
Do backlinks still work in 2022?
Yes, just look at any website that is dominating a competitive niche, I guarantee they have an off-page SEO strategy.
How do I know if the backlinks are working?
You should see an increase in the ranking positions of your keywords and the number of keywords your page ranks for.
How do you know if Google is ignoring a link?
Google has got a lot better at ignoring manually built links. You may not get a manual link penalty, but the links you build may not be passing any link equity. Advanced SEOs can set up link tests to monitor if link equity is being passed.
Do PBNs still work in 2022?
The short answer is yes if set up properly.
Do expired domain 301s still work?
Yes, but I have found them to be less effective over the last year. I would make sure you buy a decent auction domain that still has traffic coming to it and redirect this traffic to a useful page.
Is link building worth it?
Yes if you calculate the potential ROI of ranking #1 – #3 for your keywords
What is white hat link building?
White hat link building is when you don’t actually manually build links but build linkable assets.