Link building has always been a big part of search engine optimization (SEO). It is one of the biggest ranking factors to the major search engines and is essential to a successful SEO campaign. But don’t think that its only purpose is to further your SEO campaign. There are many other benefits that link building can offer to your website. Here is a list of the top 10 things it can do for your site:
-
Referral Traffic
Many people will click on links you have on other sites to check out what your website is about. When these links are provided in the right context such as resources to related articles or content provided by your site, people will be more likely to make the click in order to learn more about the topic. As a result, the referral traffic generated from these types of links tend to be very targeted.
You’ll find that if you produce high-quality content and get it posted or referenced by other sites, you’ll start generating quality leads and even sales from the referral traffic. This makes link building a worthwhile investment even if it takes several months for these links to make a big impact on your SEO campaign. So don’t think that all your link building efforts are worthless in the short term.
-
Domain and Page Authority
There are many factors that Google uses to help determine the authority of your pages and domain. Google may never reveal all the factors but it’s pretty clear that the number of links pointing to your pages and domain is one of the biggest factors. After all, it makes sense that your pages and domain are receiving links from important sources if your content is valuable, relevant, and high quality.
The authority of your pages and domain means that you’re more likely to rank higher for your target keywords in your SEO campaign. It also means that you’ll earn trust with Google and your pages will have priority over less trusted websites. This gives you the ability to rank higher in the search engines and will result in your pages getting indexed in the search results faster.
-
It Helps You Build Your Brand
A link building campaign is a great way to build your brand online. By creating your content and distributing it on the right platforms and related websites, your target audience will start to get familiar with your brand. It also gives you greater brand exposure and allows new customers to discover who you are through value-driven content rather than traditional push marketing channels.
-
Your Content Will Get Syndicated
Some companies use strategies like guest blogging and press releases to get your content distributed to a large number of sources. Doing this is helpful to a link building campaign but the real benefit of this is getting your content syndicated all across the web. This can result in your content getting picked up by other blogs, niche sites, and industry sites.
Some companies will even use this strategy in an effort to get you mentioned on media sites like MSN, CNN, Forbes, and more. This can lead to a lot of traffic, free publicity, and even stories being written about your business. To get an idea of how this is done, you can check it out here for more examples.
-
You Get to Build Credibility and Trust
Aside from the credibility and trust that comes with getting your website ranked in the top search results, you also get credibility and trust by being mentioned by trusted sources. For example, if a popular blog your audience frequents mentioned your website, it is like an indirect approval of your business. While this is not a direct endorsement of your business, the audience of the blog will be more receptive about your business than if they were to have landed on your website randomly.
-
Piggybacking Off Other Site’s Marketing and Rankings
One of the biggest benefits of getting links from other sites is benefiting from the efforts of these sites. For example, many websites engage in SEO and content marketing themselves and invest heavily into promoting their pages. If the pages they are promoting links to one of yours as a resource, you’re reaping the benefits of their efforts. If the pages manage to rank well for various keywords, it basically means free search traffic to your website. If the pages are mentioned by their partners, it’s like getting free referral traffic to your website.
-
The Ability to Build Partnerships with Other Websites
It is very difficult to succeed with an outreach campaign for link building. But putting a lot of effort into getting your content out there means that you’re bound to pick up some links from related blogs and websites. When these blogs and websites do link back to you, it gives you the chances to reach out to them and thank them for the link. This can extend to you returning the favor to them which can pave the way for a partnership where you promote each other’s content.
-
It Helps Further Your Social Media Campaign
One of the most interesting things about SEO and link building is how well it works with strategies like social media marketing. Investing in SEO results in search engine traffic which results in more social media followers. This allows you to build a respectable audience on social media platforms which you can leverage to distribute your content. This then helps you build more links and consequently increase your search engine rankings. Social media has also been shown to help with your SEO campaign.
-
Links Help You Get Found on Mobile Search Results
Link building for SEO is becoming more important than ever. Around 50 percent of the web’s traffic comes from mobile devices with trends indicating that this figure is more likely to increase. In order to capitalize on this, you want to optimize for the mobile search results which are different from the desktop search results. While there are many different ranking factors for the mobile search results, link building will always be a big factor.
-
Generate Evergreen Leads and Sales
Links on directories, blogs, industry sites, niche sites, community sites, and other resources will last for a long time. As a result, you can expect to generate a steady stream of leads and sales from your link building campaign. While the leads and sales coming from these sources won’t necessarily blow you away, it’s still an extra reward that comes out of executing a serious linking building campaign.
These 10 benefits demonstrate the power of link building. Don’t assume that link building is only beneficial for an SEO campaign. Yes, the main purpose of link building is to build a successful SEO campaign. But there are many other benefits you’ll reap from your link building efforts. There is not much to be said for link building and it’s gaining from that kind of campaign except that it’s a must for your company. Here you can read great ideas for getting started on advanced link building techniques to get over your competitors in a fast time.
