What are Backlinks?
Backlinks are like votes of trust from one website to another. When a site links to your content, it’s telling search engines like Google, Bing, or Baidu, “Hey, this page is valuable.” The more quality backlinks you earn, the more credible and popular your site appears in the eyes of search engines—just like winning a trust-based popularity contest.
Note that “not all backlinks are made equal.“
High-authority and relevant links carry more weight.
For example, a backlink from a site with Domain Authority (DA) 50 is more valuable than one from a site with DA 5.
What Makes a Good Backlink?
How to Evaluate Link Quality:
High-quality backlinks have the following criteria:
1. Relevance
A high-quality backlink should be relevant in multiple ways:
- Industry relevance – The referring website is in the same or a related niche.
- Local relevance – The website targets the same country, region, or market.
- Topical/keyword relevance – The linking page covers a topic closely related to your content. (Tip: Check which keywords the referring domain ranks for.)
2. Organic Traffic Trend
Review the referring domain’s organic traffic trend over time. Avoid websites that have experienced a sharp drop to near-zero traffic, as they may have been penalized by Google or deindexed.
Backlinks from a noindexed URL are useless.
3. Content Quality
Choose websites that maintain high editorial standards and consistently publish valuable, original content (like the articles on my website 😁). High-quality content increases the trustworthiness and value of your backlink.
4. Link Placement
Where your backlink appears matters. Contextual links placed naturally within the main content are generally far more valuable than links in the footer, sidebar, author bio, or pop-ups.
5. Link Attribute
A dofollow backlink generally passes link equity, while nofollow, UGC, and sponsored links typically pass little or no ranking signals.
6. Authority
Look for websites with decent domain authority (e.g., DA, DR, or Authority Score) and pages with good page-level authority, as they are more likely to pass valuable link equity.
7. Anchor Text
Keep your anchor text natural and relevant. Avoid over-optimizing with exact-match keywords. The key is to maintain a diverse and natural anchor text profile.
4 types of Links attribute
There are 4 main types of link attributes defined by the rel value in HTML. These help search engines understand the purpose of a link:
1. Follow – Passes SEO value (link equity) to the linked page.
By default, if no rel attribute is set.
Example: <a href="https://example.com">Visit</a>
2. NoFollow – Tells search engines not to pass link equity. Still good to have for traffic and brand exposure.
Example: <a href="https://example.com" rel="nofollow">Visit</a>
3. UGC (User Generated Content) – Used for links in user-generated content like blog comments or forum posts.
Example: <a href="https://example.com" rel="ugc">Visit</a>
4. Sponsored – Used for paid or affiliate links to indicate the link was part of an advertisement or sponsorship.
Example: <a href="https://example.com" rel="sponsored">Visit</a>
While nofollow links pass less SEO value, they still contribute to a natural and diverse backlink profile.
What is Off-Page SEO?
Off-page SEO refers to all the actions taken outside your own website to improve its rankings on search engines. This includes building backlinks, increasing brand mentions, social media signals, and improving your site’s overall authority and trustworthiness in the eyes of search engines.
In short, it’s about boosting your site’s reputation beyond just what’s on the page.
On-Page SEO vs. Off-Page SEO
On-Page SEO focuses on optimizing elements within your website, such as content, title tags, meta descriptions, headings, images, internal links, and page speed.
Off-Page SEO focuses on improving your website’s authority and reputation through activities outside your website, such as earning backlinks, digital PR, brand mentions, and social signals.
The Four Pillars of SEO
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is generally built on three core pillars: On-Page SEO, Off-Page SEO, and Technical SEO. For businesses targeting a specific geographic area, Local SEO is often considered the fourth pillar.
- Technical SEO – Optimizing your website’s technical foundation so search engines can efficiently crawl, index, and render your pages. This includes site speed, mobile-friendliness, XML sitemaps, structured data, Core Web Vitals, and more.
- Local SEO (for local businesses) – Optimizing your online presence to improve visibility in local search results and Google Maps. This includes your Google Business Profile, local citations, reviews, and location-specific content.
Further reading: SEO Encyclopedia
What is Link Building
Link building is the process of acquiring backlinks from other websites to your own. In practice, it often involves building relationships with relevant website owners, publishers, journalists, or businesses who are willing to link to your content because it provides value to their audience.
Explore 25 link-building strategies and see how I rank each of them in my personal S-to-F tier list.
How to get backlinks? 4 common methods
There are generally 4 methods of getting links to your site: Create, Earn, Buy, and Ask.
1. Create (Directly adding links)
You can create backlinks by placing them on directories, social media profiles and posts, forums, or in email marketing campaigns.
While this method is easy to execute and offers lower SEO value compared to earned backlinks, it’s still a must-do as part of your overall branding strategy.
2. Earn (Highest SEO value)
Earned backlinks come naturally when you create high-quality, useful content that others want to reference. This includes content that demonstrates E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness), supported by infographics, original data, or valuable insights.
These links are the most valuable and relevant, as they’re based on merit and content value.
Tips: Create linkable content that people naturally want to reference and share. Examples include how-to articles, in-depth guides, helpful resources, unique or weird insights, profound thoughts, and content backed by data or research.
3. Ask (Email Outreach)
Usually, this is done by emailing other website owners or editors and asking them to link to your content (also known as editorial link placement or guest posting, where you contribute an article with backlinks to your website).
Keep in mind that guest posting is generally more time-consuming, as it requires creating high-quality, original content.
This approach of directly requesting backlinks is known as email outreach, which I’ll discuss in more detail in the following section.
Email outreach also includes responding to inbound backlink opportunities, such as link exchange requests, guest post invitations, link insertion requests, and other collaboration proposals from website owners or editors.
4. Buy (Use with caution)
Buying backlinks involves paying website owners, authors, publishers, or backlink vendors to place links pointing to your website. Many consider this a black-hat SEO tactic.
While it may seem like a shortcut to improve rankings, buying backlinks is considered a manipulative link-building practice and violates Google’s Search Essentials (formerly Google Webmaster Guidelines).
It is a high-risk strategy and can be expensive, especially when purchasing high-quality, relevant backlinks from authoritative websites. That said, many website owners, agencies, and SEO practitioners still engage in paid link building despite Google’s guidelines.
If you lack experience, there is also a significant risk of being scammed by SEO agencies or backlink sellers. Some may sell low-quality, spammy, or fake backlinks, exaggerate the authority of their websites, or even fail to deliver the links you’ve paid for.
Without proper due diligence, you could end up wasting money or harming your website’s search rankings.
That said, high-quality backlinks are earned, not bought. They come from building genuine relationships, establishing trust within your industry, and consistently creating valuable content that people want to share and reference.
Link Building Team and Process
If you have a dedicated SEO team of 3 or 4, it’s great; you can form your Link Building Team, as suggested by Ahrefs.
This team consists of 4 roles: content writing, prospecting, vetting, and outreach.
To put it simply, the process is: Prospecting > Vetting > Outreach
Prospector and Prospecting
Prospecting is the process of finding people who may be interested in linking to you.
A Prospector plays a role in the link building team by identifying high-quality websites for potential backlink opportunities. With SEO knowledge, research skills, and analytical thinking, the Prospector works closely with the outreach manager to develop effective pitch angles.
They also collaborate with content, design, and dev teams to ensure all campaign assets are ready, and manage the campaign setup using data management tools to keep the process organized and efficient.
Vetter and Vetting
Vetting is the process of evaluating whether the prospects are people you’d want to get links from.
Vetting criteria: Review, Content Quality, SEO Metrics (DA, Site Traffic), Content Relevance.
The responsibilities include reviewing prospects and their pages to ensure they meet your quality standards, updating their status, and finding their email addresses.
Who are the people to contact for outreach?
Ideally, these people are: The Author, Editor, Content Marketing Manager, Marketing Manager, Webmaster, SEO Personnel.
Email Outreach
These are the methods link builders use to contact prospects to ask for a link.
The Email Outreach Managers are in charge of writing emails, maintaining relationships with the key people.
The Email should have a good reason to reach out and providing value to the targeted site.
Goal and Objective
This Link Building Team should have a clear and measurable Goal and Objective. For instance,
Getting 20 referring domains each month to your pages or posts; Rank higher in SERP and get more traffic as a result.
Understanding why people link to you
The aim is to have a good enough reason for people to link to your website:
1. They link to pages to reference or support their point.
2. They reference something they don’t need to expand on
3. If it makes them look good: People often link to things that help them build credibility and social proof
4. They are either an explicit or an implicit relationship.
Implicit: Your content super fans
Explicit: Your online friend with whom you talk shop
5. People link to things to prove that they’re not making stuff up.
6. People link to things they trust
Actionable Tips
1. Google Reviews
Get more positive Google reviews by encouraging happy customers to leave honest, unbiased feedback on your Google Business Profile
POV: Easy and doable—businesses should make this a habit.
2. Create these "Link Magnet" Page(s)
Create a testimonial page featuring your satisfied customers or suppliers—this can be your “link exchange goldmine”.
Also, consider adding a career opportunities page, turning your job posts into potential backlink magnets.
Other valuable additions include a partner page, resource page, and a write-for-us page, all of which can attract natural backlinks.
Use Ego bait by creating content or page that positively mentions and highlights a person or company.
Lastly, launching an internship program is a great way to earn .edu backlinks, boosting your site’s authority with trusted educational domains.
POV: Not easy—it often requires a web designer or developer to get these done for you.
3. Use Keyword Alerts to Find Unlinked Brand Mentions
Set up Google Alerts to monitor mentions of your brand name or your competitors’ across the web. This helps you identify pages that have mentioned your brand name or products but don’t link back to your site.
It’s a good opportunity for unlinked mention link building.
Reach out to the site owner and kindly request a backlink to your website, turning brand awareness into valuable SEO gains.
You may also consider unclaimed brand mention tools like Prowly to discover mentions of your brand that aren’t linked back to your site.
POV: Interesting tips I’ve never tried before—worth trying when I have more time.
4. Cliché remarks but utmost important for SEO
Create link-worthy content by writing helpful and resourceful articles. You won’t get anything big just by asking ChatGPT to write for you; real results require effort.
Further Reading: Skyscraper Writing technique
POV: Cliché remarks, but utmost important for SEO
5. Emphasize relationship-building (Your business allies)
Don’t underestimate the value of building connections and mutually beneficial relationships within your industry, with content creators, journalists and other industry professionals.
6. Link incentive
Create a link-building incentive by launching an affiliate program, encouraging others to promote and link to your site in exchange for commission.
7. Content Collaboration
Collaborate with clients or suppliers through partnership posts to earn relevant backlinks and strengthen relationships.
Examples:
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Co-write articles or blog posts
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Co-host educational sessions or webinars
-
Share genuine testimonials and success stories
Basic SEO Terminology and FAQs
How Can You Track Your Backlinks?
You can monitor your backlink profile using SEO tools such as Google Search Console, Ahrefs, Semrush, SE Ranking, or Sitechecker. These tools help you track new and lost backlinks, monitor referring domains, and evaluate the overall health of your backlink profile.
What is Private Blog Network (PBN)?
A Private Blog Network (PBN) is a group of websites created specifically to build backlinks to a main website, to improve its search engine ranking. These sites often look like normal blogs, but they’re controlled by one person or company and used mainly for SEO purposes. While PBNs can pass link value, they go against Google’s guidelines and carry the risk of being discovered.
Internal Link
A link that connects one page to another page on the same website. Internal links help users navigate your site and help search engines discover and understand your content.
External Link (aka Outbound Link)
A link that points from your website to a different website. External links provide additional resources and can improve your content’s credibility when linking to authoritative sources.
Linking to trustworthy, authoritative sources and citing authors with profiles such as LinkedIn when appropriate can improve your content’s credibility and support E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness).
Backlink (aka Inbound Link)
A backlink is a link from another website pointing to your website. High-quality backlinks are one of Google’s strongest ranking signals because they act as votes of confidence.
Link Equity (aka Link Juice)
Link equity, often called “link juice,” is the SEO value or authority passed from one page to another through hyperlinks. The more authoritative and relevant the linking page, the more valuable the link equity it can pass.
Domain Authority (DA) / Domain Rating (DR)
Domain Authority (Moz), Authority Score (Semrush), and Domain Rating (Ahrefs) are third-party metrics that estimate the overall authority of an entire website based largely on its backlink profile.
Although both use a 0–100 scale, they are calculated differently and are not Google ranking factors.
Page Authority (PA) / URL Rating (UR)
Page Authority (Moz) and URL Rating (Ahrefs) measure the strength of an individual webpage rather than the entire domain. A page with a high PA or UR is generally more likely to rank well and pass stronger link equity than a weaker page.