Those that are in marketing, online marketing, and website development often use the term backlink. But if you are not in those businesses, many don’t understand what they are or why they are valuable for search engine optimization and searches.

According to WPBeginner.com, a backlink is a link that takes the reader from one site to another. Search engines use backlinks as a ranking criterion as it acts as a 3rd party endorsement. When a reputable website or news source links back to a website, it is newsworthy. When links come from well-respected sources like Forbes, Money, The Wall Street Journal, etc., they are held in such high esteem, they are very newsworthy and help the website mentioned gain visibility in search engine results.

Are All Backlinks Created Equal?

No, there are two distinct types of backlinks. One is valuable, while the other is not.

  • Nofollow Link: A nofollow tag, lets search engines know to ignore the link as they don’t pass any value along and will not help with SEO rankings. They will not help elevate your rating on top search engines.
  • Dofollow Link: A dofollow link is a desirable link as they come from highly-respected sites and are considered very valuable in helping to improve website rankings. The only time a dofollow link is bad is if it comes from suspicious or spam sites. If Google sees that these links go back to a reputable site, the owner of that site can be penalized, even if no fault of their own.

How To Get a Valuable Backlink?

There are many ways to garner backlinks. Some take research, time, and planning. Those that don’t want to put forth the effort can pay companies to do this for them. Both are effective.

If you want to do it yourself, here are some tips for generating good-quality backlinks:

  • When you create media profiles for your business, include the link to the website.
  • Create a variety of interesting, helpful links. They may include, “how-to-etc…” posts, infographics, video-imbedded posts. In most cases, these are more attractive and get more backlinks than more generic, evergreen posts.
  • Create ultimate or must-have guides. These typically are several thousand words and are very expansive when covering a specific topic. These also result in good backlinks.
  • Write or comment on guest posts or write blogs, they will often include backlinks to the site if covered on other sites.
  • Reach out to industry influencers that may want to include company info on their blogs or online articles, adding more backlinks to your site.

Another Option, Have Someone Else Create Your Backlinks:

While the do-it-yourself option is great for many companies looking to gain exposure, it is time-consuming and may require help from a professional. Many SEO companies do nothing but explore your competition and find ways to elevate the presence of a site so it shows up in searches higher than the competition. Of course, these SEO companies charge for their services, so you will buy seo backlinks instead of creating them in-house.

There are some benefits to paying for SEO backlinks. Here are some ways that buying them may be better for many companies:

  • They can save time, as backlink building takes research, relationship building, and writing expertise. SEO firms have the tools to do this quickly and easily.
  • When done by a novice, it can take weeks, months, and even longer to see quality backlink results.
  • The marketing manager has control. Those that spend time cultivating relationships and working tirelessly to get backlinks often have no control of where they come from and what pages they link to. When a reputable SEO specialist creates them, the organization can feel confident that they will link to the right pages and come from quality outlets.

Those looking to increase visibility and score higher in organic searches have the option of using backlinks, whether they invest the time in-house or with an SEO expert.

Read Also: 8 Tips on Picking SEO Providers for Small Businesses