Build authority with link building
Strong backlinks from external sites, internal link building and outbound link building increase your website's credibility and authority in Google's eyes. A good link building strategy is therefore quite valuable for SEO. Here are answers to all the typical questions about link building.
Link building builds credibility
Link building is about creating links from other relevant and trustworthy websites to your own website. This can help build authority and credibility, as Google and other search engines use links as an indicator of how relevant and trustworthy a website is.
Besides content, link building is therefore one of the most important factors in search engine optimization.
Link building can roughly be divided into three subcategories:
- External link building
- Internal link building
- Outbound link building.
Links to your site tell Google that it's worth a visit. It's a bit crude, but the more links your site receives, the higher Google will rate it. You can think of them as a kind of recommendation to Google that a website is worth a visit.
External link building
External link building is about getting links from external websites and is by far the most important subcategory within link building. The more websites that link to your website, the more credible it will appear to Google - and this is something that gives your website's ranking in search results an extra boost.
However, it doesn't matter if the link comes from a trustworthy and relevant website or if it comes from an Indonesian casino website, a Russian porn site or another more or less suspicious site with no relevance to your business.
Credibility is key when it comes to link building. To take an example from the real, analog world, it's like when a restaurant is awarded a star in the Michelin Guide. A credible source is behind the review, and the restaurant will notice this in the number of reservations.
Conversely, a competing restaurant that few know and few have anything nice to say about is unlikely to have any significant turnover.
The same is true in the digital world aka the internet. Here, however, your website's reputation depends not on publicity but on quality links from relevant and trustworthy websites - so-called backlinks.
Internal link building
Internal link building is when the subpages of a website link to each other. These are links that send the visitor to other (relevant) pages.
For example, right now you are on a subpage about link building. Therefore, it makes sense for us to link to the subpage about SEO in general. That way, we create a better connection between the subpages on our website to give you a better user experience.
Internal link building also makes it easier for Google to understand what your website is about and can therefore help it rank better.
Internal link building is an effective tool for increasing traffic to the most important pages on your website. With internal link building, you are in control of how many times you link to your most important pages from the other pages on your website.
Outbound link building
Outbound link building is when you link to external websites that are relevant to the visitor.
Right now you're reading a text about how important link building is for your SEO. Therefore, it makes sense for us to link to an external page about the 200 most important factors for success on Google.
Quality links from trustworthy sites
Quality links are essentially links from credible sites with authority and relevance to your website and business.
For example, a link from the Copenhagen Bricklayers Guild would be a quality link for you if you own a bricklaying company. If you run a restaurant, a link on a recognized food blog would be a quality link. If you have a business selling clay, a quality link would be a link in an article on TV2 about the TV program "Keramikkamp".
However, you can't sleep on links like that - just like a restaurant can't sleep on a Michelin star. The content on your page should of course be valuable and give people in your industry a reason to link to your page.
Good content on your website is essential if you want to get quality external links.
If you want to know more about best practices, Erick Back has written an excellent article about link building on his blog.
Is link building shady marketing?
Unfortunately, link building has a somewhat tarnished reputation outside of SEO circles. For example, Politiken and Zetland have written not-so-praising series of articles about link building. And the kind of link building mentioned in these articles is also one of the less ethical ones.
Because just as there are quality links, there are also more shady ways to get links. For example, web agencies buy links on websites with long lists of links to get their clients quick backlinks.
Another frequently used way to get links is via so-called PBNs (private blog networks). PBNs are essentially "fake" blogs with catchy and often generic domains such as nyheder-om-alt.dk, billig-autohjælp.dk or hele-molevitten.dk.
Here you'll find mass-produced blog posts that seem informative - but only exist so that marketing agencies can link to their clients' websites.
In other words, link building can be less ethical - but it certainly isn't always.
How we work with link building
At Amplify, we have a philosophy that quick PBNs and mass-purchased links are not the right solution. We don't want to turn the internet into a landfill, and we always think long-term when creating SEO strategies for our customers.
Google is constantly refining and developing its algorithms to give users the best and most valuable and relevant results. And if we look into the crystal ball, it won't be many years before Google is smart enough to filter out PBNs in search results. That's why we never work with quick fixes when we do link building for our customers.
Instead, we focus on delivering real, high-quality content - content that is industry-relevant and targeted to each customer's audience.
That's why we have our own content department whose primary task is to write valuable and well-written content for our customers' websites. This is partly because content is king when it comes to ranking higher in search results - but also because relevant content increases the chance of quality links.
How we work with link building
Link building covers both external, internal and outbound link building. Overall, the purpose of link building is to make your website appear even more credible and relevant. Good link building strengthens your SEO.
Internal link building, unlike the external form, takes place on your own website. You do internal link building when you link from one page to another on your website.
External link building is backlinks/hyperlinks from external websites that link to yours. Good backlinks from credible and strong websites strengthen your SEO.
Outbound link building is when you create links to external websites. Outbound links must fit the context and be relevant to the visitor.
Get even smarter
Whether you're a generalist or a marketing specialist, our specialists have put together some great advice for you on our blog.
