What are backlinks?
What are backlinks?
Now I know what you’re thinking: what the heck is a backlink? Well I don’t blame you, as you shouldn’t need to know this unless you’re clued up on Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) or you’ve [vaguely] heard it from someone else. Backlinks are only one aspect of SEO, and are important if configured correctly on a website. These are not easy implementations however, many (including myself) consider Backlinking to be one of the most important aspects of SEO. If set up correctly (using high-quality links that is), they are sure to increase your ranking on search engines such as Google as well as improve visibility when your valuable visitors / potential clientele search for you or your industry; resulting in: more traffic incoming to your website.
The importance of Backlinking
Think of Backlinking like the Premier League, the better the players you have compared to your rivals, the better chance you have of winning (unless they’re [insert your team’s out of form overpriced player]). So in this case, the highest of quality backlinks you have the higher you will rank, as Google will ‘identify’ your website and its linking content and use that as a trust signal. The more high-quality links, the more chance you have of being higher ranked and above your competitors.
Back to the Premier League example: if for instance you’re little old Leicester City from 2015/2016 season (the then underdogs, the no-way-they’ll-win-a-title team… sorry if you’re not a football fan here) they were managed brilliantly but also had a few key high-quality players playing, they then astounded the footballing world by putting in consistent performances and eventually winning that luxurious title above everyone else. So it’s all about how you manage the links you have provided on the website. So if you have few backlinks included compared to other competitors, make sure they’re high-quality and set up correctly (i.e. relevant … I’m about to go into this:)
Good backlinks
The above image is Backlinking to the original source of the image, to this blog post based on the topic of Backlink: relevant!
There’s always gonna be good and bad backlinks, and the main thing to understand is to make sure the backlink is relevant, such as being in the same industry in which you have your website based on. For another example (to the above Hedgehogs), if you are looking to sell dog products such as treats or toys, you can have opportunities for Backlinking in blog posts about dogs. The link here is then entirely relevant and would link readers / visitors to your site. Clever and effective stuff, huh.
Don't overdo it, mind you
Make sure you don’t add an overwhelming amount of backlinks, as many have done this in the past and Google are already ahead of ya. Many marketers have proven to overuse backlinks with paid ones, which would cause a lot of ‘spammy’ backlinks, Google would pick up on this and see you as untrustworthy source. They would see these backlinks as ‘Toxic Backlinks’ and would see the other site source of the link with low scores and would immediately label these and crack down.
Now, obviously it’s not all about the backlinks or just adding them in and hoping for the best. You’ve got to have decent structured content on your website for the backlinks to be included within. Be sure your web designer (cough, yours truly) produces high quality and relevant content that utilises keywords and best SEO practises. Then you’re sure to be ranked high. Again, backlinks are only one aspect of SEO, but a very very useful and effective one to implement!