Having built a fantastically designed website with excellent unique on-page content, you find that it does not rank.
Surely, this will attract Google? And the visitors that Google now sends will all want to buy your products or services?
You wait, you wait some more, perhaps half a year goes by and no traffic. You end up puzzled and confused; you followed the Google Webmaster Guidelines, and yet they still didn’t send you any traffic?
Why, why is this, you ask yourself?
The answer is….lack of links. You didn’t build any links.
Links (backlinks from other websites) act as a voting system for Google; they effectively say;
“Hey, Google, we like this content and decided to link to it.”
Links, but more importantly, the correct type of links built to a website, are one of the fundamental factors in ranking a website. If you don’t consider SEO as a long-term approach to building your online lead-generating asset, your project will fail.
Our link building service is a fundamental aspect of all our SEO campaigns. We examine several link building patterns that your competitors have pointing to their websites. Evaluate their links, establish suitable links and create a plan of action to implement targeted links to your website. This is a lengthy process that can take several months to build out. Once built, Google will change how it views your website and alter your rankings favourably.
There are over 200 rankings signals that Google uses in its algorithm, and links are constantly considered one of the most important signals to consider.
Our Approach to Link Building in Auckland
Your choice to outsource the link building needs to be taken carefully and considered. We take a personal approach to link building and ensure that the links we build for our clients are built without Google thinking we’re attempting to manipulate their SERPs (Search Engine Ranking Positions).
Many businesses are rightfully dubious when considering hiring a link building company and should be. They need to be aware that if a low-cost marketing agency blindly builds links, a Google penalty can follow. And this penalty may prevent your website from ever ranking on Google.
We build the authority of your website from Google's perspective.
Link building is the fundamental part of all of our SEO campaigns, and if you want to know why links are important when ranking websites, then look at the below diagram:
Why Hiring Experienced Link Building Experts Benefits You
Google views links as a vote for your website.
Not all links are created equal, and knowledgeable SEO experts will be aware of this.
We know that contextual links from relative websites surrounded by related content are far more potent than simple blog comment links. However, there are different link types, and we look to incorporate a diverse portfolio of links for our clients from several sources.
The Links We Build for Our Clients
Our projects start with the research phase, which provides a thorough and comprehensive understanding of a website’s presence and prospects. In summary, we do the following for each client:
- Niche research
- Examining the level of competition
- Expanding the number of targeted keywords
Upon completing our research, we’re then able to create a strategic, unique link building project for your niche and marketplace. Other " agencies " may try to fit your website into a ‘pre-designed’ template of links. We create a link building strategy that is unique to your website. Each project we undertake is tailored to your website, business goals, and budget.
Once we have established the ideal pattern of links to the built and obtained, we can then commence a link building campaign.
The SEO landscape and environment are ever-changing, but links remain and will continue to remain one of the most important factors when it comes to ranking on Google. It’s an integral part of the algorithm, and it is not likely to change.
For links to positively impact your website's ranking in the SERPs will require a long-term plan combined with content distribution and targeting.
Good or Bad links, is there a difference, you might wonder? There is, and here we shall explain the different types of links.
These are the most common links a business should expect to be built for its business. Each SEO marketing agency, worth their grain of salt should be making these for your business.
It should be one of the first types of links that are built for your business on the internet.
If you’re not sure of these types of links, then here is an example:
Luckily for you, if you consider using SEO services from SAC, then we have you covered. We have our in-house software to find and replicate competitor Citations and Directory links.
Please be aware that these links are not all free and require a monthly or annual payment to be maintained and kept.
(In case you’re wondering why SEO is paid for on a monthly retainer basis, this is a clue – our costs for each client, operational software, domains and hosting requirements all need to be paid monthly. Imagine a billboard on a motorway that provides you with an ongoing stream of leads, and you take down the billboard – guess what? The leads stop!
This is effectively what happens with SEO gradually, but it will undoubtedly stop instantly when dealing with Google Ads.)
There is another benefit of obtaining these links – indirect referral traffic. Some people don’t search on Google but might search a directory for finding services and, in doing so, will find your business and contact you from that source
Before Google Penguin kicked in, blog comments were a great way to rank websites using automated software and an effective content spinner.
The automated software would be able to mass spam websites that permitted comments with links to your website. The content spinner would then create hundreds of different variations of your blog comment and produce unique content each time.
Google got smarter and figured out what webmasters were doing.
We now can use blog and forum comments to establish your website as an authority in your niche. The trick is to find blogs that are relevant to your niche. Then write a comment that is likely to be approved and about the article. We find blogs that are related to your niche.
The same can be said about Forum links; you need to find out where people in your niche communicate with one another. Or simply a forum niche relative to your niche.
It’s perfectly natural for a new business to announce their business on the internet or perhaps announce expanding their business.
There are several channels to generate and distribute a press release for your company.
We have relationships with the most prestigious media distributors worldwide. We will ensure any distribution for your website will be of high quality and not negatively affect your website rankings.
This can work quite well if you conduct relevant research into a niche.
Say, for instance, you are an air conditioning company, and you’re looking to obtain links on blogs or general information websites related to air conditioning?
Guess what, so to are the owners of those air conditioning blogs seeking links to their websites!
A match made in heaven that you decide to create reciprocal content for each other’s website. You would think so, but you need to make sure the links point to their website already are suitable to describe your website.
Google examines multiple tiers of links, so this is a factor.
Ultimately, you never actually control this link, the other website might go down, or your link might be replaced. This will, therefore, affect you, and we need to continue looking for additional link building opportunities.
These are the most powerful links to obtain and are also the most difficult to obtain, surprisingly!
Imagine, naturally (without reaching out to a website owner), achieving a link, and the links they place for you contain anchor text related to your target keyword. It would be even better if the anchor used was a derivation of the target keyword!
These types are typically achieved if your content is of a very high standard, and you rank highly. Other website owners will then start referencing your website naturally.
We know that contextual links are very powerful in the eyes of Google; they send a message to Google that a website is worth referencing. And if a website is worth referencing, then it’s worth promoting in Google's eyes.
Suppose we can contact other website owners that have a blog or authority website that is deemed relevant to your website—asking if we can obtain a link from that website to help in your ranking positions.
We will examine the links from your competitors’ websites and see if they have achieved relevant guest posts. If not in your specific niche, we shall look at the category level approach. Find similar categories to yours to ask for content to be placed and linked back to your website.
There are different types of links that can be obtained. Some links Google will count towards your rankings, and other links they will not.
Low-quality links tend to be no-follow links. To have an unusually high percentage of no-follow links could give the impression to Google that you’re trying to manipulate the rankings.
But there are sources of links that are high quality and no-follow links, for instance, Wikipedia.
We need to make sure that it looks natural when building links to your website.
We mean by natural looks very similar to other websites in your niche. Take, for instance; we started building links to your website at a rate of 10 times the rate of your competitors at the beginning of a campaign when you had no links whatsoever.
Would that look NORMAL to you? No, and it won’t look normal to the Google algorithm either.
You can purchase and use automated link building software that generates links en masse (100s a day), and Google won’t think much of you doing this!
It would look more typical for a new website to start building links slowly, a few at a time.
We will not do anything that could generate a link building velocity penalty.
Off-page SEO is a way to raise your rankings; adding links to a website will, without a doubt, increase a websites’ ranking. But there is a caveat that we need to make you aware of, don’t target the primary keyword in the anchor text of your links. Google’s penguin will find you if you do this, and it will punish you!
We ensure that our links are not going to trigger a possible Google penalty, which originates from over optimising the anchor text of links sent to your website.
Building Links Correctly Requires Experience and Thinking
Inbound links to your website provide Google with a system to decide which website is more authoritative than another. We construct a targeted link profile for our clients' websites based on several factors.
The links we build are designed to last long-term and are the most effective for our clients' branding and exposure to targeted keyword phrases.
Building Links for Long Term Sustainability
We want to ensure that Google views your website as a ‘Brand’ and that it treats your Brand amicably. Links will signal to Google that your brand is worth paying more attention to.
Links have been and will always be one of the fundamental ranking factors Google and other search engines use to rank websites.
Search engines will always favour a website with natural links.
Added Value to Your Brand
Having quality, informative and engaging content will naturally entice other websites to link to your website.
The content also gets your domain, Brand and business in front of a broader audience. This engagement will attract others to learn about your Brand, which will help convert further additional customers.
Reputable editorial link sources bring an added benefit of indirect traffic to your website. If a link is placed on a reputable website, then it is referenced as a reputable resource. Therefore, the search engines will deem your website suitable for a service or product.
Building Authority Links that Establish Credibility
Our link building methodology will ensure that your on-page content is rewarded by increasing rankings in the SERPs. The leads that your website provides will improve your business's profitability.
We would advise our clients to be wary of cheap SEO or cheap links. Most of the time, they create links on low-quality unrelated websites or over optimise the anchor text ratios. Ultimately, you’ll end up with a balance of links that are either poor or will have triggered a penguin penalty.
Links Will Increase Traffic Quality to Your Website
If you build links correctly, with branded links on authoritative websites related to your niche, your website will go up in the rankings. The time it will take to move in the rankings will vary depending on the niche, what links have been previously built and your marketing budget.
Your website will then be associated with reputable websites, which further enhances your reputation.
Adding branded links and increasing your brand exposure is only part of our link building strategy. When links are being added to aged credible websites, then your website will start to appear, from the search engine perspective, to be an authority.
Prices for Our Link Building Services
Each SEO campaign we run for our clients is bespoke, meaning that we cannot determine the cost involved until we conduct a thorough SEO audit.
Our SEO audits are not free and are a starting point for any campaign. You need to know:
- what you want to rank for,
- who else ranks for those phrases?
- How competitive is your niche
- How many links do your competitors have?
- What is the strength of the competitor links?
(TIP: If anyone says they’ll do a ‘Free Audit, ’ be wary of what you’ll get. We bet it’s likely simply an auditing report from software)
Our link-building campaigns are part of our monthly SEO packages. Each niche is different and will require different levels of attention. Therefore, each website requires a unique link profile to rank for the desired targeted keywords.
We cannot provide costs without an evaluation of both your website and your competitor's websites.
We require information to be able to start researching and have created a form to gather this information. You may find it on our Discovery Page.
We’ve barely scratched the surface of talking about links and why they matter for SEO purposes; this is just the tip of the iceberg.
Visit our services page for more SEO services that we cover and provide.