As a business owner, you need to know the basics of link building. It is one of the most important parts in your SEO strategy. In this blog post I will be sharing with you some basic information that can help you build links for your business.
In order to have a good understanding on how to build links, it’s important that we start from scratch and go over a few things first: what are links? How do they work? And why does it matter so much for businesses?
Link building takes up an essential part of any company’s marketing strategy because it makes your site more visible in search engine results pages (SERPs) through something called “link juice.” But there are tons of misconceptions about what link building really is, and those misconceptions can cost your company quite a lot.
Here are some of the most common myths that people have about link building:
1) You shouldn’t try to build links every day.
2) The backlinks you receive have no value unless they’re from .edu or .gov sites.
3) Links from pages with no page rank don’t count.
4) The more links you have the better, but if your site gets too many bad ones you’ll be penalized.
5) If Google doesn’t know about a link it won’t help your rankings at all.
6) Guest blogging is dead – nobody does it anymore.
7) Nobody cares about your website, so you have to buy links.
Now let’s go over these misconceptions one by one.
Myth #1: You shouldn’t try to build links every day
This is perhaps the biggest myth that isn’t true at all. Yes, there are ways that can help you cut down on the number of backlinks you’re building, but the fact is that having a healthy flow of links coming in can be very beneficial for your site. The idea isn’t to overdo it and go overboard with link building. You should always make sure that your link profile doesn’t look unnatural or like it was built overnight, because eventually this would catch up on your rankings and your site will be penalized.
Myth #2: The backlinks you receive have no value unless they’re from .edu or .gov sites.
This is one of the biggest misconceptions out there, but it’s also fairly easy to debunk for anyone who knows about SEO basics enough. It’s true that these types of links can help you with your rankings, but it’s really not the only kind of link that matters.
Myth #3: Links from pages with no page rank don’t count.
This is another myth that isn’t true at all. There are five types of pages in the search engines index – root domains, subdomains, second-level domains, third-level domains, and fourth-level domains. Each of these types of pages has their own page rank assigned to them. The root domains are the highest in terms of value because they represent your website that all other pages inherit their authority from.
Myth #4: The more links you have the better, but if your site gets too many bad ones you’ll be penalized.
I honestly don’t even know how this myth got started – it’s so false! The number of links isn’t what counts when you’re trying to rank your site higher in the SERPs, it’s the quality of them that matters. Most importantly, you need to make sure that there aren’t any spammy links going to pages on your site.
Myth #5: If Google doesn’t know about a link it won’t help your rankings at all.
This is another myth that makes no sense. All links are not equal, and there are tons of factors that play into how much “link juice” you receive from them. This is the reason why you would see certain sites with low Page Ranks getting ranked high.
Myth #6: Guest blogging is dead – nobody does it anymore.
Actually, this couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s true that guest blogging isn’t as popular as it used to be in 2012-2013, but there are still a lot of bloggers out there who are doing it. If you wanted to, you could still engage in this type of link building. You can’t build as many links as back then (when guest blogging was first popularized), but the ones that you do get will be better because they’ll be coming from high-quality websites.
Myth #7: Nobody cares about your website, so you have to buy links.
There are still plenty of opportunities out there for people who want to build backlinks without being forced to pay for them. These include guest blogging, reaching out to bloggers or journalists in your industry through simple e-mails that ask if they would be interested in publishing a post on your website, asking for backlinks on forums, and even the comments section on blogs where you can link out to your site. There are tons of ways to build links without having to pay for them, but you have to make sure that they’re coming from websites that are relevant or useful for readers of your content.