If you want to rank a site, either in organic search results, or with LLM citations, one of the most difficult issues is how to get high-quality backlinks. Although some people say they can rank a site with no links, that’s not exactly true. You can rank new pages of a site without actively seeking links IF you already have a huge, established brand and you get links effortlessly. If that’s your case, that’s great.

If you don’t have a globally famous business, then you should try to earn backlinks for your site. The most valuable links are links from authority sites in the same niche as yours. Links from smaller sites aren’t to be thrown away either but they won’t have a big impact either.

Like anything else in life and business, something that is very valuable is also hard to get. Influential sites are very strict when they choose to whom they link out.

That is why we hired Minuca Elena to reach out to 28 SEO experts and ask them the following question:

Table of Contents

What is your best tip to get high-quality backlinks from authority sites?

Without further introduction let’s see what the experts had to say.

Bill Sebald – Greenlane

I have been a link builder for a long time. It was a channel dependant on tactics – sometimes very cheap ones. But I’m finding that many of the tactics are losing effectiveness (in both acquisition and influence).

I’m seeing that a bigger strategy devised for acquiring links is almost always a more successful campaign. This means determining the goal(s), thinking through the campaign, doing a bit of research, then spending money on building the asset.

An asset can be many things – content, tools, videos, you name it. But it may not be something that already exists on your site. For example, if you work in a space where there is a clear need for a digital tool, you would not know that without research.

If a wide audience can use that tool, then you’ll get branding and qualified traffic through the development of this tool.

Notice I didn’t just say PageRank (or whatever Google is calling it internally these days).

Once you know what you want to create, spend the money to make sure it’s the best version of the tool. Yes, spend money. I see too much shortcutting on quality to save money. You are competing to be #1 on the web, so find the appropriate budget.

BONUS: FREE Guide on How to Acquire High-Quality Links​

Once the tool is built, promote it everywhere. Newsletter, social ads, as well as outreach. (Yes, again spend more money).

Tactics can get you smaller one-off links, but these bigger programs can be like throwing a boulder into a lake. Google will definitely notice, and you can see results that certainly offset all your time and costs. If you are in a competitive niche, this is even more important.

Dmytro Sokhach – Editorial.Link

The best way I’ve gotten high-quality backlinks is by publishing original data. Stats, surveys, or niche studies that others in your space actually want to cite.

We did a link building statistics report that got picked up by agencies, bloggers, and even some competitors. It worked because it was relevant, backed by real numbers, and filled a gap in the industry.

Right now AI search is a hot topic. A lot of companies are publishing research around it, and those assets are earning strong links. If you’re creating something similar, make sure it gets seen. Share it on LinkedIn, get it mentioned in newsletters, and keep it in front of the right people.

If you want links your competitors don’t have, create something useful and make sure people see it.

Chris Dreyer – Rankings.io

The best way to get authoritative links is to build and cultivate real-world relationships. In the early days of SEO, it used to be that you could get a site to rank well without talking to or even emailing another living soul.

That’s simply not the case anymore, as Google largely ignores low-value links that anyone can get by creating a profile, submitting a form, sharing a link on a social network, building citations, or submitting sites to directories.

Those types of links are still important for an overall link profile, but getting the referring domains that will move the needle requires perseverance, time, social skills…and a little salesmanship.

I’m talking about things like developing referral relationships, collaborating with other site owners on content production, constructing and promoting news-worthy content, and emailing or calling editors of major publications to learn their audience’s content preferences. Tactics like these lead to high-value, authoritative, and optimally placed links that will improve a site’s Domain Rating.

Glen Allsopp – Detailed.com

Focus far more on the other person than you focus on yourself.

In some industries, you only have X number of great websites that link out consistently. If you start the relationship with a clearly automated email, writing out their full website name unnaturally and just asking directly for a link, you might be burning bridges and opportunities forever.

You could literally always be remembered as the guy or girl who sent that spammy email and that’s your chance gone.

Yet if you start the interaction by focusing on the other person and what they can get out of your deal together, you’ll not only stand a better chance of picking up your first link from the site, but many more going forward as well.

Steve Toth – SEO Notebook

Build relationships with established writers in your niche. Short list a group of writers and look for indications that they like to link out. Put a Google Alert on each of their names and make sure you read every article they write — do this for at least a month.

Get familiar with common topics and themes and tailor your content assets around them. You could even go so far as to ask a writer to contribute a quote to your article. This could increase the likelihood of them wanting to link out to it (YMMV).

Before emailing or going “straight for the kill.” Connect with them on places like LinkedIn or even some common Facebook groups. Avoid making the sales pitch email the first time they’ve heard about you. Be persistent and make it about the relationship, not a one-off link. Good luck!

Mark Webster – Authority Hacker

We’ve had a lot of success lately using the HARO platform to build high authority, high-quality contextual links.

The platform is free and it’s relatively easy to get started. Simply sign up, search their daily email for reporter queries and answer the questions you’re most qualified to answer. If your submission is successful you’ll get a link. And sometimes we’re talking HUGE sites here – some of our most recent DR90+ successes include the likes of Forbes and American Express without paying a penny.

As with most things, optimization is key here. The more responses you send that tick the right boxes, the more links you’ll get. We currently have a team member monitoring the daily request email who will start writing a reply to relevant queries the moment they come in. Over time they’ve perfected how to ensure they say the right things without spending an excessive amount of time on responses.

As a result, this link building method currently yields a success rate of around 15-20%, which when considering the quality of the links makes it a worthwhile time investment.

It’s free to get started and works for almost any niche – if you’re looking for a new way to get high authority backlinks, this is absolutely worth checking out!

Dixon Jones

One big mistake link builders make is not deciding what an “Authority site” looks like to a recipient. For me, the authority of the page is much more important than the site, but even so… one person’s authority is another person’s “Dog’s dinner”.

This leads to the tip… find a “natural match”. That is to say, the topic must be so close, that the authors probably know each other in person!

Almost all my best links come from personally knowing the sites that link to my product. If this tip gets a link, it will very much be the exception, for me!

My tip: Make links personal and you won’t go far wrong… might cost a few beers for influencers along the way though!

Julie Joyce – Link Fish Media

The best way to land a great backlink from a high authority site is to have content that isn’t already covered on that site.

That is such a simple concept but so easily forgotten.

You can have amazing content in the coolest format ever, but if the site you’re pitching to has a competing resource, your chances of getting your own link are lessened.

Chris Labbate – SEO Bank

My Expert Tip: LinkedIn LinkBuilding

People are tired of getting outreach emails (even if they are personalized) yes, I know they work to a point. I too have used them in the past, but instead of fishing for single guest post opportunities, in bulk email scrapes, I use LinkedIn’s advanced search to find editors of the authority sites I’m going after.

Chances are these editors might write for more than a few High DA sites, so you are already talking to the influencers, not single blog owners. Brilliant!

Here is how to do custom searches in LinkedIn for Influencers:
First, you must develop a search string that best matches the criteria of your influencer market. LinkedIn understands Boolean so you can craft your search strings around these operators:

• OR – Author OR Editor – This combination will perform an all-encompassing search that includes all LinkedIn profiles that has the keywords author or editor.
• AND – Author AND Staff – Is much more limiting as the profile must include both terms author and staff.
• NOT – Author NOT Staff – Will deliver a search of profiles that include the word author and not the word staff.
• ” ” – “Vice President Marketing” – Is used when there is more than one word it the title or phrase.
• ( ) – Is used to group phrases together. (“Staff” OR Director) AND (Author OR Editor) will bring up a search of all Directors and Staff that are authors or editors.

BONUS: You can combine search strings or add a company name to the query.
(Author OR Editor) AND (SEJ)
Next, paste the search string in the search bar.

And BOOM! You have 222 Expert Authors in your Niche, doing 1 search, under 3 seconds:

The success rate of reaching out for a guest post, or even an opportunity to be a writer, is much higher in LinkedIn because there is less friction than with the traditional back and forth email pitch. LinkedIn conversations can happen live and in real time.

Allan Pollett

One problem that link builders continuously have is finding new places to get links. One powerful strategy my team uses is to find authority blogs to place links.

Doing a simple search for “target keyword + blog” is a fast way to find potential blogs to approach. Since the top-ranked sites generally are not only themed correctly but usually have the authority associated with them, you can trust they are a good link source.

The next step is to quickly check the blogs post dates. If the blog is currently posting infrequently they might be open to having an article written for them. Often they are keen to have fresh content because content can be expensive or time-consuming to create.

These blog owners want to maintain the appearance of having fresh content. So they will often receptive to your pitch of the idea of writing a blog for them and in return they just need to give credit to the writer, which is the backlink to your site.

BONUS: FREE Guide on How to Acquire High-Quality Links​

Often you can add a slogan or keyword phrase within the link text as well which can make the link extra power. So this is a simple but very effective method for building backlinks from authority sites.

Brian Swanson – FlashPoint Marketing

If you are going to get an authoritative backlink then you need to think outside the box. What can angle can you take on a topic that has not already been taken?

We have found with our clients the best approach is to tackle a specific topic featuring some of their knowledge, but also to include insights and comments from others in the industry (that can offer a high-quality backlink).

It’s human nature to promote content that promotes them, so positioning is important.

Let all the experts you include in the content parcel know you have published the blog, ask them to share the link on social media and link back from their website. Even if you get a no-follow link from an authoritative source, it will still have value for the site.

Remember, Google is evaluating a website on its expertise, authority, and trust (E-A-T). Backlinks from authoritative sites will help your company build your site in these areas in the eyes of Google.

So, take a new perspective approach to a topic, seek out insights from experts, feature those insights and ask them to link to the content and promote it on social media.

Marco Benavides Ferlini – Semantic Mastery

The best tip I have for land backlinks from authority sites is to create your own trusted/authoritative sites.

The original Distance Graph patent was granted in 2015 and updated in 2018. The information in the patents tell us how to create our own trusted/authoritative sites. Since they tell us what Google is looking for, we can give Google exactly what it wants.

The patent looks at trusted/authoritative sites. In Google’s relational database, sites are clustered around relevance, trust and authority. If a website has accrued enough trust and authority, it becomes a seed site and any site it links to is part of a seed set.

My thinking is: Why go and try to get a link from a seed site or seed set in a given niche if I can create my own seeds sites and seed sets in the niche? I’ve seen through endless testing that links must not only be trusted and authoritative, they must also be niche-related. This is one of the reasons I prefer building my own links.

What it comes down for me is control. I would much rather be in control of the incoming link than not.

Gabriella Sannino – Level 343

My top tip is the use of HARO, or Help a Reporter Out, and various sites like that. Journalists need quotes, and you – as the expert – have the ability to give those quotes. It’s one of the few ways I can think of for a new business, or any business for that matter, to get backlinks from a high authority website like Forbes, The Daily Mail, Fortune, etc.

#journorequest is similar to HARO. Add your specialty to a Twitter search (example: #journorequest #marketing) and you’ll find open quote requests from journalists. You can drop the specialty hashtag if it doesn’t return enough results and you have the time to dig through requests.

Once you signup to these sites, you’ll need to stay on top of your emails and visit the sites frequently. Quote requests are quickly answered, so you can run out of possibilities before the day is half over.

Make sure your quotes are more about helping people than selling yourself. Journalists aren’t interested in getting your product sold; they’re interested in getting their article read.

As well, remember that it’s not just about building backlinks. It’s also about building yourself and your company up as authorities for your niche.

James Dooley – Fat Rank

Our best tip to land high authority Backlinks is reading the latest few blogs an author has written and see if there are any topics where it’s causing conflict between readers.

We then create a blog supporting the author’s opinion and try to get stats on this to support his thoughts shared. Reach out to the author and he loves the backup so links to our blog to strengthen his opinion on a given topic.

If we don’t agree with everything the author says in his article we wait 2-3 months and then delete our blog and 301 this to the most relevant money page on our site.

Kris Gunnars – Search Facts

The best way to get natural high-quality backlinks is having useful, authoritative content that has information that people find compelling.

You can usually start ranking somewhere without many links, but as people find the content then a small percentage will naturally link to it without asking.

The more this happens, the higher your site rises in Google, leading to a virtuous cycle. This doesn’t work for each individual article, but it can be an effective way to build domain authority for a website.

Floyd Buenavente – SEO Philippines

First off in the world of SEO there are many kinds of “Authority Sites”, but if by an authority site you mean a site having a high Domain Authority with great relevance, organic traffic,  and Trust Factor then you still have to satisfy another requirement and that is if the website allows free guest posting in their pages.

Realistically such websites are VERY rare to find except if you have these resources available at your disposal.

They are as follows:

1. Budget
2. SEO Tools such as Ahrefs, Hunter, G Suite, Mailshake and Buzzstream
3. Lots and lots of time
4. Great Content

Linkbuilding nowadays is not a walk in the park, because let’s be honest here, A LOT of websites nowadays asks for payment in exchange for a link that is great in the eyes of Google.

The free ones are still out there although they are very rare and very few.

In the end, it comes down to the number of outreach emails you are able to send out and the number of websites you are able to harvest. In this regard, the help of the tools I mentioned above is essential in achieving your targets.

However don’t let this bring you down, there are still other FREE ways to get links from authority websites.

The technique is simple, go to Google and search (YOUR KEYWORD) “write for us”

And there you go you will have a list available at your disposal, now all you need to do is to gather all of them from Google and be creative with the keywords you are using when you are searching in Google.

BTW: You can also use this technique using the tools above.

Just a caveat, as this is a free opportunity you should expect these sites to be hammered with other links from your competitors and other websites.

Hazel Jarrett – SEO+

Done well, guest posting is brilliant for earning high authority backlinks.

Google loves great content, audiences love content that solves a problem for them or gives them relevant information, and high authority sites love amazing content too.

Guest posting is an excellent way to reach a new audience, build brand awareness, grow your authority as an expert and also land backlinks from authority sites.

To be accepted by high authority sites, your guest articles should:

• Be clearly targeted to the host’s audience
• Include a ton of value through highly relevant, unique content
• Give deep and detailed information that covers the topic from a different angle to what’s already on the host site
• Include some internal links to other content on the host blog’s site
• Be promoted by you to your audience as well as by the guest blog’s host
• Feature a strong guest bio, which includes a link to your site
• Appear on relevant, high authority sites that share a similar audience to you (use Google and check domain authority using Moz’s Open Site Explorer)

And don’t forget that being included in expert roundups like this one can also land you a backlink from authority sites and it takes far less time than writing an entire article!

Dominic Wells – Onfolio.co

Take the time to build up a relationship with the owner or writers of the authority site. This is obviously not something that can be done at scale super efficiently or if you run a bunch of sites, but it’s easily the most surefire way to land links. They’re also links that others might not be able to get access to, as they haven’t bothered to take the time to network and build trust and friendship.

You have to approach it from a genuine angle too, people can spot insincerity, even over email. It’s one of those things where you do a lot of work upfront becoming known in the space, and you don’t get much return for it, but in the long run, it pays dividends, and you build real, long-lasting authority.

Aleks Shklyar – iPullRank

Write for a Niche–Just Not Your Own

If you want to earn links naturally, it’s imperative to do it through great content. But great content isn’t enough. Instead, think of sites where you want to be featured and who THEIR audience is.

For example, if you are a company offering help with filing taxes, writing about what you do can apply to anyone who files taxes. Your content will offer little to no added value compared to H&R Block, TurboTax, etc.

However, if you angle your tax preparation advice towards retirees living in the beautiful state of Florida, suddenly you are speaking to a demographic targeted by tons of publications online.

This type of personal approach is appreciated by both the readers and publications themselves to whom you’ll be pitching.

A great example of that strategy working is for one of our auto insurance comparison sites. While they do an amazing job covering all their bases of building content for their own users, they leverage their blog content for link building.

A post that did unexpectedly well for them was on the family travel when a family member has autism. This in-depth post clearly struck a chord for many publications focused on this developmental disorder and families dealing with its effects on everyday life like family trips.

Christina Nicholson – Media Maven

The best way to land a backlink from an authority site is by providing information that is of value. When you are cited in that article, you can share a link from your website that leads to a blog post that shares a more, in-depth look at the topic you shared in the article.

In an article, you can only say so much due to word count. People may want to find out more and that leaves you the opportunity to link back to that information on your website. This doesn’t only help you get the backlink, but it also helps you get clicks which plays an even bigger role in SEO.

This is also an important reminder to consistently be updating your website with relevant information by blogging. There is nothing worse than getting an opportunity to share a quote, but not have anything helpful to link to if people want to learn more.

Many times, outlets will not link to the homepage of your website. It can appear promotional and it doesn’t add any extra value, so be sure you are updating your site on a regular basis to increase your chances of earning backlinks as an expert in your industry.

Isaac Hammelburger – Search Pros

I’ve been using HARO for years and have found it to be the best way to get mentions on top tier sites. Here are my 3 best tips, which helped me get more than 100 links in the past year:

1. Use Good formatting in your answers. If the question has multiple questions, repeat the question in bold and type your answer underneath.

2. Get yourself a signature, this makes your emails look much better than any other person who sends it in, and making yourself look credible is one of the most important things to do

3. Change your sending identity – This is one of my secret tips, but I’ll share it here. When you respond to a HARO, most of the time people only see your email name. Most of the time this is just your regular name – which is boring and not enticing someone to click on your profile.

Instead, add your profession to your name so it reads “name – Profession” this gives the writers a reason to click on your name.

Pierre de Braux – Spiralytics

My number one tip for landing authoritative backlinks would be to build a relationship with the prospect first.

Put yourself in the shoes of the webmaster that you’re reaching out to.

When you receive an outreach email from someone you’ve never heard of, you’re probably going to perceive it as spam. However, when you receive an outreach email from someone you’ve communicated with before, you’re naturally more receptive to it. This applies when link building, guest posting, or doing any other collaborative outreach strategy.

Building a relationship with someone doesn’t have to be difficult. You just need to do things that make yourself more visible to that prospect. It can be as simple as commenting on their blog posts or joining in on one of their discussions on social media. You can also do things to help their exposure like share and link to their content to get yourself on their radar.

Links from leading websites have huge amounts of SEO and PR value, so take the time to nurture these relationships for the best chances at success. Remember that authoritative sites get unsolicited outreach emails all the time, so get a step ahead of the crowd by making yourself known. Once you’ve had a few two-way interactions with them, only then should you request anything significant like a link, share, or guest post.

Juliana Weiss-Roessler – WR Digital Marketing

You can gain high-quality backlinks by consistently replying to HARO requests. HARO stands for Help a Reporter Out. It’s a service that connects journalists with sources for their stories. You can sign up to receive their interview and quote requests via email. They are organized by subject matter, so it is easy to spot requests that are relevant to you and your industry.

Make a point to check them every day, and respond to at least one. Typically, they just want a paragraph or two, so it doesn’t take long to do.

Make sure to provide an original response that specifically addresses the request from the reporter. And don’t be overly promotional, or you’re unlikely to be featured. The goal is simply to showcase your knowledge — not directly promote your services.

To save time, I recommend keeping a document with your bio, website link, social media links, and a link to your headshot. That way, you can easily copy/paste it to the end of your reply to provide the reporter with all your relevant information.

Not all of your replies will end up being used. But over time, the results more than make up for the time invested.

Sameer Somal – Blue Ocean Global Technology

The quality and relevance of a website, both for a specific subject area or industry demographics, can be attributed to its Domain Authority. The higher the Domain Authority, the better the chance to rank atop search results. Search engine algorithms trust and prioritize the content from websites that have a high Domain Authority. As such, receiving a do-follow backlink from such a website will enhance your visibility on the internet. Below are a few actionable tips that you can use to build backlinks to your website.

Broken Link Building

Broken links lead users to 404 error pages because the pages these were originally directed to is no longer valid or active. They damage a website’s credibility and compromise the user experience. Google bots systematically crawl the internet and account for all broken links.

One strategy for receiving a backlink from a website with high DA is to identify broken links and offer a high-quality alternative to replace it. Such collaborations offer mutual benefits.

Guest Blogging

This is a common practice for earning a backlink. There are several viable guest blogging platforms on which one can author articles that contain a link to redirect the user to your website. Outbrain, Mashable, The Muse, Medium represent some of the more mainstream Guest Blogging Platforms.

Build Real Relationships

If you want to succeed at SEO and attracting the right people for your business on the internet, forge genuine friendships with others in and out of your network. Relationships build on a foundation of mutual trust and understanding will (for example) underpin interview opportunities with online magazines. They will also create a demand for your opinion and thought leadership by other company websites. When done with purpose and genuine intent, this practice will also be effective for generating backlinks.

Use Social Bookmarking Sites

Social bookmarking sites like Reddit, Dribble, Pinterest, etc. are important because they will improve your DA and generate significant traffic for your website. You can also use question and answer platforms like Quora; posting regularly on such open source websites is definitely a great way to get backlinks.

Bibi Raven – Bibi Buzz

HA! My best tip is not what you’re gonna want to hear. If you’re looking for some MIND BLOWING KNOWLEDGE BOMB or super-secret-salsa-effortless-links-forever sauce from me, you’re gonna be sorely disappointed #sorrynotsorry:

As I tell everyone I consult or train: stop thinking like a link builder. This means:

1. You disrupt people’s expectations of what link building outreach sounds like
2. You think like a writer and are content-centered in your approach

This works with all sites, authority-sized or pea-sized.

The first part of my approach to outreach is all about avoiding anything that makes you sound like a zillion other link builders. The underlying link request remains the same, but you word things in a new, unexpected way.

So stop the fake flattery, the veiled begging and all that. Be surprising, honest & personable. Editors and owners of authority sites get thousands of emails – they’re so sick of “love your blog yada yada gimme linky linky”. If you can jump out with unexpected, original copy, you disrupt their assumptions about link builders and grab their attention.

I see you eye roll – because you kinda knew this already but you can’t be arsed to try it. You know what? Don’t. More power to the few that actually do make the effort (and reap all the winz!).

Still here? AWESOME HIGH-FIVE.

BONUS: FREE Guide on How to Acquire High-Quality Links​

About the second aspect: In most cases, a site grows into authority because of its high-quality, specialized, controversial or otherwise engaging content. When you want free backlinks, you increase your chances by getting into the head of their editors. The content should be front of mind, and the link last. Because that’s what THEY focus on.

How do you put content first? For example, when you’re doing a guest post pitch, spend more time than usual on content ideation.

One of my fav methods at the beginning or end of the year is:

1. Search for “<niche of link prospect> trends <year>” (Example: luxury trends 2024)
2. Take a look at the listicles, pick one trend (Example: existential luxury)
3. Research what content already exists. You can use this for title inspiration, to create your own angle, etc. You can also reverse engineer what has already worked well around this and similar topics.
4. Generate 5 titles inspired by what you found. Format them in different ways (listicles, narrative, how-to, etc).
5. Rinse and repeat till you have a nice list of various topics and title formats
6. Pick one or more titles you think will work best for specific authority sites (look at their existing content to check)
7. Pitch them, and if you like, explain why you think this piece would work well for their audience. You can even refer to their existing content, and point out how this would tie into that.

There are a lot more ways to do content ideation like this. But my point is: give some love to the content you’re pitching (no matter the campaign type). It’s totally worth it.

In my experience, editors don’t need that much convincing anymore, as the content speaks for itself.

Mandy McEwen – Mod Girl Marketing

My best tip for landing backlinks from authority websites is to build relationships! Follow the authority sites on all of their social media properties and find key employees that would be involved in collaborations. Engage with them on social media – leave comments, share their posts, etc. Twitter is my favorite for this.

When you’re consistent about retweeting content and mentioning the individuals in your tweets, you will stand out. Now, take it a step further after you’ve engaged on social media and send them a direct message AND an email.

In your email make sure it is personalized and mention how you’ve been following them on Twitter and sharing their content. Compliment them.

Then you can find an article that is relevant to your content that you are trying to promote and mention how it would be a great addition to their article and explain why. Try to keep this email short, sweet, and personalized.

It’s a numbers game so the more you do this the more opportunities will arise for you.

Servando Silva – Stream SEO

Getting a link from a high authority site isn’t as difficult as many people think, especially of both sites (your site and the one you want to get a link from) participate in the same niche.

Authority sites love great content, and usually, the owner/s of the site are very passionate about the topics around that niche and always hoping to read and learn more about it. A great tip that works to get them to link to you is to create a super nice post where you write a tutorial or maybe a case study with a ton of data and stats they can quote or link.

This is easier said than done, of course. The article needs to be rich in content, images, and video and easy to understand for the audience. If possible, it needs to link to other authority sites or maybe even quote something that the authority site said or has done before. This highly increases your chances to get linked back.

In terms of scaling this strategy, the problem is you can’t be creating super awesome content to get links all the time. So, for bloggers who are getting started, it might be “easy” as they have a lot to talk about and pretty much every site is an opportunity, but if you’re getting links on a monthly basis or getting them as an agency that seels the services creating this type of content can be either very difficult or very expensive.

Another problem is that you might want the link to point to another post and not your awesome tutorial or case study, but you can also funnel that link juice and authority through your on-page SEO and use it as supporting content while you develop more the relationship with the owner of the high authority site.

Keep in mind many high authority sites get requests for links or guest posts on a daily or weekly basis. In order to stand out from the rest, you need to show that you’re really interested in sharing something special with their audience and not just a clickbaity or generic post with 5 tips to achieve X thing as they will see through your intentions.

Patrik Bindea – Strodin.com

If you’re not well-known in the field so that people can naturally find your content and link to it, the fastest way to get high-quality backlinks is through outreach.

And the first step to successful outreach is to get their attention.

Here are two unexpected ways I had tremendous success with:

Tell the truth right from the start (because no one expects this). I landed a few solid links by simply being unexpectedly honest.

Most people try to sugarcoat their outreach and most bloggers already smell a pitch from the moment they open the email (never use an outreach template!).

So I told the blog owner right from the start that I’m terrible at outreach, that I know they’re being pitched a gazillion times a day, but I would like to write a damn good article.

I got so many replies thanking me for finally sending an email that doesn’t sound like the same old template everyone is sending.

Be funny
Along with my blatant truth, I also included a strange picture with me standing with a cardboard with the website owner’s name on it. I opened the email stating that cold email is so awkward so I want to break the ice with this.

Again, people appreciated the sincerity and trying to be somehow funny.

The next step after getting people’s attention is to tell them what’s in it for them.

An in-depth article based on keyword research? You can fill a gap in their content? Can you offer them a guest post opportunity as well? Promote them to your audience?

Imagine what would you like someone to offer you in order to let them write on your website.

Johnny Baskin – Nomadic Advertising

There are a few different methods popular in the SEO community for generating backlinks from authority sites.

At the end of the day, most of these methods boil down to creating value for the website you are trying to get a link from either through great content, infographics or identifying mistakes (such as broken links).

When trying to get backlinks most authority sites will be more strict about who they are linking to than less authoritative sites. This means if you are trying to get a link from them it will often require more initial work.

Take some time to research the website and the audience you are targeting. You want to make sure when you reach out to the website you are contacting the right person and your message resonates with their audience.

If the website you are reaching out to has a community it is always best to try and interact with the community beforehand to get a better idea of who the users are and what kind of content they would be interested in. This will make it easier to give them a compelling reason to link to you.

For example, if I had an eCommerce shop selling kitchenware and I was trying to get a link from a cooking website I would try and find a way to appeal to that specific audience while also mentioning my products.

It’s important when reaching out to the website to make it about them and not you. I might reach out to the site and offer to make an infographic compiling all the best “one-pan” recipes featured on their website.

This is highly relevant to them, gives me a chance to interact with their existing users and at the same time provide a link to my favorite pan to cook with from my site.

Jeremy Skillings – You Can Be Found

We often want the internet and technology to do our work for us and many people in SEO are data geeks that are searching for great tools to dig into our work. I’m one of them, so I’m not looking down on that.

However, link-building is relationship building, and for data people, sometimes that is the hardest thing to do. Getting out of our shells and creating offline relationships that turn into online links. Reach out and engage with people in your world or your client worlds. You are still dealing with human beings.

Create useful content that is worth linking to and then create real relationships in the industry that can get that information out there. There are tools like HARO that can help with this, but sometimes you have to be creative and reach out to people and show them the value that they are providing their users.

It isn’t easy, but sometimes hard is how and why you differentiate yourself and outperform your competition. Start with creating unique, different, and useful content that is worth sending users to. Without that, the rest doesn’t matter.

Thank you so much to all the experts that contributed to this expert roundup! Let us know in the comments below which is your favorite link building method.

Remember sharing is caring. Share this post on social media with your friends and followers.

If your practice isn’t visible at the top of search engine results, you may miss out on connecting with these individuals when they’re ready to schedule an appointment. 

Search engine optimization (SEO) is the key to ensuring your chiropractic website gets found online. In this guide, we’ll explore how to build an effective SEO strategy, covering everything from optimizing your website to creating authoritative content and targeting local search terms.

With the right approach, you can increase your search engine rankings, attract more patients, and position your practice as a trusted source for chiropractic care.

What Is Chiropractic SEO? 

SEO stands for search engine optimization, which involves enhancing your website and online presence to appear higher in search results. 

For chiropractors, this means reaching patients actively searching for services like spinal adjustments, back pain relief, or sports injury recovery.

Why Is a Chiropractic SEO Strategy Important? 

Research shows that the majority of users click on the top three search results, with very few scrolling past the first page. 

If your chiropractic website isn’t ranking near the top, you’re likely missing out on a large number of potential patients.

SEO for chiropractors offers a sustainable way to generate consistent traffic and stand out in a competitive local market. 

Ranking higher in search results helps ensure your practice is the first choice for individuals seeking expert care in your area.

By optimizing your online presence, you can ensure your practice is easy to find, build credibility, and connect with the patients who need your services most.

How Does Google Decide Which Chiropractic Services To Rank First? 

To get your chiropractic SEO strategy right, it’s essential to understand how search engines determine which chiropractic practice will be at the top of the search engine rankings. 

Google alone has over 200 ranking factors, making it a complex system. While you don’t need to master all of them, understanding the main factors can help you create a successful strategy.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the key factors:

Relevance: Your website and content must closely match the user’s search query. For example, if someone searches for “chiropractor near me,” your site needs to include relevant terms like location, services offered, and conditions treated.

Authority: Established websites with a strong reputation in their field are more likely to rank higher. This comes from factors like backlinks, quality content, and user trust.

Backlinks: Backlinks are links from other websites to yours. They signal to search engines that your site is credible and trustworthy. The more high-quality backlinks you have, the higher your authority rating—and the better your rankings.

Page speed: A slow-loading website can frustrate visitors and hurt rankings. A study showed that 40% of shoppers will abandon a website if it takes longer than three seconds to load fully. Also, Google prioritizes sites that load quickly because they deliver a better user experience.

Content quality: Search engines prioritize comprehensive, helpful, and tailored content that meets users’ needs. For chiropractors, this means creating valuable content about topics like back pain relief, the benefits of adjustments, and injury prevention.

Mobile friendliness: With most searches now happening on mobile devices, Google prioritizes websites optimized for mobile. A responsive, mobile-friendly site is critical for attracting and retaining patients.

You might be thinking that you don’t need SEO when you can get new patients by running ads. Below, we’ll explore why chiropractic SEO is a smart, long-term investment for your practice.

Why Invest In Search Engine Optimization? 

Investing in SEO is one of the smartest moves a chiropractor can make to grow their practice. Here’s why:

Great return on investment

Compared to paid ads, SEO for chiropractors offers a higher long-term return on investment. While ads stop working when you stop paying, SEO continues driving traffic to your website without ongoing costs.

Suppose your chiropractic practice is based in Jersey City, NJ. Therefore, you target the term “Chiropractor in Jersey City.” 

Using an SEO tool allows us to see how many people search for this term each month. We use Ahrefs, but other popular platforms include Moz and Semrush.

A quick look at Ahrefs’ keyword report for “Chiropractor in Jersey City” reveals about 30 monthly searches. 

Source: Ahrefs

Let’s assume you achieve this traffic (the top-ranked result gets far more traffic at 350).

We’ll also assume:

• A general customer lifetime value (CLV) of $3,000 per patient. 
• A conversion rate of 3%.

That’s 10.5 new monthly patients, or 132 per year, with a CLV of $396,000! 

Attract potential clients online

The majority of people looking for chiropractic care start their search online. SEO helps your practice appear at the top of search results for terms like “chiropractor near me” or “back pain relief.” By optimizing your website, you can ensure that you attract patients who find you before your competitors.

Target high-intent traffic

Unlike social media or other marketing strategies, SEO connects you with people actively searching for your services. These are high-intent users who are more likely to convert into patients.

Build trust and credibility.

Ranking high in search results signals to potential patients that your practice is reputable and trustworthy. People tend to trust businesses that appear at the top of Google, and SEO helps you get there by emphasizing quality content, reviews, and authority.

Local search visibility 

Local SEO ensures your practice appears in “near me” searches and Google Maps results, making it easier for patients in your area to find you. Showing up in local search rankings boosts foot traffic and inquiries to your chiropractic office (more on that later!) 

Stand out from competitors

The chiropractic industry is competitive, and by investing in SEO, you can differentiate yourself and gain an edge over competitors who rely solely on traditional advertising or outdated digital strategies.

Step-by-Step Guide to Chiropractor SEO

Step 1: Perform keyword research

Keywords are the words or phrases people type into search engines for information. 

For chiropractors, identifying relevant keywords to target in your SEO campaign is essential for attracting potential clients.

You’ll need keyword research tools to find SEO keywords for your niche. As we mentioned above, there are a range of options, but we’ll use Ahrefs to help you discover the best chiropractic keywords. 

1⃣ Find your seed keywords 

Start by identifying broad topics related to your chiropractic practice. Think about the primary services you offer and the issues your patients frequently face, such as:

• Back pain
• Neck pain
• Sports injuries
• Chiropractic adjustments

These topics will serve as your seed keywords.

2⃣ Go to Keywords Explorer

The next step is to navigate to the Keyword Explorer tool and input your seed keywords, such as “chiropractor for back pain” or “spinal adjustment near me.” We’ll use “chiropractor near me” as an example. 

Source: Ahrefs

3⃣ Analyze keyword metrics

Ahrefs will generate various keyword ideas to help you identify the best keywords for your chiropractic practice. You’ll see metrics like:

• Search volume (how many people are searching for that keyword).
• Keyword difficulty (how hard it is to rank for that keyword). 
• Traffic potential (how much traffic you could get if you ranked #1 for that keyword).

For example, our keyword “chiropractor near me” has a search volume of 244,000, with a traffic potential of 450. It also has a keyword difficulty of 8, which means it’s easy to rank organically: 

Source: Ahrefs

4⃣ Check keyword ideas

Ahrefs will also suggest related keywords, long-tail keywords, and questions your potential patients might be searching for. These can include terms like:

• Walk-in chiropractor near me (8.8k)
• Best chiropractor near me (7.1k)
• Dog chiropractor near me (2.7k)

Source: Ahrefs 

5⃣ Focus on local, condition-based, and service-based keywords

Next, narrow your options by looking into keyword difficulty, volume, or other metrics to find manageable, high-value keywords. We recommend focusing on three key areas:

Local keywords 

Condition-based keywords 

Service-based keywords

Most chiropractors serve clients in their local area, so prioritizing location-specific keywords is essential for improving visibility in local searches. Additionally, targeting condition-based and service-based keywords ensures you’re connecting with patients searching for specific needs.

Examples of location-specific keywords:

• “chiropractor in [city name]”
• “sports chiropractor [region]”
• “back pain relief [zip code]”

Examples of condition-based keywords:

• “neck pain chiropractor [city name]”
• “chiropractor for sciatica”
• “herniated disc treatment near me”

Examples of service-based keywords:

• “spinal adjustment [city name]”
• “prenatal chiropractic care [region]”
• “chiropractic massage [zip code]”

Focusing on a mix of these keyword types often results in lower competition and higher conversion rates. They allow you to address the specific issues and services your patients are searching for, ensuring you attract high-intent traffic ready to take action.

5⃣ Check the SERP overview

Use Ahrefs’ SERP overview feature to analyze the competition for your chosen keywords. Look at:

• Who’s ranking at the top? Are they local competitors or large directories?
• Content quality: What type of content are they ranking with? (e.g., service pages, blogs, FAQs)

You’ve found a great keyword to target if the competition looks manageable.

Source: Ahrefs 

6⃣ Export your keywords

Once you’ve identified the most valuable keywords, you can export your list for easy reference:

1. Go to “Keyword Ideas” in Ahrefs.
2. Click “View All” to see the complete list of related terms.
3. Click “Export” and download the data as a CSV file to effectively plan your content or campaigns.

Source: Ahrefs 

Pro-tip: Don’t have access to an SEO tool?  Don’t worry! To look for target keywords, you can use Google Keyword Planner. It’s a free tool that can help you with keyword research.

Step 2: Show E-E-A-T

Establishing Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T) is critical for building your chiropractic practice’s online presence. 

This framework, used by Google to assess the quality and reliability of web pages, can significantly influence your search rankings.

Here’s what E-E-A-T means for chiropractors:

• Experience: Demonstrating firsthand knowledge and success in chiropractic care, such as patient outcomes or specialized treatments.
• Expertise: Showcasing your qualifications, certifications, and skills in addressing conditions like back pain, sciatica, or sports injuries.
• Authoritativeness: Being recognized as a reliable source of information on chiropractic care through publications, partnerships, or industry recognition.
• Trustworthiness: Building confidence through transparency, ethical practices, and patient satisfaction.

Ways to enhance E-E-A-T

Feature patient testimonials: Highlight reviews and success stories from satisfied patients to showcase your experience and the positive outcomes you’ve achieved.

Showcase professional accreditations: Display certifications, licenses, and memberships in reputable organizations like the American Chiropractic Association (ACA) to establish credibility:

Source: Texas City Chiropractic Clinic

Introduce your team: Create profiles for your team members, including their qualifications, specialties, and years of experience. This not only demonstrates expertise but also helps personalize your brand:

Source: Well Adjusted Chiropractic

Publish quality content: Share informative guides, articles, and blog posts on topics related to your niche:

Source: ChiroUP

Ensure transparency: Your website should clearly display your contact details, office location, service areas, and operating hours. This will foster trust and reassure patients that your practice is legitimate and accessible.

Source: Well Adjusted Chiropractic

Step 3: Create quality content 

Creating high-quality content is one of the most effective ways to improve your ranking in Google search results. 

While many chiropractors don’t heavily invest in content, doing so provides a unique opportunity to attract search traffic, build authority, and connect with potential patients.

Why does content matter for Search Engine Optimization?

Search engines like Google prioritize websites that provide users with valuable, informative, and relevant content. Regularly publishing fresh, keyword-rich content helps you:

Rank for a variety of search terms, from general topics like “chiropractor near me” to niche queries like “chiropractic care for sciatica.”

Reach new audiences and attract organic traffic by addressing common patient questions and trending topics.

Build trust and authority as a go-to resource in your field.

For example, chiropractor Tim Bertelsman’s blog post on whether hot or cold therapy is best for musculoskeletal injuries addresses a common patient concern, showcases expertise, and builds trust with patients.

Source: ChiroUP

Beyond blog posts, you can create various types of content to boost your chiropractic SEO and connect with potential patients:

DIY wellness tips

Provide practical advice that patients can use to improve their health between visits. For example, this guide on chiropractic stretches to improve flexibility at home can attract readers looking for at-home solutions while showcasing your expertise.

Source: Reinhardt Chiropractic and Wellness 

Video guides

Video is highly engaging and a great way to connect with your audience. Research shows that 91% of people watch explainer videos to learn about products or services.

A great example is Back Intelligence’s YouTube video that explains what a chiropractic adjustment is, specifically for people new to this type of treatment:

Source: YouTube

Infographics and diagrams 

Visual aids simplify complex topics and make them easier to share. For instance, the infographic by Tuck Chiropractic on back pain is a great example. This type of content works well on social media and blog posts, attracting backlinks and boosting engagement.

Source: Tuck Chiropractic

Step 4: Set up condition-specific service pages

When building your chiropractic website, it’s essential to include condition-specific pages that directly address the issues your potential patients are searching for. 

These pages help you align your content with high-intent search queries and position your practice as the go-to solution for specific health concerns.

For example, you could create a dedicated page that provides a comprehensive overview of how chiropractic care helps relieve back pain. 

By optimizing this page for keywords like “back pain relief,” “how does chiropractic help back pain,” or “can chiropractic cure back pain,” you make your website highly relevant to users searching for these terms.

Tuck Chiropractic is an excellent example of this: 

Source: Tuck Chiropractic

They also have dedicated pages for:

• Lower back pain treatment 
• Herniated disk treatment 
• Neck pain treatment 
• Pregnancy back and neck pain treatment 
• Sciatica treatment 
• Sports injury treatment  

Source: Tuck Chiropractic

Key point: Know the regulations Before diving into content marketing for your chiropractic practice, it’s important to understand the legal and ethical guidelines that govern healthcare advertising. Here are some essential points to keep in mind: Avoid false or exaggerated claims: Do not make unrealistic promises about your treatments or claim guaranteed results. Statements like “Chiropractic care will completely cure your back pain” can mislead patients and violate regulations. Be transparent about your qualifications: Only use terms like “expert” or “specialist” if you have the official certifications or credentials to support those claims. Use testimonials carefully: If you feature patient testimonials, ensure they are truthful and represent typical results. Include disclaimers if required, such as: “Results may vary from person to person.” Avoid implying a doctor-patient relationship prematurely: Ensure your content doesn’t give the impression that someone reading your material has already entered into a professional relationship with your practice. Clearly identify your practice: Your marketing materials should always include your practice name, contact details, and location. This will build trust and ensure compliance with advertising guidelines.

Step 5: Sign up for local citations and directories 

Chiropractors primarily serve their local communities, so ensuring your practice is visible to potential patients nearby is essential. 

Listing your business in relevant directories and optimizing your Google Business Profile (GBP) can significantly enhance your local SEO and attract more patients.

Local directories

Directories like Healthgrades, Zocdoc, Yelp, and Vitals are valuable tools for improving your online visibility.

Source: Healthgrades

These directories, called local citations, act as trusted references for your practice, helping search engines confirm your location, legitimacy, and relevance to potential patients.

Having accurate and consistent listings on these platforms boosts your SEO and makes it easier for patients to find your chiropractic services when needed.

Set up a Google Business Profile

Your Google Business Profile is one of your practice’s most important local citations. An optimized GBP ensures you appear in local search results, increasing your chances of being featured in the highly sought-after Local Pack at the top of Google search results.

What is the local pack?

The local pack is a key section on Google where local businesses are highlighted for searchers.

For example, if someone searches “chiropractor in Austin,” the local pack will display a small selection of practices, complete with reviews, contact details, and their location on Google Maps:

Source: Google

Being featured in this section boosts your visibility and makes it easier for patients to choose your practice.

How to Set Up Your Google Business Profile

1⃣ Sign in to your Google Account

Start by using an existing Google account or creating one specifically for your business.

2⃣ Access Google Business profile

Visit Google Business Profile to begin the setup process.

3⃣ Add or claim your practice

If your business is already listed, claim ownership. Click “Add your business” or “Manage now” to create a new listing if it’s not listed.

4⃣ Provide complete and accurate details

Ensure your profile includes all essential information:

• Business name (e.g., “Oakwood Chiropractic Center”)
• Address and the areas you serve
• Phone number and website link
• Business category (e.g., “Chiropractor,” “Spinal Health Specialist”)
• Hours of operation

5⃣ Verify your practice

Google will typically send a postcard with a verification code to your business address. Enter this code in your GBP dashboard to confirm your listing.

Pro tip: Depending on your account, you may also have email or phone verification options.

6⃣ Optimize your listing

Make your profile stand out by adding additional details:

• Write an engaging description: Highlight your expertise and the conditions you treat, such as back pain, sciatica, or sports injuries.
• Upload high-quality photos: Showcase your clinic, equipment, and friendly staff to build trust.
• Post updates regularly: Share tips, announcements, and promotions to engage with potential patients.
• Request patient reviews: Positive reviews enhance your reputation and can significantly boost your local rankings.

Step 6: On-page SEO

On-page optimization is an essential part of your chiropractic SEO strategy. It involves fine-tuning your website to make it easy for search engines to understand, navigate, and index. 

These optimizations improve your rankings and create a better experience for potential patients visiting your site.

Here’s a checklist of key on-page elements for chiropractic websites to optimize

Title tags

These are the clickable headlines that appear in search engine results. They tell both search engines and users what each page is about. Here is an example of a title tag:

Source: Google 

Meta descriptions

Meta descriptions are short summaries under the title tag in search results. They give users a snapshot of your page and encourage them to click. For example: 

Source: Google 

Headings (H1, H2, etc.)

These structure your web content, making it easy to read. H1 is the main title, while H2s and H3s are subheadings that logically organize the information. Here’s an example from a blog post 

Source: The Spine and Sports Health Centre 

Image alt text

Alt text improves accessibility and helps search engines understand your images. For example:

“Chiropractor performing spinal adjustment on a patient in [City].”

This also allows your images to appear in Google Image searches, potentially driving more traffic to your site.

Internal links

Internal links guide visitors to other relevant pages on your site and help search engines crawl your content more effectively. For example:

On a page about “Back Pain Treatment,” link to related services like “Spinal Adjustments” or “Sports Chiropractic Care.”

Keyword usage

Use target keywords throughout your content naturally. Avoid overloading the page with keywords, which can negatively impact your SEO.

Key point: What is Keyword Stuffing?  Keyword stuffing is when you unnaturally overload a page with the same keyword, hoping to manipulate search engine rankings.  This outdated tactic can harm your SEO and make your content less readable. Instead, create helpful, user-focused content with a natural keyword placement.

Step 7: Build high-quality backlinks 

Backlinks, or inbound links, are links from other websites pointing to your site. They play a crucial role in chiropractic SEO because search engines see backlinks as a vote of confidence, signaling authority and trust. 

The more high-quality, relevant backlinks your site has, the more credible it appears, leading to higher search engine rankings.

Building a strong backlink profile is essential for chiropractors to establish authority in their field and reach patients searching for care. Here are some effective techniques tailored for chiropractic practices:

1⃣ Create linkable content

The best way to earn high-quality backlinks is to create valuable, informative content that other websites want to link to. 

We mentioned this in step 3, but the key idea here is to focus on addressing common questions or concerns about chiropractic care in a helpful and easy-to-understand way.

For example, this guide to chiropractic adjustment for back pain has 209 backlinks, according to Ahrefs:

Source: Ahrefs

2⃣ Digital PR

Digital PR focuses on gaining media coverage and earning backlinks through press releases, interviews, and news features. This strategy can enhance the visibility of your chiropractic practice while securing high-quality links from authoritative sources.

Reach out to local or national media outlets with newsworthy updates about your practice, such as introducing new services, highlighting patient success stories, or winning awards. For example, here is a news article on USA Today: 

Source: USA Today

For the best results, consider collaborating with a PR professional to develop compelling narratives that resonate with journalists and their audiences.

3⃣ Guest posting

Guest posting allows you to write articles for other websites in exchange for a backlink. This builds your authority while helping you boost your chiropractic practices’ online visibility.

Here’s an example from the pregnancy website Carolina Birth and Wellness. A chiropractor wrote an article discussing chiropractic treatment for expecting mothers. 

At the end of the article is some information about the author and a link to their website.

Source: Carolina Birth and Wellness

A straightforward way to find guest post opportunities for dentists is to use a Google search. Simply type something like:

Guest post

Write for us

Guest author

Along with a term that’s relevant to your area of expertise. 

Finally, you could leverage a link insertions strategy where you insert your site’s link into existing healthcare or chiropractic articles, earning a contextual backlink to improve SEO.

Ready to build online authority? Building a strong backlink profile is one of the most challenging aspects of SEO and one of the most rewarding. Let Authority Builders handle the heavy lifting with our proven link-building strategies designed for chiropractors. Get started today and take your practice to the next level!

Step 8: Technical SEO

Once you’ve tackled keyword research, content creation, and link building, the next step in your chiropractic SEO strategy is technical SEO. 

This ensures your website has a strong technical foundation, making it easier for search engines like Google to crawl, understand, and rank your content effectively.

Here are the key technical aspects chiropractors should focus on:

Site speed

A fast-loading website is essential. Compress images, optimize code, and choose a reliable hosting provider to ensure your site loads quickly for a seamless user experience. 

Use Google’s PageSpeed Insights to check your site speed and get recommendations for improvement.

Mobile-friendliness

Most people search for chiropractic services on their phones. Because of this, it’s important to ensure your site has a responsive design, looks and functions well on all devices, and provides a positive experience for mobile users. 

Google Lighthouse can help you assess your site’s mobile-friendliness.

Security (HTTPS)

Security is vital for building trust with customers. Make sure your website uses HTTPS to protect user data and signal to search engines that your site is safe and reliable. 

Check out this guide on implementing HTTPS encryption to secure your website.

Final Thoughts: SEO For Chiropractors 

When someone is struggling with pain or an injury, finding the right help quickly is crucial. Effective SEO ensures your chiropractic practice appears at the top of search results, connecting those in need with your vital services.

Need chiropractor SEO services?  

Authority Builders specializes in helping businesses like yours thrive online. Our SEO services include:

Link Building

Guest Posting

Digital PR

Citation Building 

Ready to increase your online visibility and help more people find chiropractic care? Sign up today! 

Yet, it can be difficult to know where to start, especially for sites with thousands of existing links.

Jumping in blind is never a good idea, so always kick things off with a backlink audit. 

Auditing your site’s backlink profile will help you identify potentially harmful links (which you may want to disavow) and uncover new backlink opportunities.

When done correctly, analyzing your backlink profile can provide invaluable insights—but you need to know what you’re looking for. 

With a bit of detective work, you will uncover:

• The websites that link to yours the most
• Which sites linking to yours have the highest DA scores
• Links coming from PBNs and other spammy sources 
• Which content is performing the best
• Broken internal and external links (to fix them) 

Stay tuned to learn how to conduct an in-depth backlink audit on any website. 

What Is a Backlink Audit?

A backlink audit is a process whereby you review and evaluate all the backlinks pointing to your website. 

The primary purpose of conducting a backlink audit is to gain valuable insights that can help you grow and maintain a healthy backlink profile, which is critical for improving your search engine rankings.

A backlink audit also involves analyzing the following:

The linking website’s domain rating/authority score 

The linking website’s URL, domain, and IP address 

The piece of content they link to on your site 

The anchor text used for the link 

The web page containing the backlink (and if it’s relevant to the page it links to) 

A backlink audit is often the first step in your link-building strategy, regardless of the website’s purpose or industry. 

Why is that?

An audit is the best way to gauge the health of a website’s backlink profile. If you don’t start with an audit, you have no way of knowing if the website has potentially harmful links pointing at it that could cause a manual action from Google. 

Additionally, backlink audits provide a whole host of other benefits, including:

Grow your backlink profile: Who are the biggest fans of your site? In other words, which sites link to your content the most? You won’t know unless you do a backlink audit. Building relationships with sites that already like your content can be super powerful for your backlink profile.

Keep your backlink profile healthy: Auditing your website’s backlinks is the best way to keep your link profile healthy, which is key to SEO success. Regular audits will help you identify spammy and toxic backlinks like paid links or links from PBNs (private blog networks).

Track your progress: Are your link-building efforts paying off or not? You won’t know unless you examine your backlink profile. During an audit, you’ll discover your most effective link-building strategies, which will be helpful in refining your campaign.

Get insight into competitor strategies: Backlink audits aren’t just for your website. You should plug competitor sites into whatever tool you use. Doing so will let you peek into their link-building techniques, and you may find some you want to copy. You may find valuable backlink opportunities by auditing your competitors (like finding a website in your niche that accepts guest posts).

How to Perform a Backlink Audit in 9 Steps 

Step #1: Choose a backlink audit tool 

Now that you know why backlink audits are worth the effort, it’s time to dive into your backlink profile to discover the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

There are multiple tools you can use to audit your backlinks, including:

SEMrush: The Backlink Analytics tool lets site owners conduct an in-depth analysis of their backlinks, including each referring domain’s authority score, IP address, toxicity score, and many other factors. 

Moz: Moz offers backlink audit services and Link Explorer, a free backlink audit tool enabling users to view their backlink’s anchor text, page authority score, domain authority score, and more. 

Ahrefs: The Site Explorer feature offers comprehensive insights into a website’s backlink profile, including: 

• Total number of backlinks and referring domains
• Anchor text distribution
• Link relevance and quality assessment
• Historical backlink data
• Ability to discover new link opportunities by analyzing competitor backlinks

Pro-tip: Don’t have the budget for Ahrefs?  Don’t worry! Ahrefs offers a free Backlink Checker tool for search engine optimizers who are eager to audit their links but don’t have the budget for the paid version.

Google Search Console: The “Links” report in Google Search Console is good for starting a backlink audit. It gives you a list of sites linking to yours,your most popular pages, and a glimpse into the quality of your backlinks by showing top linking sites per page. GSC is a great starting point, but you’ll need additional tools that offer more detailed analysis and allow you to remove unwanted links.

Generate a list of backlinks

Before conducting an audit, export a complete list of your backlinks. The quickest and easiest way to do this is with Google Search Console (if you haven’t set up GSC for your site already, here’s how to do so). 

1. Log in to GSC and navigate to the “Links” tab on the left-hand sidebar. 
2. Once you’re at the Links Report, click on the “Export External Links” button at the page’s top-right corner. Decide whether to export the file as a CSV, Google Sheets, or Excel file and hit “Export.” 

A manual backlink audit is entirely possible with this list—but it would be extremely time-consuming and complex. So, to make it easier, we’ll show you how to do a backlink audit in Ahrefs’ Site Explorer tool. 

Step #2: Benchmark your website against competitors 

Once you have chosen your backlink audit tool, benchmarking your website against your competitors is the next step. You want to see how your site stacks up regarding backlinks and other key SEO metrics.

Why benchmark?

It’s like knowing your starting point in a race. You need to see where you stand compared to your rivals, especially if you want to outrank them. If they have way more backlinks and referring domains, you have some catching up to do. Plus, benchmarking helps you understand your website’s strengths and weaknesses.

Assess your website’s performance

1. To get started, log in to Ahrefs and navigate to the Site Explorer tool at the top of the page: 

2. Enter your website’s URL, and hit the “Search” button:

Pro-tip: Use both the ‘http+https’ option We recommend using the ‘http+https’ option, as it will check both versions of your website. The ‘subdomains’ selection will analyze the entire domain and subdomain, which is the best way to get an accurate overview of your backlink profile.  You also have the option to analyze exact URLs, specific paths, and domains (excluding any subdomains).

3. From there, you’ll be directed to the “Overview” page:

Here, you’ll get to peek at all your crucial SEO metrics like:

Total number of backlinks: How many links point to your site?

Diversity of referring domains: How many unique websites link to yours?

Domain rating: A score showing your website’s overall authority.

Total number of keywords you rank for: The terms people use to find you in search.

Traffic by location: Where your visitors are coming from.

The ratio between dofollow links and nofollow links: The balance of links that help your rankings (do-follow) and those that don’t (no-follow).

The Overview screen is invaluable for quickly gauging the success of your link-building tactics. Think of it as the home base of your SEO strategy since you’ll frequently check it to monitor the progress of your efforts. 

Notable metrics here include your total number of backlinks and referring domains. In our example, we have 168,000 backlinks coming from 6,100 unique domains. 

However, you must compare your metrics to competitors to truly benchmark your performance. 

Check how your competitors are performing

Now, let’s see how you measure up.

1. On the “Overview” page, go to the “Competitors” tab and add the URLs of your main competitors. It’s set to “Metrics”  by default,  which charts out your organic traffic and referring domains over a set period (you can view increments of one month, six months, one year, etc.):  

2. Click on the “Competitors” tab to add URLs for your competitors:

Once you’ve added a competitor, you’ll see charts directly comparing their SEO performance to yours. 

3. Next,  select “Backlink Profile” to compare your links directly: 

From here, you can view how you compare in terms of:

• Referring domains 
• Domain rating
• New and lost referring domains 
• Top-level domains 

This will let you know whether there are any significant link gaps between you and your competitors, which is extremely useful. 

Let’s look at a quick example:

As you can see here, the website marked orange has significantly more referring domains than the website marked blue. In this scenario, the blue site has an astronomical amount of link-building to do if they want to catch up. 

However, the gap isn’t as wide regarding the website’s URL ratings. The orange site has a URL of 57, while the blue site has a URL rating of 30. Therefore, the blue site is lagging behind the orange site, but the gap isn’t as wide as the referring domains would suggest. 

This suggests that although the first website has tons more backlinks, they aren’t better quality. 

Finding competitors

Are you not sure who your top organic competitors are? Ahrefs has got you covered. 

Navigate to the “General” tab and scroll down to “Top organic competitors.” This will provide a list of your closest competitors, any keyword overlap, and common keywords (which are keywords you’re both competing for).

This makes it easy to quickly identify websites competing for the same audience, which you can then mine to discover new backlink opportunities. 

Step #3: Find out which content is performing the best 

Next, it’s time to discover which pages on your site attract the most backlinks. This helps you see which content types—like videos, infographics, or how-to guides—perform well for earning inbound links and driving organic search traffic.

Why does this matter?

Knowing which content gets the most backlinks helps you focus on creating more of what works. For example, if videos are earning lots of links, producing more videos will help you build even more. Without this insight, you might waste time on content that doesn’t attract backlinks. Below, we’ll show you how to find your top-performing content on Ahrefs. 

How to find top-performing content with Ahrefs

Enter your website’s URL in the Site Explorer search bar and click the “Search” button. This will give you an overview of your site’s performance. Look for the “Pages” report on the left-hand menu and select “Best by Links” underneath: 

This will take you to a report that includes a detailed list of your most linked-to pages with 50 results per page. Ahrefs provides the following backlink information for each page:

• How many backlinks your site has 
• Number of referring domains
• New backlinks gained
• Lost backlinks
• A breakdown of dofollow backlinks vs. nofollow links 
• Number of redirects

The metrics above are all critical to consider when analyzing your top-performing content. For example, one of your web pages might have a lot of high-quality backlinks, but when you dig deeper, you find that most are nofollow links, which means they don’t help improve your SEO. 

What is a “nofollow” link?  A no-follow link tells search engines not to pass on SEO value (also known as “link juice”) to the website it points to. In other words, when a link is marked as no-follow, it doesn’t help the linked page improve its search engine rankings. No-follow links have a lot of uses including preventing spam when the site owner doesn’t want to vouch for the linked content or in situations where links are user-generated, like in blog comments or forums.

Another example is that you could have a page with tons of backlinks, but they all come from the same few websites. This is often a sign of private blog networks (PBNs)—a risky link-building tactic.

Let’s use our website as an example: 

Our “Best by links” report shows that our home page is the most linked-to page (not too surprising), followed by numerous free SEO tools (rank checker, keyword planner, title generator, etc.). 

For our website, it’s clear that our free SEO tools are generating backlinks left, right, and center. If this were your domain and you wanted to attract more organic backlinks, designing more free tools would be the way to go. 

Pro-tip: Free tools are backlink magnets Free tools are an excellent way to pick up quality backlinks and this doesn’t just apply to digital marketing efforts.  Try to brainstorm helpful tools you can create for your audience. Day planners, calculators, and document templates are all viable free tool ideas that can help you bring more links to your website.

Step #4: Refresh existing content that has untapped potential 

Once you know which content types are putting in the most work for your backlink profile, it’s time to consider the flip side of the coin. 

You need to look at your site’s backlink profile for pages that aren’t ranking well—they may contain many backlinks that don’t generate much traffic. These web pages have the most untapped potential. 

Luckily, there is an easy way to find these pages, fix them, and hopefully boost traffic: Ahrefs’ Legacy Top Pages report. You’ll find it in the left-hand menu of Site Explorer, under the Legacy column. 

This report displays your best-performing web pages in terms of ranking, traffic, etc. However, at this stage, we want to see pages with next-to-no traffic. 

To filter the report this way, click on the “Traffic” icon so that the arrow next to it points up instead of down. 

Now, your lowest-performing pages (traffic-wise) will appear at the top. 

What you’re looking for now is pages with low traffic yet lots of referring domains, like this example:

This page has a high number of inbound links but generates very little traffic. If you spot something like this in your report, undiagnosed issues are likely causing this page to perform poorly in the SERPS. 

Here are some possible reasons:

The web page contains outdated information that needs updating. 

Several on-page or technical SEO factors are holding the page back. 

The content failed to satisfy the search intent of users, causing them to click back to the search results (a high bounce rate is a clue). If you want your web pages to succeed, you must consider the users’ search intent. 

Pro-tip: What’s search intent? Search intent is the “why” behind a user’s search – what they hope to find. There are four main types: Informational: Seeking information on a topic. Navigational: Trying to reach a specific website. Commercial: Researching products or services before buying. Transactional: Ready to buy immediately. Failing to meet search intent leads to frustrated users. Always consider the user’s goal when targeting keywords. Keyword research tools can help you identify search intent.

Lastly, it is essential to ensure that your on-page and technical SEO is on point for the pages in question. We’ll discuss how to do this in more detail below.

Step #5: Check for technical SEO issues

We mentioned above how technical problems with your website can hold back your page’s performance. This is such an important area that we need to discuss it in more detail. Technical SEO ensures your website’s structure and technical elements are in good shape so search engines can easily find and understand your content.

Factors like having the same content in multiple places, slow loading times, or leaving users confused when they try to navigate your site can all make it harder for your page to rank well.

It can get a little technical, but we’ll keep it simple and cover some of the main things to look out for when checking your backlinks.

Crawlability

Ensure search engines can access and crawl your website without any issues. Search engines can be blocked by misconfigurations in the robots.txt file, meta tags (e.g., noindex tags), or server errors that restrict crawlers from accessing the site. If a page isn’t crawled, then it cannot be found in a search.

To identify issues, look at Google Search Console’s Crawl Report. The report shows pages being crawled and any issues encountered, such as 404 errors, server errors, or pages excluded from indexing.

Indexability

Make sure that search engines index all critical pages. 

Best practice: Use the URL Inspection Tool in Google Search Console to check whether pages are indexed. Ensure there are no noindex tags on critical pages. If certain pages should not be indexed (like admin pages), use the noindex directive appropriately.

XML sitemap

Make sure that your XML sitemap includes all relevant pages and that it’s submitted to search engines. 

Best practice: Create and submit an XML sitemap to Google and Bing. Ensure it is automatically updated when you add new content. Your sitemap should only include important pages you want to be indexed and exclude duplicates or pages with “noindex.” 

You can also submit an XML sitemap in Google Search Console. 

Canonicalization

Verify that duplicate content issues are handled using canonical tags. 

Best practice: Use canonical tags to signal the preferred version of a page when you have duplicate or similar content. This helps prevent the dilution of link equity across multiple URLs and ensures search engines understand which version to index.

Mobile-friendliness

Make sure your site is optimized for mobile devices.

Best practice: Regularly use Google Lighthouse to check whether your site works well on mobile. Google prioritizes mobile-first indexing, so your site should be responsive, with text, buttons, and images optimized for smaller screens.

Site speed

Check whether your site loads quickly, as slow pages can hurt both user experience and SEO rankings. 

Best practice: Use tools like Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix to assess load times. Aim for a load time of under three seconds.

URL structure

Ensure URLs are clean, descriptive, and consistent across your site. 

Best practice: Use simple, readable URLs that include keywords when relevant. Avoid long, complex, or dynamically generated URLs. Implement 301 redirects for any outdated or removed pages to avoid 404 errors.

Broken links

Check for any broken internal or external links that lead to 404 errors. 

Best practice: Use tools like Ahrefs to identify broken links and fix them by updating URLs or setting up redirects. Regularly audit your site to ensure links are kept up-to-date.

We’ll explain this in more detail in Step #7

Step #6 Improve on-page SEO

In addition to technical SEO, you’ll need to add checking your on-page SEO. 

Best practice: When auditing on-page SEO, you analyze individual web page’s content and HTML structure to ensure they are optimized for search engines and user experience. Here are some key issues you need to look at:

Title tags

The title tag of each page should be clear, descriptive, and include your main keyword. 

Best practice: Keep title tags between 50-60 characters, make them compelling, and ensure they reflect the page’s content. If possible, include your primary keyword naturally at the beginning.

Meta descriptions

Meta descriptions should briefly summarize the page’s content and entice users to click. 

Best practice: Keep meta descriptions between 150-160 characters and include the target keyword. Make sure it’s relevant and encourages users to click through to your site.

Header tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.)

Make sure each page has a clear structure by using header tags (H1 for the main heading, H2 for subheadings, etc.). 

Best practice: Use only one H1 tag that includes the main keyword per page. Use H2 and H3 tags for subheadings to organize your content logically. This helps both users and search engines understand the structure of the page.

Keyword usage

For each page, ensure your target keyword and its variations appear naturally in the text. Avoid keyword stuffing. 

Best practice: Aim for natural, relevant use of keywords in the title, headers, and body text. Include long-tail keywords and related phrases to make the content more comprehensive.

Internal linking

Check internal links that point to other relevant pages on your site. 

Best practice: Use internal links to guide users to other important pages and distribute authority across your website. Make sure your anchor text is descriptive and relevant.

Step #7: Identify and fix broken links (internal and external) 

Broken links are a certainty that every website faces, and if you aren’t careful, they could harm your SEO efforts. 

Why do links break?

There are dozens of reasons, including mistyped URLs, deleted pages, changes in site architecture, and domain name changes—just to name a few. 

It’s common to find broken internal or external links, but they can negatively impact your SEO if left unaddressed.

Google prioritizes high-quality websites with accurate information. Numerous broken links might signal to Google that your website is neglected or outdated, affecting your rankings. Regular cleanup is key to maintaining a healthy website and strong SEO performance.

How to detect and fix broken internal links 

There are a few ways you can go about this with Ahrefs, but we will stick with the Best by Links report because it’s the quickest and easiest way (and it has options to identify both internal and external broken links). 

1. Enter your website’s URL in the Site Explorer search bar and click the “Search” button. Look for the “Pages” report on the left-hand menu and select “Best by Links” underneath: 

2. Navigate to the “Internal Backlinks” option at the top of the page. By default, this report will show your internal pages that receive the most links.

3. Next, select “404 Not Found” under the “HTTP Code” filter option to display pages with broken links:

4. Click on “Show Results,” and you’ll get to see a list of all the broken internal backlinks on your website: 

Correcting broken links on your web pages is crucial, especially for ones with lots of links pointing to them. Until you fix those broken links, all that link juice is going to waste. 

The good news is fixing broken internal links is not too difficult. All you have to do is either: 

1⃣ Updating the URL to point to the correct page. 

2⃣ Removing the link if the page no longer exists. 

How to detect and fix broken external links 

Next, it’s time to check for broken external backlinks that could hinder your SEO. Select the “External Backlinks” tab. From there, select “404 Not Found” under the “HTTP Code” filter. 

Now, you can view all your external backlinks that return 404 Not Found errors. Once again, all that precious link juice is wasted if the link points to a 404, so you should aim to correct these links ASAP. 

Unfortunately, fixing broken external links isn’t as quick or easy as fixing internal links. You’ll have to contact other site owners to fix the link, which may take longer than you’d like. 

Ideally, you’d want to get broken backlinks reinstated, which will restore the link juice and improve your SEO. 

However, this isn’t always possible, as the page in question may no longer exist. In that case, contact the site owner and request that they remove the link instead. 

Pro-tip: Manually check each link that Ahrefs claims is broken No tool is 100% accurate all the time, so you should first confirm that a link is broken before contacting the site owner.

Step #8: Disavow or manually remove any harmful links 

Alright, let’s get back on track with the audit process.

The next crucial step is scrutinizing your backlink profile for potentially harmful links. These links can seriously damage your website’s reputation and search rankings in Google’s eyes.

Harmful links are backlinks that originate from low-quality, irrelevant, or spammy sites. They can signal to Google that your site is engaging in manipulative link-building practices, which can result in penalties or even complete removal from search results.

Here’s a breakdown of some common types of spammy backlinks:

PBNs (private blog networks): These are networks of interconnected websites created solely to pass on link authority to target sites. Google actively seeks out and penalizes PBNs.

Guest posts on low-quality sites: While guest posting can be a legitimate way to build backlinks, it becomes harmful when done on low-quality, irrelevant, or spammy websites.

Forum spam: This involves posting links to your site in irrelevant forums or discussions, often with generic or promotional anchor text.

Comment spam: Similar to forum spam, this involves posting links in blog comments or other online discussions, often with little or no relevance to the topic at hand.

Hidden links: This type of spammy backlink is intentionally hidden from users but visible to search engines. They are often used to manipulate search rankings.

Links from nonrelevant websites: Even if the linking site isn’t spammy, links from completely unrelated websites can be seen as unnatural and potentially harmful.

Now, go back to the list of backlinks you compiled earlier and visit each linking page. Carefully examine each link and the context in which it appears to determine whether any of these toxic backlink types are present.

If you identify any truly harmful links during your audit, or if your site has already been penalized due to manipulative links, you’ll need to use Google’s Disavow Tool to disavow them. We’ll show you how to do this below. 

How to disavow backlinks 

Disavowing links is essentially a way to tell Google, “Hey, I don’t want you to consider these specific links when evaluating my website’s authority and rankings.” It’s like cutting ties with those links, making them invisible to Google’s algorithm.

Google’s Disavow Tool is located within Google Search Console. Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to use it:

1. Log in to Google Search Console and select your “property type.”
2. In the left-hand menu, navigate to “Links” and then click on “Disavow links.“
3. You’ll see a warning message about the potential risks of disavowing links. Read it carefully and proceed only if you’re confident that disavowing is necessary.
4. Click on the “Disavow links” button.
5. Choose the .txt file containing the list of links you want to disavow. Ensure it’s formatted correctly according to Google’s specifications:
6. Click “Submit” to upload the file.

Pro-tip: This is a last resort!  Disavowing links should only be used as a last resort when you’re sure the links harm your search performance.  Disavowing links should be your last resort, not your first line of defense. Misusing this tool can have negative consequences, potentially further harming your rankings.  Google’s algorithm is sophisticated enough to automatically identify and discount most low-quality links.

Step #9: Regularly monitor your backlink profile 

By now, you’ve completed a full backlink audit and disavowed any harmful links. Well done! 

The final step, however, is to monitor your backlink profile periodically to catch any major changes before they get a chance to cause issues. 

How often you monitor your profile will depend on your website’s activity and your niche’s competitiveness. 

If your site sees a ton of traffic each day and your niche is fiercely competitive, you should review your link profile once every two weeks. If your site is less busy, then reviewing your links once per month should suffice. As for full backlink audits, you should knock one out every few months (or sooner). 

Monitoring your link profile is crucial for the following reasons:

Detecting new links 

Link-building is an ongoing process, and your team (or the agency you use) will be conducting outreach constantly to acquire new links. Accordingly, you need a way to detect any new links you pick up. Ahrefs’ Backlinks Alert is perfect for this.

An email notification goes out whenever your chosen domain, subdomain, subfolder, or URL gains or loses a backlink. This makes it extremely easy to keep track of your current link-building efforts. 

Monitoring negative SEO 

While their effectiveness is debated (Google claims negative SEO attacks have no effect), negative SEO attacks are a very real thing. This happens when a competing website floods your site with tons of spammy links, hoping to derail your search rankings. By closely monitoring your backlink profile, you can catch negative SEO attacks as soon as they occur. 

Managing broken links

As stated before, broken links happen all the time, and they affect virtually every website. That’s why it’s important to keep an eye on your backlink profile to ensure that you don’t accrue too many broken links. 

Competitor insights 

You never know when one of your competitors may stumble upon a backlink goldmine. If you keep a close eye on their backlink profile (in comparison to yours), you’ll be able to capitalize on any new backlink opportunities they find. 

Take Your Backlink Profile to the Next Level with Authority Builders 

Conducting a backlink audit is by no means a simple or quick process. As you can probably tell by now, it’s a time-intensive, complex endeavor. If you’re running a business, it’s unlikely that you’d have the time to audit your backlink profile. 

Authority Builders Link Audits will take this integral process off your hands, and we’ll provide you with a perfectly formatted disavow file to ensure the health of your backlink profile. 

We also offer custom link-building campaigns through ABC Plus, so don’t delay and sign up today.    

Well, the sites listed in these types of directories didn’t get there by accident. 

Enter local citation building, an SEO tactic where you list your business’s NAP (name, address, and phone number) and sometimes other information (photos, reviews, etc.) on relevant websites. 

Most commonly, this takes the form of uploading your NAP to online business directories, but you aren’t strictly limited to them. You can also build citations through social media platforms, blog posts, press releases, and other types of web content. 

41% of consumers use three or more review sites before visiting a local business, and 91% report that local reviews impact their perceptions of brands – so it’s crucial to maintain a strong presence on relevant directories and review sites. 

In this article, we’ll teach you how to build local citations for your business like a pro, so stick around. 

Why are Local Citations Important for SEO?

Are you not sold yet on why you should spend time and money building local citations?

If so, you should know local citations play a significant role in how search engines like Google rank local businesses in search results. 

After all, Google wants to ensure that it ranks the highest quality, most trusted businesses at the top of its rankings to provide the best user experience. 

How does Google verify each business’s relevance, quality, and trustworthiness?

The algorithm cross-checks local business citations online. 

In particular, it checks:

• Your Google Business Profile (formerly Google My Business) 
• Business directories 
• Third-party content (review sites) 
• User-contributed content (social media posts, forums, etc.) 
• User ratings and reviews 
• Any available photos of your products or services 
• Your business’s address on Google Maps 

This is why local citations are integral for local SEO campaigns. If your business isn’t mentioned or listed on any directories, social media platforms, or forums like Reddit – you’ll have a hard time ranking for your most important local keywords.

Why consistency is key 

That brings us to the other core component of local citation building: consistency. 

Why is remaining consistent so important?

It is because the last thing you want is outdated business information floating around online. 

For example, a picture that you’re listed in 200 directories, but 150 of them contain your business’s old address and phone number. To make matters worse, you don’t have a way to manage your citations, so you have no idea that there are 150 web pages with incorrect information for your business. 

This means you’ll miss out on a lot of potential business because customers cannot get in touch. 

You can avoid this nightmare scenario by practicing local citation management, which entails keeping track of all your business’s citations in one central location. 

Most companies outsource this process since it’s a bit of a headache to do manually, but more on this in a bit. 

How to Build Local Citations in 6 Steps 

Before we dive into how to start building local citations, we need to make an important distinction. 

There are two types of local citations you can build: structured and unstructured. 

Here’s a look at the differences between the two 

Structured citations 

A structured citation means the business listing follows a unanimous structure that applies to all citations on the website. 

Online directories are examples of structured citations, as they provide their business listings in a uniform way. 

Most commonly, this involves listing a business’s NAP, but structured citations may also include:

• Photos of your location 
• Product photos 
• User reviews
• Business descriptions 
• Industries or audiences served
• Links to your business’s social media platforms (Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, etc.) 

Local business directories and review sites often feature structured citations, and they also go by the name ‘NAP listings’ (since they always list each business’s name, address, and phone number). 

A few examples of structured citation websites include:

• Yellow Pages 
• Yelp 
• Angi (formerly Angie’s List)  
• Foursquare 

These sites are great because they provide a consistent format for your business information, and they’re the types of sites Google’s algorithm checks when ranking local businesses. 

However, some structured citation directories require a monthly fee due to their ‘premium listings,’ which is something to note when browsing citation opportunities. 

Unstructured citations 

These are citations that don’t follow a specific format and often appear on blogs, press releases, and news articles. 

An example would be a blogger listing your business’s NAP (and possibly a backlink) after posting a positive review. 

Or you could use HARO (Help-a-Reporter-Out) to get your business listed in a related news article. 

Unstructured citations tend to be more difficult to obtain than structured citations due to their nature. You can’t simply upload your business’s information to a news site, for instance. 

Instead, you’ll need to do some outreach to acquire unstructured citations, which will likely bleed over into your link-building efforts. For example, HARO is a popular tool for both link-building and local citation-building, effectively letting SEOs dig two holes with one shovel. 

Step #1: Optimize your online presence 

Local citations are undoubtedly an important ranking factor for local SEO, but they’re by no means the only one. 

You’ll also want to optimize your Google Business Profile, Google Maps address, and Google Reviews profile. Lastly, don’t forget to tweak your on-page SEO until it’s picture-perfect. 

Google Business Profile verification

Let’s start with setting up your Google Business Profile (GBP). 

If you want your site to rank for relevant local search queries (and to appear in the ‘local pack’ SERP feature that integrates Google Maps), you’ll need a fully fleshed-out Google Business Profile. 

The good news is that creating a Google Business Profile (or claiming an existing listing) is completely free. 

Here’s what you’ll need to do:

• First, log in to your Google account (you’ll need to create one if you don’t have one already) and search for your business. 
• If there’s a listing for your business, select it. 
• Click the ‘Claim this business’ button if it’s available. 
• Follow Google’s verification process to confirm ownership of the business. 

From here, there are a few options for verification, including the following:

• Mailing a postcard with a verification code.
• Verifying ownership over the phone. 
• Receive verification instructions via email. 

If you verify through phone or SMS, you’ll receive instant verification and can move forward with the rest of the optimization process. 

Optimizing your GBP 

Now that you have a Google Business Profile, it’s time to start filling it out. If you want to appear in local SERP features and rank higher for local queries, your GBP needs to contain the right content. 

Here are some quick best practices to follow:

1. Fill out your NAP and add a detailed description of your business that highlights what makes you unique (don’t forget to include relevant local keywords throughout). 
2. Choose a primary category that most accurately describes your business. Don’t forget to include additional categories to further clarify the specifics of your product and service offerings. You can add up to 10 additional categories, and they’re perfect opportunities to capitalize on relevant local keywords, so include as many as you can. 
3. Upload high-quality photos of your products, services, and business location (if applicable). 
4. Post regular updates for your customers that highlight upcoming promotions, events, and specials. 
5. Encourage customers to post reviews on your GBP and then respond to them enthusiastically. 
6. Enable the messaging feature so your customers can interact with you through GBP. Responding to customer inquiries will help build trust with your audience. 
7. Add a Q&A section where you address and answer common questions about your business. 

Once your GBP is up and running, you’ll start to appear in Google Maps searches by default, so you don’t need to take any further action to appear in Google’s ‘local pack’ SERP feature. 

Tweaking on-page SEO 

Besides your Google Business Profile, you also need to optimize your website for local SEO. 

As with traditional on-page SEO, you’ll want to add crucial local keywords to your content, metadata, image alt tags, and headings. 

Speaking of headings, they’re especially important for your landing and product pages, so you should try to localize each one. Headings carry quite a bit of SEO clout since they’re one of the first things Googlebots crawl on your page. 

Therefore, if you throw some localized keywords in there, it’ll help the algorithm associate your business with related searches in your location. 

Here are a few examples of localized landing page headings using St. Petersburg, FL, as an example:

• Reasons to Get (Service) Done in St. Petersburg
• Why Our (Products) are The Best in St. Petersburg 
• Who Is (Your Service) Right for in St. Petersburg?

Also, don’t forget to include your NAP on your website in a place where it’ll be hard for your customers to miss. Popular locations include your Contact Us and About Us pages, as well as the footer on your homepage. 

Step #2: Submit your NAP to core online directories

Next, you should upload your NAP to ‘core’ sites, which are the most recognized and widely-used directories that provide local business citations. 

Specifically, you’ll want to highlight the ‘big 4,’ which consists of:

• Facebook
• Yelp
• Foursquare 
• Yellow Pages 

Regardless of your industry or niche, you’ll want your business listed on these major directories for two reasons.  

First, these are the main directories Google’s algorithm looks at to determine how well your business matches a user’s local search query (for instance, if someone searches for a service you offer in your location, Google uses directories like Yelp to decide if you’re a good fit). 

Next, these are the most popular online business directories, so you’ll likely receive referral traffic from being listed on them. People turn to directories like the Yellow Pages and social media platforms like Facebook to discover all sorts of products and services, which is why it’s worth submitting your NAP to them. 

When uploading your NAP to these sites, the #1 most important thing is to ensure the information is accurate and up-to-date. Ensure that your phone number, address, and website URL are all correct before submitting. 

Remember, if your business ever changes locations, gets a new website, or changes its phone number, you’ll have to update your NAP in every directory it’s listed in. 

That’s why it’s essential to have a way to manage all your citations once they’ve been submitted. Manually updating each listing will quickly become too cumbersome, especially if you go beyond uploading your NAP to the ‘big 4’ (which you definitely should). 

We’ll cover the best local citation tracking tools in a bit, so stay tuned. 

Step #3: Submit your NAP to local and niche directories 

Once you’ve covered the major directories and social media platforms, it’s time to move on to more industry and niche-specific citation opportunities. 

There are thousands of niche business directories and local news outlets out there, and they can help your local search rankings through citations. 

However, it’s crucial to note that not every industry-specific business directory is worth uploading your NAP to. 

For every niche directory that’s actually popular, there are hundreds of others that don’t receive a lot of traffic, and thus aren’t worth your time.

A good rule of thumb is to stick to directories that you’ve heard of before. Another vetting technique is to do a Google search for ‘(your industry) in (your location)’ and see if the directory shows up in the top 20 results. 

If it’s nowhere to be found, you’re better off uploading your NAP elsewhere. 

Claiming existing listings on directories like Yelp 

Before you call it quits on structured citations (i.e., business directories), it’s a good idea to do a quick search on major directories to see if there are existing listings for your business. 

Why is that?

It’s because there may be inaccurate listings for your business floating around that contain inaccurate or outdated information. 

Most major directories like Yelp and the Yellow Pages have a feature where you can claim an existing listing, granting you the chance to correct any errors. As a bonus, many of these directories let you upload reviews and photos once you claim a listing, so it’s worth the trouble. 

Step #4: Find or create unstructured citations 

By now, you’ve uploaded your business’s NAP to the most important directories, so you’ll have plenty of structured citations. 

However, structured citations are only half of the equation. 

To make the most out of local citations for SEO, you’ll also want to target unstructured citations. 

As a quick refresh, unstructured citations don’t follow a unanimous structure and appear on blogs, news outlets, press releases, and other types of websites. 

They differ from structured citations in that you have to earn them instead of simply uploading your NAP. 

An example would be earning your business a shoutout on an influencer’s blog after they positively reviewed one of your products. 

Targeting unstructured citations is a lot like building backlinks in that it involves a lot of outreach. 

Let’s take a look at the most effective methods for acquiring unstructured citations. 

Find unlinked brand mentions online 

A popular link-building tactic that also works great for local citation building is looking for unlinked brand mentions. 

What are those?

An unlinked brand mention is where a website mentions your brand but fails to link back to your website. 

When targeting backlinks, your goal is to convince the site owner to add a backlink to one of your web pages. 

Citation building has a similar yet different goal. While acquiring a backlink is never a bad thing (and there’s no reason why you can’t ask for both), your primary concern is that the website lists your business’s NAP (maybe a better word for it is unNAPPED brand mentions). 

Ideally, your business’s NAP and backlink should accompany every mention of your brand, but that’s not always possible. 

Either way, pursuing unlinked brand mentions is a great way to build backlinks and local citations for SEO. 

But how can you find blogs, news outlets, and social media posts that mention your brand?

Ahrefs’ Content Explorer is your best friend in this regard. 

All you have to do is enter your domain into the search bar while excluding your domain (to avoid your own web pages appearing in the search). 

Voila, you’ll have a lengthy list of nearly every website that’s ever uttered your brand’s name. 

You can also filter the list to only include websites with a high DA score, a certain amount of organic traffic, specific publishing dates, and other parameters. 

If you don’t want to use any specialized tools, you can also find unlinked mentions using plain old Google, albeit with the assistance of the ‘intext’ search operator. 

Search for ‘intext: “your brand name”, and you’ll generate a list of websites that mention your brand. 

Use HARO to build Google local SEO citations 

Help-a-Reporter-Out is a goldmine for backlinks and local citations, so you should definitely add it to your bag of tricks. 

It works by hooking up reporters and journalists with business owners and industry experts. They send out several emails each day containing reporter queries (requests for sources). 

They usually need a quote or some information from a reputable source. 

By responding to these queries, you can land valuable backlinks and citations (listing your business’s NAP) if the reporter chooses your response. 

HARO is a time-consuming endeavour, though, as you’ll need to stay on top of the reporter queries that go out each day if you want to land a citation. The early bird gets the worm 9 times out of 10 on HARO, as timely replies are always preferred. 

Step #5: Upload your NAP to the major data aggregators 

Since there are so many business directories online, there’s no way they can rely on manual submissions only. 

If they did, they’d have significant gaps in their data, rendering their directory essentially useless. 

Data aggregators are how obscure directories are still able to have long lists of accurate business information. These services collect business information and then distribute it to other websites. They typically ‘mine’ the information by scouring the internet for public records. 

You can also upload your NAP directly to these data aggregators. 

Why would you want to do that?

It’s a good idea because if data aggregators have your business information, they’ll distribute it to thousands of online directories, and you won’t have to lift a finger. 

Step #6: Regularly monitor your local citations 

Lastly, you need to keep track of your local citations to ensure their accuracy. Should your business go through a chance, you’ll have to update all your citations, which is where citation tracking tools come in handy. 

Not only do inaccurate citations create a poor user experience, but they can also harm your local search rankings. 

Beyond that, it’s also important to keep an eye out for duplicate listings, as they can tank your local SEO. 

As long as you keep your citations up-to-date, you shouldn’t run into any trouble. 

Start Using Local Citations to Improve Your SEO Today 

To summarize, local search citations are integral for local SEO campaigns, and they can take several forms. 

Structured citations appear on business directories, and Google’s algorithm checks them to learn more about local businesses. 

Unstructured citations show up on blogs, social media posts, and news outlets, and they carry lots of local SEO clout. 

However, getting your business listed can be an arduous and time-consuming task (after all, it took this massive article to explain how to do it). 

Data aggregators can speed things up, but you don’t have any control over the listings. Incorrect spellings and inaccurate details happen all the time, and they take a long time to correct. 

The solution?

Sign up for our Local Citation Building Service, where we get your business listed on relevant, high-quality directories that directly relate to your industry and location. Our citations are always accurate and up-to-date, so don’t wait to try our citation service to take your online visibility to the next level.          

Unnatural links aimed at manipulating search rankings can land you manual penalties, ruining your SEO through lost rankings, dips in organic traffic, and even disappearing from the SERPs. 

That’s why it’s worth knowing how to disavow bad backlinks just in case you receive a dreaded manual action from Google. 

If there are any noticeable skeletons in your SEO closet, such as paid links, PBNs, or hidden links, you’ll want to remove them before they destroy your website’s search performance (and so you can sleep better at night). 

Yet, Google’s Disavow Tool isn’t something you should wield lightly. 

It’s an advanced tool that can easily do more harm than good if you don’t know exactly what you’re doing. 

There are plenty of cases where SEOs thought they were disavowing toxic links, only to realize they were actually helping them rank. 

That’s why we’re here to teach you the correct way to use Google’s Disavow Tool, including if disavowing links is the right move for your website – so stay tuned. 

Why Disavow Backlinks? (A Reminder) 

Before we dive into the nitty-gritty of using the Disavow Tool, let’s briefly recap why you would want to disavow certain links in the first place. 

(If you’ve already heard this a million times, feel free to skip this section).

Google wants its search results to provide the best user experience possible, which is why its team designed backlinks to work as ‘credibility votes’ for other sites. If a website contains links to its content from other trusted websites, it’s a sign to Google that the site is also trustworthy.

However, this system only works when links are built honestly. 

In other words, the backlinks must:

• Come from relevant websites (related to your business/products/services) 
• Exist to provide value to readers 
• Be run, written, and built by professionals

Dishonest link-building tactics, such as buying links and using private blog networks, are strictly against Google’s guidelines because they disrupt the entire system. 

These harmful links are:

• Irrelevant and come from low-quality websites
• Provide no value to readers
• Only exist to artificially boost your search rankings 

Since these links throw a stick in the wheel for Google’s backlink/credibility vote system, they punish them with manual actions. 

A manual action or penalty means that Google detects unnatural links coming from your site, and it could result in a significant drop in rankings or remove your content from the SERPs altogether. 

In this scenario, the only way to recover your rankings is to remove the offending links from your backlink profile, and Google’s Disavow Tool enables you to do just that. 

Do you disavow spammy backlinks?

A common question site owners have is if they need to disavow links coming from ‘spam’ websites that offer no value to users. 

This rumor grew because lots of SEO agencies and tools sold website owners on the idea that spam links hurt their search rankings. 

After all, if you see links coming from random foreign-language websites that aren’t related to your content, shouldn’t you disavow them?

While this may have been necessary in the past, the Penguin 4.0 update marked the beginning of Google ignoring spammy links. 

Practically every website is bound to accrue low-grade spam links just by existing, which is why Google trained its algorithm to ignore them. 

The key factor to pay attention to is whether you intentionally built the links or not. 

If you suddenly acquired some spammy links but had no part in building them, you won’t need to worry about disavowing them. 

However, if you bought the links or got them from a PBN, that’s a different story. 

The links that you intentionally build to manipulate the search rankings in your favor are the only types of links you need to disavow. 

Disavowing Backlinks Should be a Last Resort 

Uncle Ben’s famous quote, ‘with great power comes great responsibility’ certainly applies to Google’s Disavow Tool. 

As stated before, using the tool on a whim could lead to disastrous results for your SEO. 

Even Google knows the danger of disavowing links, which is why they include this warning:

The last thing you want to do is disavow a URL or entire domain that’s actually helping you rank, which is deceptively easy to do. 

Why is that?

It’s because there’s pretty much no way to tell which links are harming your site and which are actually helping you rank. 

Google’s John Mueller has been warning SEOs about using the Disavow Tool for quite some time, and there are plenty of instances where he recommends not using it, like what he said in this tweet:

“Essentially, if you weren’t buying backlinks, don’t disavow.”

Ryan Jones, the Senior Vice President of SEO at Razorfish, had similar comments to share:

“I’m still shocked at how many SEOs regularly disavow links. Why? Unless you spammed them or have a manual action you’re probably doing more harm than good.”

These two quotes share the sentiment that disavowing links only makes sense if A) you currently have a manual action or B) suspect you may receive one soon due to the intentional use of manipulative link tactics (like buying links). 

If neither of these factors applies to your backlink profile, you’re better off staying far away from the Disavow Tool. 

Avoid building poor-quality links to begin with 

The #1 way to avoid manual actions from Google is to avoid building manipulative links in the first place. 

As long as you employ a ‘white-hat’ link-building strategy where you build high-quality links that benefit users and search engines, you won’t have much to worry about. 

Links pointing to your content should be:

• Relevant 
• Valuable (answering a user’s question, providing a solution to their problem, etc.) 
• Organic (acquired through outreach instead of paying money or engaging in link schemes) 

Here’s a list of some acceptable link-building practices:

1. Engaging in targeted outreach for guest posts and relevant link placements.
2. Fixing broken links by replacing them with relevant content from your website. 
3. Distribute press releases informing the public of new developments at your business. 
4. Creating outstanding content that generates shares naturally (i.e., infographics, videos, how-to’s, listicles, etc.) 

Here are some link-building tactics to avoid at all costs:

1. Buying links in bulk. 
2. Using links from private blog networks (PBNs). 
3. Hidden links that hide in the background (like white text on a white background). 
4. Spamming backlinks in forum comments via signatures (i.e., including a link to your site in the signature for every post you make). 

Steps to Take Before You Use the Disavow Tool 

If you’re certain beyond a reasonable doubt that you need to disavow harmful links from your website, there are a few steps you’ll need to take to prepare. 

First, you must create a comprehensive list of all the websites linking to your site that you suspect may be harming your SEO. 

How do you do that?

The quickest and easiest way is to use Google Search Console. 

Here’s how to export a complete list of your backlinks in GSC:

1. Log in to Google Search Console. Select the property you want to audit, and navigate to the Links tab on the left-hand sidebar. 
2. This provides access to the Links Report, which lets you view all your backlinks and internal links. 
3. To export a complete list of your backlinks, click on the ‘Export External Links’ button appearing on the top-right corner of the page. 
4. Select the file type you want to export the list as (options include Google Sheets, Excel, and CSV). 

You now have a full list of your backlinks that you can use to pinpoint all the links you believe are harmful. 

Besides going through the list manually, you can also use a tool like SEMrush’s Backlink Audit Tool to speed up the process. 

Not only will this tool help you identify potentially harmful links faster, but it’ll also automatically create a properly formatted disavow file ready to submit to Google. 

If you go the manual route, you’ll need to know how to create a text file containing your disavows (more on this in a bit). 

Try to remove links manually 

The Disavow Tool isn’t the only way you can remove backlinks from your website. You can also attempt to manually remove the backlink by getting in touch with the site owner and asking them to delete the link pointing at your site. 

If you built these links yourself, then you likely already have the contact information for the site owner (and may have an existing rapport with them). 

Let them know that you’d like them to remove the backlink without insinuating that they run a low-quality website. 

Here’s a sample outreach email you can use to request backlink removals:

Hey (site owner), 

I’m currently cleaning up my website, and I’d sincerely appreciate your assistance in removing a few links from your website. 

There’s nothing wrong with your website; I’m just getting rid of as many excess backlinks as possible right now (Google currently views us as a ‘black sheep’ of sorts due to how many links we have). 

Here’s the page on your site that contains the link:

www.fictionalsite.com/blog-post

Here’s the page on my site that you linked to:

www.yoursite.com/product-page

Rather than disavowing or no-following the link, I need it to be completely removed. Please ping me as soon as you’ve removed the links. 

Thanks so much for your help, 

Fictional Site Owner 

Decide if you truly need to disavow links 

Lastly, you should ensure that disavowing links is truly the only option you have left. 

Remember that Google’s algorithm will automatically devalue spammy links that you didn’t intentionally build, so you shouldn’t panic if you see random links coming from some fishy-looking URLs. 

You should ONLY use the Disavow Tool if:

1. You currently have a manual action negatively affecting your search performance.
2. You know for a fact that you build manipulative links that could lead to manual actions in the future.

Also, do your best to exhaust all other options before disavowing. Besides reaching out to site owners to manually remove links, you can also try no-following links you think are suspect. 

How to Disavow Backlinks Using Google’s Tool 

Okay, enough warnings; it’s time to learn how to use Google’s Disavow Tool to get rid of unnatural links harming your SEO. 

You’ll need the list of backlinks that you exported from GSC, so don’t forget to complete that step before creating your disavow file. 

Once you have your list ready, pinpoint every link (or domain) that you believe is either causing a manual action or may cause one in the future. It helps to create a separate Word file where you copy and paste all the links you want to disavow. 

From there, you’ll need to draft a .txt file where you list each URL in the proper format. 

Correct formatting for disavow files

Here are the exact specifications you need to follow to create a disavow file (as explained by Google):

• Each disavow MUST have its own line (do not include two disavows on the same line) 
• If you want to disavow an entire domain, you have to prefix it with ‘domain:’
• You must encode the text file in ​​UTF-8 or 7-bit ASCII.
• The file name has to end in .txt.
• The maximum URL length is 2,048 characters.
• The maximum file size is 100,000 lines (including blank lines and comments) or 2 MB total. 
• Use the # sign to add any comments (Google will ignore them, but they can help organize the file).

 Here are a few example lines for reference:

# one page to disavow

http://www.spamsite.com/useless-post.hmtl

# one domain to disavow

domain:spamsite.com

Upload your disavow file to Google’s tool 

As soon as your disavow file is ready, all that’s left is to upload it using Google’s Disavow Tool. 

First, head to the Disavow tool page, and select the property that you want your disavow file to apply to. 

After that, select the disavow file that you created and hit Open to upload it to Google. 

Wait and monitor your SEO metrics 

Unfortunately, Google disavow files do not take immediate effect. 

John Mueller has confirmed this, stating that:

“This is a process that happens incrementally over a period of time where I would expect it to have an effect over the course of … I don’t know … maybe three, four, five, six months … kind of step-by-step going in that direction.”

In other words, it’s a slow process. 

All you can do is keep an eye on your SEO metrics until you hopefully see a recovery to your fallen rankings. 

How to Cancel Disavow Files  

Since using Google’s Disavow Tool is so risky, they included a way to remove existing disavow files should you discover they did more harm than good. 

Navigate back to the Disavow Tool page and select the property you want to edit. 

Click on the Cancel Disavowals button to remove any existing disavow files for your property (remember to repeat this process if you have different properties for the http and https versions of your site). 

Much like uploading a disavow file, this is not an instant process. It can take Google several weeks or months to incorporate the removal into their index as they recrawl the web and reprocess your web pages. 

Build High-Quality Links with Authority Builders 

At this point, it’s no secret that disavowing backlinks is risky business. 

Disavowing a helpful domain or backlink by mistake can have catastrophic results on your SEO, and it can take months to recover (if it ever does). 

The solution?

Avoid having to disavow links by building high-quality links with Authority Builders. Our ABC Plus campaigns offer hands-free link-building campaigns, and the links we build follow Google’s guidelines to the letter. 

Should you need to disavow some harmful links you built in the past, we also offer expert Link Audits, so don’t wait to try out our services today.           

As with everything in SEO it’s about your ROI. And not just the direct cost, for SEOs time is money.

Because we’ve made outreach our business we are always exploring different strategies that will help to reduce costs and maximize ROI and in this article, we want to share some of those strategies.

You’re going to learn a quick way to increase your response rate on outreach emails by 268% with hardly any effort.

I want to share with you some small changes you can make to the way you set up your outreach that will help to get blog owners to listen to your proposals, and ultimately, to increase your ability to place links.

At the same time, we’re going to run tests to provide data that either supports the theory or dismisses it. Most importantly, the changes are easy to make and require little to no investment.

It boils down to this…

Blog owners love their blogs. It’s an understatement to suggest they’re protective over them. Some because they’re business people, they see it as protecting their investment.

Others because they started the blog as a passion project and watched it grow into something special.

Bottom line, they’re very selective, it’s not easy to get them to agree to a guest post and these days, they are flooded with proposals which makes it even more difficult.

With that in mind, consider how many of those emails they get day-after-day are canned templates, that look spammy. They give other SEOs a bad name and make our lives much more difficult.

A lot of prospectors use a template that they send out to hundreds if not thousands of mined emails addresses. It’s about bulk, the more, the better.

The problem is, it’s often the same template used, it’s very clearly a template, it’s also very impersonal.

If it looks like spam, walks like spam… it’s probably spam, right?

We all get contacted by African princes and the World bank on a near-daily basis. We instinctively know what spam looks like and we are very quick to distrust unsolicited email. Rightfully so.

With outreach, we have to do everything possible (without taking up too much time) to ensure that our prospecting stands out from the crowd, but not only stand out we make sure it doesn’t come across as spammy because we’ll immediately hit a brick wall.

There are a variety ways to do this, and two simple tweaks to your outreach I’d like to explore, (which experience tells me really makes a difference) are to use a branded email address AND to use a well-designed signature block.

I think that they are effective in increasing positive replies to outreach because they help to demonstrate that you are contacting the prospect from a position of authority and trust and these “strategies” help to the receiver that impression.

Why branded email addresses are effective

So many prospectors do their cold outreach with a Gmail account. It’s easy to understand why. They are cheap, quick to set up and if you send out less than a couple of hundred emails a day, they’ll very likely to hit the inbox.

However, business or official organizations rarely do.

Most of the spam or unsolicited emails I receive is from generic email addresses, so unless I recognize the sender I am very unlikely to open it. However, if I receive a branded email that I am not expecting I’m assuming that I’ve given up my email for a reason or they have a reason to contact me.

I’m much more likely to consider opening it.

With that in mind, when running outreach, if you are able to get a client email address for outreach, it’s definitely worthwhile because the client is likely to be niche relevant and hopefully considered an authority.

And that’s instantly recognizable.

If it’s not possible, using your agency’s brand or creating a brand for your affiliate site works too.

That’s the theory, and I’m going to run some tests to see if the data validates this theory.

Why you should set up a signature block

In a nutshell, it seems logical that using a professional signature block will instantly let the reader of the email know you’re serious and it should add trust and validity to your offer.

Readers not expecting an email will make a judgment in just a few seconds whether they are going to take the time to read it. So you need to grab their attention and the theory is a signature block helps with that.

The good news is, it takes minutes to set up. If you not able to create one yourself, there are loads of tutorials on YouTube or you can get a signature block made on Fiverr, for next to nothing.

Something like this:

Or a little simpler:

If you can, it would make sense to use a signature block from the client when talking about client SEO. Often the client has a brand identity that immediately acts as a trust signal for blogs within that niche.

For example:

I have clients who are lawyers specializing in the construction industry. Naturally, they’re looking for links from authority or niche relevant sites related to the construction industry.

Sending out prospecting emails from an email address that has lawyers in the address and that has a signature block with logo and contact details really add authority to my email before they’ve even read it.

The first and most important goal is to get your recipients to open your email and read it, the first paragraph at least.

You could have the best offer in the world of outreach but if very few recipients give you the time of day, it won’t matter.

The email address can help to build trust. A signature block builds trust, and so if I have something of value for them, I am more likely to be listened to and more likely to persuade them to give me a placement.

And equally, as importantly, they help to differentiate my email from the rubbish, spammy emails the prospect receives from other prospectors.

The data behind the strategy

It passes the sniff test (it’s logical) but at ABC we don’t leave it at that, we love to test everything. So, we’ve run a little test to collect data on just how effective implementing branded email addresses and signature blocks can be.

The test subject is a client. A men’s fashion E-commerce website. I sent 600 emails to fashion blogs in total.

An unbranded, Gmail address, used in this niche, had an 8% success rate (16 positive replies from 200). Which, from experience, is pretty standard.

Depending on the niche and how you have sourced your prospects, you can expect 5-10% positive reply rate and 8% falls in line with that.

The 200 emails sent out from a branded email address (In this case, the client’s branded email address) showed a significant increase in positive replies with 21.5% positive replies (43 positive replies out of 200).

Having used the same semi-personalized email template on both groups, and with similar delivery rate, this is would be data that confirms having a branded email address increases the number of positive replies we can expect and significantly so.

It’s a significant difference. Scale that over the days and months and you will see a major difference in your ROI. Now we need to measure the effect having a signature block has on a reply rate.

Looking to compare positive replies from an email sent out to 200 prospects with just a branded email address, in comparison to replies from an email sent out to 200 prospects using both branded email address AND a signature block, we can see an increase of 8%.

The signature block group had a total of 59 positive replies, which is just under 30% (29.5).  That’s x3 more positive replies than a prospecting email sent out from a generic emails address and without a signature block.

Key takeaways

We tested 2 small changes to the way we prospect potential link placements. These changes, from experience and common sense, tells us they increase the effectiveness of our outreach.

Specifically, we wanted to explore what effect, if any, having a branded email address has on outreach and also, how a professional signature block affects the number of positive results we receive.

Both tests provided us with data that reinforces these changes.

Yes, using a branded email address ( in the test a client email address) has a really positive effect on the number of positive replies you can expect to get from prospecting. In the test case, it more than doubled. From 8% to 21.5%.

Every niche will deliver different results, as will the quality of your email copy and the value of your offer, but the results suggest it has to be worth exploring.

The second test included incorporating a signature block. Because it was a client-branded email address, we used a client signature block. Again the results proved that using a signature block positively impacts the number of positive replies we get when prospecting. Specifically from 21% to 29%.

The difference between 8% to 29% really drives home the point. These changes really make a difference to outreach performance.

As with everything else we do in SEO, trust matters. The data suggests being able to differentiate your email from others, by have easily identifiable trust signals like a signature block and branded email address, increases the effectiveness of your outreach. These are both strategies you should look to implement and test for yourself.

There’s a lot of confusion around ranking aged domains..

Sometimes they work great and they get you a quick edge over using a brand new domain.

And sometimes they fail miserably.

Constantin Oesterling is a member of The Affiliate Lab since the beginning and is one of the top contributing members.

He’s about to take you though the whole journey of how he took a 50k search/month affiliate keyword from nowhere to page 1 using an aged domain.

You’ll learn about his technical setup, his onsite optimization strategies, and the backlinks he built in this follow-along case study.

Introduction

I’m not going to bore you with fluff and theories.

Instead, I’ll share every step of my journey from not ranking at all to ranking on page 1 for a money keyword with more than 50,000 searches per month (80%+ U.S. traffic) using an aged domain.

You won’t find long explanations why I think something worked or didn’t work, but just the details of what exactly I did and what happened.

Anyway, let’s jump right into it.

Q2 2018: Niche and Domain Selection

Instead of researching a niche and finding a domain, I bought a pre-built site on an aged and semi-relevant domain from DominatingPBNs.

The niche was in home improvement and looked promising. Although monetized with Amazon, it’s a category with “OK” commissions considering the relatively high average product price.

The domain looked great, as well. It had 100+ RDs already, including some quite powerful ones. This meant I had to build fewer pillow links and would likely get a head start.

The site itself had about 10 pages with a total of 20k words. Half of them money pages, the other half informational ones.

It’s a branded domain with a portal homepage, which both were important factors for me.

​While micro niche sites work well too, I just prefer branded domains.

Overall a cool package to get started without having to do much more than building links and adding content (or so I thought).

The site didn’t have any visitors to speak of when I bought it. Maybe 10 a day, maybe less.

One issue was the SERP layout for the main keyword I talk about here. It’s got ads, of course, featured snippets, people also ask, videos, Google shopping, and even a freakin’ map pack.

Due to the layout, I knew I wouldn’t get many clicks unless I actually rank #1 and not just on page 1.

I also had to beat Amazon, Walmart, Wayfair, and several niche-specific authority sites with DR60+ domains.

But who doesn’t like a little challenge?

I figured if I get the page to rank for its main keyword, it will rank for related keywords, and long-tails. These areas would have less clustered SERPs.

Q2 2018: Initial Site Tweaks

These are the first tweaks I applied to the site after I bought it.

Bloat Removal

One of the first things I like to do with every WordPress site is to remove some of the bloat it adds to pages.

Clearfy is a great plugin for that. Below are the settings I usually apply.

Performance Optimization

I didn’t only want the site to be as bloat-free as possible with WordPress, but also, loading as fast as possible.

This meant moving the site to a WordPress hosting setup that allowed me to squeeze as much performance out of it as possible.

Matt has an in-depth article on hosting for SEO on his blog.

​The money page in question has a huge amount of content on it, including images, tables, etc. and still loads in less than 2 seconds, which is good enough for me (and Google).

​I also optimized all images using Shortpixel, which usually has a huge impact on page size and speed.

SEO Plugin

Although I don’t think it matters too much which SEO plugin you use as long as it’s a decent one, I just love Rank Math and that’s what I migrated the site to.

Meta Data Tweaks

I also went through all meta titles and descriptions and tweaked them for higher CTRs.

I like to make sure the main keyword is being mentioned first and to repeat it in the meta description.

The style I usually use looks like this:

Title: Best Blue Button 2019 (Unbiased & Detailed Review)

Description: Want to get the best blue button money can buy? Make sure to read our review before you end up with a turquoise one.

Basic CRO

In this case, I didn’t have to do much other than to adjust the style of the CTA buttons and change the button text from “Check Latest Price on Amazon” to just “Check Price.”

Since the design and layout were already decent, I didn’t worry too much about low click rates.

Internal Anchors

I decided to go heavy on internal keyword anchors. About 80-90% of my internal anchors contain target keywords, secondary keywords, or synonyms.

I tested this a number of times and at least with a small number of pages, I found this to be safe and work rather well.

​I don’t use branded or URL anchors at all internally.

​Just either keywords or generic words if I feel like it makes sense to add a few non-keyword anchors to the mix.

Q2 2018: First Link Building Campaign

I started sending some links right after the initial tweaks. Because I don’t plan on flipping the site and it already had decent authority links, I figured it would be safe enough to use some generic PBNs.

In Q2 2018, I sent two guest post links and about 20 generic PBNs. The guest posts pointed to the money page, and the PBNs to various inner pages as well as the homepage.

For guest posts, I use Authority Builders. With their thorough vetting process and easy-to-use ordering, it takes most of the headache out of building guest posts.

Because which SEO would want to spend more time communicating with site owners and writers than doing actual SEO?

Anchor Strategy

I kept target anchors and secondary keywords limited to about 50% and the other 50% were generic, brand, and URL anchors.

I didn’t follow very specific ratios at this point.

If anchor text analysis starts to get too difficult, read this comprehensive guide.

Results

The money page wasn’t even ranking top 100 yet for the target keyword.

And I knew why…

Q3 2018: TF*IDF and More Links

It was time to launch WebSite Auditor and actually optimize the content.

So far I had only touched the meta titles and descriptions but hadn’t actually optimized the pages.

Keyword Selection for WebSite Auditor

I like to use the broad variation of the initial target keyword to optimize the content around that.

What I mean by this is instead of optimizing the content for “best blue button,” I’d optimize it primarily for just “blue button” while still keeping the “best” in meta title, description, and h1.

This way, money pages tend to rank for both and not just the “best” variation.

If you only optimize for “best blue button,” you potentially leave a ton of traffic on the table.

​That being said, I still also run a TF*IDF analysis on “best blue button” to make sure I’m not heavily under- or over-optimized for either variation.

TF*IDF Optimization

The first thing I do is to optimize the frequency of the main keyword.

My goal is to hit more or less exactly the transition between the green and the yellow part of the bars on the screenshot above. The bottom third of the yellow part is fine too.

I then switch to the “Single-word Keywords” tab and do the same for the words “blue” and “button.”

Then I would try to include all “Multi-word Keywords” on my page that 30% or more of the competing pages mention. I also pay attention to their frequencies.

For “Single-word Keywords,” I usually just include the ones that 50%+ of competing pages mention.

I also check how often the main keyword is being mentioned in subheadings and alt tags on average and would try to match that.

I optimized all money pages this way.

Link Building

In Q3 2018, I built about another 20 generic PBN links, more than half of which went to the homepage and just one or two to the money page in question.

I’m using that strategy mostly to get some link signals while working on the on-page factors and letting everything age.

I didn’t actually intend to really rank using these. They’re just better than no links if used in moderation.

Results

Nothing else happened in Q3 2018, because I’ve mostly been distracted with other projects and still do way too much of the work on my own.

What did happen was that the money page started to rank on page 5-7 of Google for its target keyword.

Q4 2018: It’s Alive!

Supporting Content

I added 5 child pages for the money page. Instead of using informational content, I decided to go with subcategories of the main product.

These subcategories included topics like “blue buttons for women,” “cheap blue buttons,” etc.

Then, the main money page linked to them contextually and the child pages linked back to the main money page.

Stronger Links

At this point, it made sense to build stronger links. The money page was already on page 2-3 of Google.

First, I added an anchor strategy to my Linkio setup. This makes it easier to track ratios, and indexation of the linking pages.

Next, I built Authority Builder 5 guest posts and 2 outreach link insertions to the money page. Then, I sent 4 guest posts to the new child pages and 4 strong niche-specific homepage PBN links.

For most of the PBNs, I pointed them at the homepage. This helps boost its rank, and at the same time, passes link juice down the money pages.

Results

By December 2018, I was ranking #12 for the target keyword. Rankings shot up after adding the child pages and more links.

But I still wasn’t able to break through to page 1.

Q1 2019: The (Endless?) Plateau

Playing with PBNS

I assumed that all I needed to break through to page 1 was more link power.

I sent about 10 PBNs, all homepage links from PBNs with 100+ RDs and most of them pointed to the money page I wanted to rank.

I built 5-7 guest post links as well and continued to build tier 2 links.

Citations & Other Pillow Links

To balance out the current link building campaign that heavily focused on inner pages at the time, I got a bunch of citations that were linking to the homepage.

Thanks to the already existing link profile of the aged domain, not too many were needed.

FAQ Section

To gain more featured snippets and relevance, I added a FAQ section at the bottom of the page that answered the “People Also Ask” questions that Google was showing for the main keyword.

​Internal Anchors

I tested different internal anchor ratios to make sure there’s nothing wrong with the strategy I was using.

None of the ratios I tried made much of a difference, so I eventually reverted back to the one I was using initially.

Results

The rentals, citations, and on-page tweaks didn’t move the needle at all.

The rankings were plateauing for months and actually slightly dropping to the bottom of page 2.

I knew I had to do something more drastic than power up the page with links and play with small on-page tweaks.

Q2 2019: Hello Page 1

Removal of PBNS

I canceled all recent PBN links. They didn’t work in this case, so I wasn’t concerned about any drops if I wasn’t replacing them.

Better Links

I continued to build only ABC guest post links on relevant sites with DR40+ and organic traffic. No PBNs, and nothing weird.

Instead, just guest posts with a single special requirement:

The content of the guest posts had to mention my main keyword or a variation of it in its title.

​In terms of anchors, I went heavier on brand anchors and less heavy on keyword and generic ones and completely stopped building URL anchors.

Keyword Cannibalization

All of the 5 supporting money pages I added under the main money page were also competing for the main target keyword.

This was happening to pretty much all of my competitors as well. And it wasn’t like the main money page was dropping out of the SERPs and getting replaced by one of these pages or anything like that.

The supporting pages were just ranking on page 3-4 for the same main keyword, while the main page was consistently on page 2.

They were also ranking well for their intended sub-product, and the SERPs for each of them clearly indicated that Google prefers to rank dedicated pages that target exactly these keywords, so I didn’t really like the idea of dropping them.

After the huge plateau that links couldn’t get the site out of, I still decided to merge these pages with the main money page to avoid any potential keyword cannibalization issues.

Fine-Tuning with Surfer

After I merged the pages, it was time to fine-tune the single remaining money page with Surfer.

I particularly paid attention to “Exact keyword density,” query word ratios, and popular words and phrases.

This should be self-explanatory.

​I tried to get my densities as close to the top 5 as possible and excluded domains like Amazon from the analysis.

​Outbound Links

I also added quite a few outbound links to decent external resources that answer a question related to the product category in more detail than my page.

Results

It took me two attempts to find the best keyword densities.

After that, I was back to the top of page 2 instead of the bottom of page 2.

In early June right before the Google update, the page jumped to the middle of page 1 for a day or two.

Since then it slightly dropped again but has remained on page 1 for almost 2 weeks now.

Unfortunately, the rankings of the child pages I merged didn’t really transfer to the destination page.

To this day, I’m not exactly sure if the mild cannibalization was actually an issue.

Or, if just the fine-tuning with Surfer and the content update when I merged the child pages along with better-optimized guest post links eventually caused the page to jump to page 1.

Takeaways (Warning: Some Speculations)

Using an aged domain did give me a head start and allowed me to use PBNs at an early stage. It was already ranking for some long-tail variations when I bought it. If you need to check the age of a domain, you can use our free tool here.

​TF*IDF optimization and fine-tuning of densities with Surfer did have a positive impact on rankings and should be part of every on-page SOP this year.

​It’s also a good idea to keep your site fast, bloat-free, and implement Schema (Rank Math handles that partially).

Keyword cannibalization may or may not have been an issue in this particular case. Due to the way I resolved it, it’s impossible to know for sure if it was. But in general, it’s always a good idea to avoid it.

When building links, it makes sense to make sure the sites receive organic traffic, have decent metrics, aren’t link farms that link to too much spam and to keep the linking content as relevant as possible to the target page.

​In terms of anchors, going heavy on “branded + natural” and “branded + partial match” seems to work well currently, while just natural/generic and URL anchors seem to have the least impact on rankings.

​You can rank sites with just content updates, content optimization, and link building. There is no need to add a ton of pages to get started or even to publish new ones frequently.

If you start a new site, don’t repeat my mistake. Make sure you actually have the time and resources to rank it within a couple of months.

If I hadn’t been as distracted by other projects, I’m sure I could have ranked this site in half the time.

Conclusion

It was a long and bumpy ride, but the money page eventually got on page 1 and is ranking between huge authority sites.

(It looks like it’s dropping in and out of SERPs right now, but that’s just Ahrefs not being accurate – I verified this with several other rank trackers and manual checks)

The money page picks up about 4,000 visitors per month, 30% of them click on Amazon links resulting in lower four figures of monthly commissions.

Overall an interesting challenge, because I really wasn’t sure if I could actually make it to page 1 with the limited time and resources I had allocated to that site, especially when I hit a plateau.

So in summary, we’ve discussed my technical setup, optimization techniques and backlink strategies in this month-to-month follow along case study.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask in the comments below.

Google’s algorithm updates around 500 to 600 times each year, and that means that SEO best practices are constantly changing.

That’s one reason it is vital that you regularly monitor key SEO metrics to ensure that your website is properly optimized for ranking.

SEO metrics let you see what is working and what needs adjustment.

In fact, the ROI of SEO can be over 12x higher than other types of digital marketing if done right.

With that said, let’s jump into what SEO metrics are and how to measure them.

Keep scrolling to learn more!

What are SEO Metrics and Why It Matters

SEO metrics are bits of data points or indicators that you can keep track of and monitor over time.

These metrics help you measure performance, health, and the overall optimization of a website.

Whether you’re trying to keep track of your engagement or SERP authority, monitoring your SEO metrics can help you plan out a winning strategy for the future.

There are many different SEO metrics to keep track of, and just as many tools you can use to measure your success.

SEO metrics help you measure how effective your SEO efforts are and then make changes based on that data.

If you don’t regularly check on these key metrics, then you may fail to notice opportunities or setbacks.

For example, if you have been targeting an audience, and your target audience isn’t staying engaged with your content, then you may fail to notice your bounce rate increasing.

As a result, you may not be able to fix a problem on your page that is causing a higher bounce rate that would otherwise be resolved sooner.

With that said, let’s explore the top metrics you should track:

What are the Top SEO Metrics to Track?

SEO metrics are critical information points to create better strategies or improve existing methods.

But, how do you know which metrics to measure?

Some of the metrics you would benefit from tracking are:

• Engagement metrics
• Crawled pages
• Location
• Local visibility (if you have a brick-and-mortar location)

Content engagement metrics are important for business because they show you how your content strategy lines up with search intent.

Customer engagement is related to profitability, as engaged users are actually more likely to buy, become repeat customers, and refer your service to people they know.

The most relevant pages that are picked by search engine crawlers with the best content appear at the top of Google’s search results and 75% of website visitors never go beyond the first page of search results.

Website crawling is the main way search engines know what your web pages are all about. This allows them to connect to millions of search results at once.

Keeping track of your pages crawled lets you know if Google is indexing your content.

Additionally, here are the top SEO metrics you can track to measure your SEO efforts:

Organic traffic

The amount of organic traffic your website gets should be one of the main metrics you keep track of because this ranking factor can directly affect your SEO success.

In fact, organic search drives 53.3% of all website traffic.

What’s more, B2B companies generate 2x more revenue from organic search than any other channel.

Without any organic search traffic, there can be no SEO-based conversions or revenue. Basically, if you aren’t getting page views, you need to change what you’re doing.

Here are a few tips for increasing your organic traffic:

• Use long-tail keywords
• Research link building
• Consider guest posting
• Optimize your on-page SEO
• Create visual content such as video
• Promote your content on social media platforms

Organic conversion rates

Organic conversions are an important SEO metric because they help you understand if you’re gaining the right kind of traffic for your website.

If your traffic numbers are rather high, but your conversion rates are low, that is a sign that you’re not targeting the right people.

You’re attracting people who aren’t interested in the products or services you’re offering.

Here are some tips for boosting your organic conversions:

• Link your website’s blog articles to relevant products or services pages
• Create a “live chat” button on your website
• Encourage visitors to sign up for your newsletters
• Retarget some of your website’s organic traffic

Keyword rankings

Keeping track of keyword rankings is a vital SEO metric to track.

They help you benchmark your process and offer early signs that your SEO efforts are paying off.

Additionally, rankings provide an overview of your current organic market share as well as any keyword ranking opportunities that might have been overlooked.

Here is some actionable advice for keyword research:

• Know your audience
• Keep your business goals in mind
• Check out your competition
• Conceptualize your content
• Stay consistent
• Optimize your content and landing pages for your target keyword

Organic search visibility

The search visibility score is the percentage of clicks that are estimated based on your organic ranking positions across all of the keywords that you are currently tracking.

Search visibility is one of the first metrics you may notice on your campaign dashboard.

Here are some tips for better organic search visibility

• Use original, high-quality images
• Add social sharing buttons to help promote content
• Create a catchy headline
• Align the primary CTA above the fold
• Add visuals such as videos or infographics

CTR (click-through-rate)

The #1 Google organic search result has an average click-through rate (CTR) of 31.7%, and this result is 10x more likely to get a click compared to the tenth result.

Additionally, only 0.78% of Google search engine users clicked on something from the second page.

Moving up one position in Google’s search engine rankings increases CTR by 30.8%.

Domain authority

Domain authority is a search engine ranking score and a metric that should be kept track of. Originally developed by Moz, DA predicts how likely a website is to rank in search results.

DA scores can range from 1-100 with the higher scores corresponding to a higher chance of ranking.

Tips for a higher DA score:

• Optimize your title tags, image alt-tags, and content
• Produce high-quality content
• Include internal links to improve the searcher experience
• Run an audit to see what’s working and what isn’t

New backlinks and referring domains

Referring domains, which are often called linking domains, are external websites from which your web page gets one or more backlinks.

Backlinks and referring domains are fairly similar and both a part of your link-building strategy.

The number of backlinks is a good metric to track because as a business owner, you would want to see where any authoritative backlinks are coming from and what that means for your SEO efforts.

Additionally, you would want to know if any low-quality links are backlinking to your website.

By removing any spammy backlinks, you will also boost your domain authority.

Bounce rate

Bounce rate is a metric that measures the percentage of people who land on your website but do nothing on it.

For example, you searched, “how to put together an office chair.”

The first result seems like it would answer your question but it doesn’t, so you click the back button.

Many actions taken on your website such as this would be considered a high bounce rate.

Here is how to lower your bounce rate:

• Keep track of your page load time
• Make your website search friendly
• Make your website easy to navigate
• Focus on a clean website design
• Keep mobile-friendliness in mind
• Make website content easy to read
• Write in short paragraphs
• Use different types of content

Page speed and core web vitals

Core web vitals are three main metrics that score a user’s experience while loading a web page.

1. Largest contentful paint: LCP is a page’s main content. Google states that this is a simple measurement that looks at the render time of the largest image or text block on a website link.
2. Cumulative layout shift: CLS is content shifting when a page is scrolled through.
3. First input delay: FID is the page load in a browser as a user clicks on a visual element on a landing page such as a button, an image, or a scroll bar, and that page is immediately ready to receive input.

LCP is an important metric to track because it can directly affect the load speed of a webpage. This can affect user experience, bounce rate, dwell time, and SEO performance.

Let me use an example here to help explain cumulative layout shifts.

Have you ever been scrolling through an article, and all of a sudden the content shifts randomly up or down?

The layout shifts each time something begins to load. That’s CLS and it’s something that should be monitored for a better user experience.

FID metrics score how quickly page content loads, how fast a browser can respond to a user’s request, or even how unstable content is as it loads.

This expectation is that you can click on something even if the page is still loading. Measuring this metric can help keep your users from leaving your website due to slow response times.

Additionally, Pagespeed Insights help you analyze the performance of your web page and show you how to boost its speed.

It reviews all three core web vitals on desktop and mobile browsers.

SEO Metric Tools

As I mentioned in the beginning, Google’s algorithm updates all of the time, and sometimes updates can help your rankings, but other times it can leave you feeling confused or even concerned.

The good news is that there are a ton of different SEO tools (both paid and free) out there to help you measure your technical SEO metrics so you can keep track of what’s working right now and what isn’t.

With that said, let’s jump into some great tools you can begin using right now:

HubSpot Website Grader

Website grader analysis is an awesome tracking tool that helps measure marketing effectiveness of a website.

It provides an inbound marketing score on a scale of 0-100.

It incorporates:

• Website organic traffic
• Helps you avoid crawl errors
• SEO
• Blogosphere
• Social Media
• Inbound marketing factors

It also can provide basic advice on how a website can be improved from a marketing SEO strategy standpoint and helps users understand how their website compares to any competition.

Google’s Data Studio

Google’s Data Studio can easily report on data from a huge variety of sources without any programming needed.

In just a couple of minutes, you can connect to databases including BigQuery or Google Marketing platform products including Google Ads, Analytics, Display & Video 360 and so much more!

Google Search Console

Google’s Search Console is a free service developed by Google that helps you monitor, maintain, and troubleshoot your website’s online presence in Google’s search engine results pages or SERPs.

You don’t have to sign up for Search Console to be included in search results, but Search Console does help you understand and improve the way Google views your website.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics includes features that can help users identify trends and patterns regarding who visits their website.

With Google Analytics, you can enable data collection, reporting, and other integration with other platforms such as WordPress.

Google Analytics is one of the best tools out there for monitoring and analyzing traffic on your website.

It gives you a huge amount of data about your target audience, what they are looking for, and how they’re finding their website.

Here is some advice for using Google Analytics:

• Use segments
• Track search queries on a particular page
• Remove your IP address
• Monitor web page speeds
• Get emailed versions of your reports
• Use annotations
• Create business goals
• Optimize visitor insights
• Compare historical traffic

Google Trends

Google trends is a tool developed by Google that explores trending topics on Google search.

You can use this tool to discover what your target audience is searching for online and then analyze the information to gain a better understanding of your customers.

You can then create a specific page or piece of content to bring in more of what your audience wants to see.

Google trends is also a great tool for content marketing.

Here are a few tips for using Google Trends:

• Understand keyword search volume
• Identify seasonal trends (these topics are only being searched for an average time or time frame of 90 days)
• Avoid temporarily popular topics
• Find trending relevant subjects
• Use trend predictions

Let’s Wrap It Up!

SEO metrics are vital tools for ranking, traffic, and so much more.

If you can’t fully measure your SEO efforts, then you won’t be able to see what is and isn’t working.

If you’re ready to succeed but aren’t sure where to start, contact us today!

Sign up now!

You’re going to have to learn how to put together great outreach teams if you want to build strong links and develop valuable relationships with the other people in your niche.

If you’ve tried putting good outreach teams together before, I don’t have to tell you that it’s not that easy. Trust me, I know. I’ve been managing outreach and outreach teams for years now. I’ve made most of the mistakes that it’s possible to make.

But on the plus side, that means I’ve finally figured out where all the pitfalls are. In this guide, I’m going to show you all of them.

I’m going to teach you what not to do when building out your training documents, hiring and guiding your people and managing your tools and assets. By the end, you’re going to learn how to hop over all of the mistakes I made so that you can build a perfect team the first time.

Nothing happens until you have a clear process. So the first mistake is simply not doing that.

1. Not Building A Clear Process

Every successful effort starts with a plan, and when it comes to outreach, you want one that meets several criteria. It has to be easy to understand (especially if you’re passing it off to staff), it has to cover each possible step and it has to be easy to repeat.

For my own team, the basic process for guest posts goes a little something like this…

• Build a list of websites
• Find their email addresses
• Contact them
• Review the site make sure it passes verification* (This step can be done after the first)
• Haggle prices
• Write the content
• Send the content off
• Verify the content goes live
• Ensure the blogger gets their cheddar

There may be reasons that you have to go with a different process, but no matter what it is, get it in writing.

This will give you a plan of attack, and something to compare against the messier process of getting things posted in the real world. After you have a plan, develop it into complex training materials such as procedures and training videos.

You can always add extra steps later if you find out that certain tasks come up a lot more often than you expect.

Of course, you don’t want to just repeat a substandard process over and over. Your next step is to step up tracking so that you can truly measure what’s working.

BONUS: Free Guide on How to Scale Outreach for your Agency

2. Not Tracking Data and Drawing Statistics

How much you can improve your first plan (which might not be the best) is going to depend on how effectively you’re tracking your data. Without tracking data, you could be stuck with a plan that’s not worth its budget, and doomed to fail.

In my campaigns, I’ve started tracking all of the following against my performance in the previous cycle…

1. How many sites were identified?
2. How much contact information was collected?
3. How many sites are emailed?
4. How many of those emails got replies?
5. How many of the responding sites did we agree to work with?

This information is pretty easy to track with just an excel sheet, but it’s even easier if you use an email platform like Pitchbox that will track it all for you.

When you measure the sum of the first item against the sum for the last one, you get your conversion rate. To break it down a little further—

If you email 100 websites a week, with 15 replies and 3 placements, then you know that your conversion rate is 3%. Now, let’s assume you have a much more ambitious goal than that, like 60 new links per month.

If you take that number and divide by your conversion rate, you know how much you need to multiply your efforts. In this case, by 20.

20 x 100 (the number of sites you reached out to in your first run) is going to be 2000 sites. Assuming your conversion rate holds (or better yet, you can improve that, too), that’s how many sites you’ll need to reach out to in order to hit your goal of 60 new links.

When you have this data and you’re tracking it, it’s very easy to work out what it’s going to take to scale your team and hit your goals.

That’s not all the tracking you’re going to want to do, though. You need to make sure you’re also tracking all the work you’re doing so the process works at all.

3. Not Properly Recording Actions

You need to keep track of a lot of actions if you want your outreach process to go smoothly.

For example, it’s very easy to lose track of which webmaster agreed to what price, or what contact information for them is correct.

The spreadsheet or tool you use to keep track of all these actions needs to be adopted very early before there’s a chance that losing track of them will grind your outreach process to a halt.

Once you’ve chosen how and where the information will be recorded, start tracking all of the following…

• When you found the website
• When you emailed the website
• Who sent the original outreach to the website
• Who handled the reply
• How soon the reply was sent

This is only a starting list. The truth is, you’re going to find a lot more to record as you continue to develop your process. The more effort you put into tracking different actions, the easier it will be to improve on them.

Once you’ve eliminated the risk of tripping over missed information, you should consider some of the ways you could fall short despite great data-keeping. First, by failing to hire people who won’t excel at the work.

4. Not Hiring Based on Key Competencies

Placing links can be really expensive, and that can encourage you to cut costs in other areas. Staffing isn’t really an area where you can go too cheap. The people doing the outreach will be making your first impression for you, and form emails will only take them so far.

Start with a strong hiring process. You want to ask each person…

• Have you worked as a VA before?
• Are you familiar with spreadsheets?
• Can you speak/write English at a college level?
• Have you done similar work before?

The person who can answer yes to all these questions will be a lot easier to train. In fact, they’ll probably be able to hit the ground running. Still, make sure that you tell them exactly what you need from them for each step.

After that, manage them to avoid burnout. Most staff will burn out if their sole job is to find new leads 8 hours a day.

Give them a different task after 4 hours or alternate their task every 30 mins.

Once you have a good process and good people, your future expansion is going to depend on getting them to deliver their best and get better. That’s going to take setting some vital Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

5. Not Setting KPIs for Your Staff

Each role in the outreach team should have its own KPIs. This helps to establish expectations and gives you something to measure future performance against from campaign to campaign.

The best KPIs for your team may be determined by unique factors, but some roles tend to be universal across outreach projects. I recommend that for each of the following roles, you consider the corresponding indicators.

Prospectors: Eligible websites, how many sites are they looking for?

Content Writers: QA on good titles, solid link placements, quality content, authority links, inner links

Emails Handlers: How many emails should they be replying to a day?

Start with high standards and use the data you record to push your team to do even better. When practical, work with them one-on-one to get better insights into which KPIs can be improved and how.

Even a great team can collapse into confusion and infighting if you make the next mistake: Not establishing a clear chain of command.

BONUS: Free Guide on How to Scale Outreach for your Agency

6. Not Establishing a Clear Chain of Command

A great outreach process shouldn’t take up too much of your time. Your reward for taking the time to find great people is being able to rely on them.

At Authority Builders, we’ve done excellent things with a structure like this one:

Once you’ve set up a clear hierarchy, you only need to speak to a single person to make sure that a new direction gets all the way down the chain. This will save you a lot of time. After all, no one enjoys the whack-a-mole game that is responding to 20 people.

Of course, a hierarchy isn’t that much use to you if you play an outsized role in it. The next mistake comes when don’t utilize your command chain by failing to delegate.

7. Not Delegating Decisions that Don’t Need You

There’s nothing wrong with being really invested in the success of a project. However, there does come a point when your attention comes at a cost to you, especially if you’re already budgeting a significant amount to good staff.

Once you’ve trained your staff to your satisfaction, you should have the confidence to turn the reins over to a manager. Fully extract yourself from all the decisions that don’t require your immediate input.

Yes, your staff will still make mistakes. No, they won’t be as attentive or as experienced as you, at least at first. But eventually, they WILL get better than you at the task since they’re working at it ALL the time. Be patient, and you’ll be rewarded for it.

Of course, the best staffing in the world won’t help you if you paint yourself into a corner where you can’t afford them. The next mistake you can make is not budgeting correctly.

8. Not Budgeting Correctly

I must emphasize again how important it is that you record data properly. In this case, your costs.

There are a lot of moving parts in an outreach campaign, and the budget for any one of them can start to spiral out of control and tank the project. Before you begin charging anything, you should estimate all your costs and place limits on how much each part of the project is worth to you.

Here are some of the necessary costs that you should consider, and should be estimating and tracking from the start.

• Outreach staff
• Subscriptions/purchase costs for any systems you use e.g ninja outreach / mailjet
• Content costs, both for production and placement
• The total average costs per link

In the short term, tracking these costs will help you determine where to prioritize your efforts to improve. They’re even more important in the long-term, though. Use this data to determine how much further you can go when you scale up.

For example, based on the last month of outreach, what will it cost you to double your efforts? Or triple them?

A strong budget will help you deliver quality at cost, but quality itself can be a difficult thing to control. If you want to build a reputation and better your conversion rate, you’re going to need to have a strong QA process in place.

9. Not Having an Eagle-Eyed QA Process

Ever checked a live URL only to realize an obvious mistake was missed? That’s never a good feeling. While it’s not always difficult to contact the webmaster and have the post updated, that’s still time used, and therefore a cost that you didn’t predict.

That’s why your team should include a few people who focus exclusively on quality assurance. Having team members in place to handle QA exclusively will create necessary accountability that you can use to prevent errors in the future.

To help you out, here are some selections from the list that my team uses before any content is sent out to a blogger.

• Have we included the images?
• Have we included high DA relevant links?
• Is the anchor text naturally placed?
• Does the URL have the correct anchor text?

Make sure that the checklist you create for your own team includes any other quality points that match your brand identity.

If you care about your reputation, there’s another area where you need to keep your eyes peeled. Few mistakes come across as sketchy to bloggers as suddenly being unable to communicate with your original email address.

BONUS: Free Guide on How to Scale Outreach for your Agency

10. Not Protecting Access to Your Email/Assets

You may need a series of email addresses to manage your outreach campaign. A lot of novices will use a Gmail account because it’s free and easy to set up. There is a downside, though: it’s easy to get banned.

Google is highly suspicious of accounts that deal with a large volume of sent mail, say 500 a day or more. They don’t want spammers on their platform, and they may ban you with no questions asked and no appeal process.

For the sake of appealing, you should invest in a Google Suite account if you insist on using Gmail. That way, you can approach them and ask them to unfreeze. Of course, you can consider yourself watched after that point. Google won’t need much of an excuse to ban you again.

Beyond Gmail, a more industry-friendly service like Mailjet or Sendgrid may be the better bet for ensuring the email gets delivered.

Honestly, though, you should be doing most of your outreach with a proper website email such as pete@example.com. Even better, create a cheap web page and domain to act as a pretend agency. Use this address to contact people instead of the address from the site where you’re building out the links.

Ensuring that your email reaches webmasters is only half the battle though. You also have to ensure that email isn’t going to immediately turn them off.

11. Not Giving Webmasters a Reason to Like You

There are a lot of ways to turn webmasters against you, even when you think you’re just reasonably keeping the process moving.

For example, if you don’t get a reply and you follow up too quickly (I’ve seen some outreach emails that gets repeated after only 12 hours), you could get blocked entirely. Remember, these people are humans and they are probably comparing your emails to hundreds they get per day.

I use this list of “do” and “don’t” to help my outreach team stay on the good side of the people they contact.

Do:

• include their name
• add a personal touch
• give them a compliment
• make sure your email is well written; no typos!
• include a footer with an image and real links to things; this tends to help with deliverability.

Don’t:

• Spam them with messages
• Call them the wrong name
• Assume they owe you something just because you have content related to their website.

After the initial outreach, it’s important that you’re particularly sensitive to the needs of people who have responded to you. This is only going to be a fraction of the people you’ve sent outreach to, so treat them like a valuable resource and be willing to accommodate.

Protect Yourself from Costly Mistakes

If you can avoid these mistakes, you will be well on your way to making your first outreach campaign a successful one. Now, you understand the best ways to track the data, to build out sustainable processes and to manage hand-picked team members.

Now you can expect to do more than avoid the traps—you can thrive.

If you have any questions, what-so-ever, click this link to join the conversation on Facebook.