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The theory behind link acquisition is easy and almost anybody can develop the tactics and strategy that’s needed to make a campaign work. Executing the campaign so that a site secures the right type of links in volume is another challenge. SEOs can work for thousands of hours, only to secure a few links. What’s frustrating is when SEOs finally secure links after weeks of work only to learn that the links that they have acquired hold no or little authority. In some cases, the links even receive a nofollow or noindex attribute.
So, how can SEOs successfully acquire links that will actually make a positive impact on their SEO campaign? Rightmix marketing previously published The Right Way of Measuring Backlink Building Campaigns, however, we’ve decided to also provide 9 factors that can trigger more link acquisitions in your link building campaign.
Sourcing relevant link opportunities.
Your link building success will only be as successful as the link opportunities that are in the pipeline. Your site needs to pitch at least 150 websites a month to be able to generate at least 1-3 links per month. Ideally, you will be able to pitch upwards of 50 sites a day.
In order to scale your site’s link building acquisition efforts, you need to source thousands (or potentially tens of thousands) of websites where you can secure link opportunities.
Over the life of the site’s SEO campaign, more links will start to trickle in volume due to the amount of link opportunities that you’ve sourced.
Pitch at scale.
It would be nice to pitch only a few websites and actually get links back consistently. The reality is that you will need to pitch several hundred or even thousands of websites in order to secure links back to your site successfully. In theory, the more you pitch, the more links you should be able to acquire. However, it doesn’t work as straightforward as that.
It’s common for email filters to pick up the same pattern if a templated email is sent too many times within a day. To minimise the chances of the site getting flagged for spam, limit your pitches to less that 3 a day.
Additionally, you can use software such as Gmass to send and schedule bulk emails during the life of your campaign. This will also help to automate pitching in the link building process.
Publish several pieces of content on the same high authority website.
Many SEOs make the mistake of only publishing content on a website once, when they can actually publish several pieces of content on the same website and reference a link back to their site. It already takes time to build a relationship with an editor, journalist or site owner. By gaining several links from the same website, you scale your site’s link building efforts.
Many sites that take on contributors end up publishing several contributions made by the author. Additionally, the published piece may be paginated in several ways such as:
- Keyword tags
- Category posts
- Blog page appearance
- Additional language publications
This allows the author to secure several links back to their website.
Respond to submission enquiries.
It is easier to swim with the current than against it.
Getting on lists where journalists, bloggers and content publishers are actively looking for responses to their enquiries are quick ways to earn natural backlinks to your site. It essentially comes down to developing a strong contribution that will compel them to publish your response along with a link back to your website.
Successfully implementing this strategy can earn your site up to 30 placements a month. You can use services such as HARO or Sourcebottle to start receiving alerts for submission enquiries.
Pitch your content to be included in resource pages.
Search for useful links or recommended resource pages that’s relevant to your industry. It’s likely that these pages already have authority and if you can successfully gain a placement on these sites, your site should start to see a sudden upward shift in its organic search rankings.
The success of the link placement depends on the compellingness of your web content.
Will it offer value to the site owner and the visitors of that particular site? If so, then it should be easy to gain a link.
Republish posts on content syndication websites.
This technique is actually underutilised due to the fear of a potential duplicate content penalty. When done correctly, this is an effective technique that will generate exposure, more inbound traffic and of course more inbound links.
The trick is to ensure that the post that is published on your site (or on another site) is indexed by Google before syndicating it. It is generally quite safe to start syndicating content after 3 weeks.
Add to relevant blog comments.
This tactic is really underutilised because it has been abused by spammers for so many years. But it is an effective technique if it is used in the right way. Securing blog comment links on posts that gain traffic can be a quick win for gaining exposure, referral traffic, authority and additional link opportunities.
Where most SEOs go wrong is they publish with the sole intent to get a link back to their site, instead of contributing to the discussion and acquiring a natural link back to their site.
Commit to publishing content regularly on your web properties.
This technique takes time, but it starts to work wonders over the long term as you start to build an audience to your site and your third party web properties. People crave new content and are continually seeking out content that they can engage with and share. By publishing content regularly, the more of an opportunity you will provide for your site to earn natural links as a result of people sharing your site’s content.
In some cases, the links can be gained fairly quickly (within 6 months). However, it is more likely that the success of this technique will take between 12-36 months depending on the industry that you are publishing for.
Link out to other web properties and let them know about it.
People like being published. If you link out or cite their work, and let them know about it, there is a chance that they will link back to your site to reference where they have been featured.
Sometimes you might not get a link, other times they may approve a trackback link, other times they may publish a link on a dedicated web page on their website.
Link building is challenging, but it doesn’t have to be any more difficult than it needs to be. Create the right opportunities and use the right approach to create inbound link opportunities and you will find yourself earning several ‘high-impact’ links over the course of your SEO campaign.
Author bio.
Nathan Elly is the branch manager of the link building agency Digital Next. Based in Melbourne Australia, the agency can help scale guest blog acquisitions at scale. When he isn’t link building, you can find him enjoying the Australian sunshine and scoring goals on the futsal pitch. You can also follow Digital Next on YouTube and Google +.