Netlinking, also known as “link building” or “external linking,” is a core SEO technique for improving your website’s natural search visibility and getting it into the top 3 results on search engines. But it’s a practice that calls for a strong grasp of SEO…
According to specialists at the local search summit organized by Whitespark, the two biggest drivers of local organic ranking for a website are on-page content optimization (34%) and the link profile (31%).
What is netlinking in SEO and what is it for?
Netlinking is an SEO technique aimed at building quality external links that point to your website in order to improve its visibility and search ranking. These inbound links, also called “backlinks,” help Google gauge how trustworthy and useful the content on a web page or website is. Netlinking can be thought of as a “vote of confidence” from one website to another. It works the same way it does in real life: if your friends and family tell you about a great dentist, you’ll trust that dentist more. The same logic applies to Google. If sites other than yours talk about you through a web page that includes a backlink, Google’s trust in your site grows.
For example, a mention of your website in a directory that links to one of your pages counts as a backlink.
This technique matters for SEO because it helps improve a website’s natural search ranking. In practice, the more useful links pointing to your site or page, the more Google trusts it. That means Google will rank the site or page higher for the keywords that match it.
For instance, if your site offers immigration assistance services and sites that list various immigration resources mention you with a link to your site, Google will understand that your site is a good match for people searching for immigration help. As a result, your site’s ranking for terms like “immigration help,” “immigration services,” or “immigration resources” will improve. You’ll get better visibility online and, in turn, more visitors to your site. And potentially more conversions!
That said, as you can probably tell, it’s not just about getting a link, it’s also about fit. Not every link is good for your ranking, as we’ll see later in this article. That’s why it’s worth working with an agency that specializes in SEO, like Hamak, or building that skill in-house.
What makes a good link?
Broadly speaking, a good link is one people actually want to click. It should sit within specialized content that’s tied to your site’s line of business and gives readers extra, useful information.
For example, if a page is about cooking recipes and a link points to kitchen equipment, that makes sense. On the other hand, if a link on that same recipe page points to a shoe website, it won’t mean much to readers and won’t get clicked. If Google can’t see a logical tie between two sites or pages connected by a backlink, that backlink won’t carry any weight. Worse, it could even lead to penalties, as we’ll cover further down.
You also need to think about the setting the link appears in. Beyond topic fit, where the link sits on the page matters too. A link near the top of a page will likely bring in more traffic than one buried at the bottom.
Which links should you steer clear of?
Building a solid netlinking strategy means looking closely at bad links too. Poor or toxic links can hurt your SEO link profile and drag down your site’s natural search ranking. Tools like Semrush or Moz can help you spot these bad backlinks.
A number of things can make a link low quality, such as:
- The hosting site is tied to fraudulent sites
- It’s obvious the link was created just to game SEO
- The link never gets clicked by visitors
- The two linked sites have no topic in common
- The two linked sites have no geographic overlap
Google keeps a close eye on low-quality links. The search engine is constantly refining the algorithms it uses to review sites, all to keep serving users the best content. A bad link can lead to penalties, usually in the form of a drop in ranking for the site’s target keywords. That drop in ranking leads to less traffic, and inevitably, fewer conversions.
In practice, though, Google rarely penalizes a site over low-quality links, simply because site owners don’t always control who links to them. Many sites end up, without knowing it, with links from questionable sources like sports betting or adult sites. Because of this, Google tends to just ignore those low-quality links.
Even though penalties are rare, you won’t gain anything from a bad link, and you’ll have wasted time, and sometimes money too, if you paid for it. That’s why it’s worth being careful when building links with outside sites.
How do you find good links?
Building useful links to your website comes down to three steps.
- First, you need to spot link options. There are a few ways to do this:
- Use tools that help surface promising link options. SEMrush, for example, offers backlink suggestions.
- Look at your competitors’ link profiles using specialized software. One reason a competitor outranks you might be a strong link profile. To close that gap in natural search results, you can try to pick up links they already have.
- Do manual research based on your main and secondary keywords to find blogs or media outlets covering related subjects. This route usually takes more time and effort to find sites worth getting a link from.
- Find broken links and offer similar content to replace them. It’s a win for both sides, since the host site fixes a dead link and your site picks up a good backlink.
- Look for mentions of your website that don’t include a link. You can reach out to those sites and ask them to add a link next to the mention. It’s rarer, but it works really well!
How do you choose the right links?
Once you’ve put together your list of website options, you need to weigh their fit using a few criteria:
- Domain authority. This shows how much search engines trust a given website. Moz is a free tool that gives you a site’s authority score.
- Site traffic. You don’t want a link on a site that barely gets any visitors.
- Geographic fit. Think about how well your site’s location matches the hosting site’s. A link tends to carry more weight when it fits the same geographic area.
- Topic fit. A link works best when the hosting site covers the same subject as yours. For example, a site selling auto parts that lands a link on a car blog will see its ranking improve.
It’s the mix of all these things together that determines how much of a positive impact a link ends up having.
How do you get the links you want?
Once you’ve pinned down the best link options, you need to reach out to each site and pitch sharing your content. Personalizing your outreach emails matters, since it opens the door to real communication and gives you a shot at landing your backlink on the site you’re after.
How do you build a good strategy?
Growing your website’s natural link profile takes time and should be treated as a long-term goal. Naturally, building up external links will take several months, sometimes even years. So it’s worth spreading your link building out over time and mapping your strategy several months or even a year ahead to build a strong ranking.
Your strategy should start with setting goals for your SEO efforts. Which pages do you want to push forward through netlinking? Which keywords are you aiming to rank for? How many links will you build each month?
From there, figure out which topics matter most to your target audience, so you can create content and get sites in that same space to publish it.
Lastly, human relationships make or break how well your strategy holds up over time. Building trust with experts, bloggers, and journalists in your industry gives you a real advantage, making it easier to get your content published on outside sites and reach a wider audience in your target market.
