How do quality backlinks help website rank on Search Engines

Excerpt : The presence of a backlink is a great way to assure the search engines that your webpage has high quality, reliable content. In this article we will learn about..

Backlinks, also known as inbound links, one-way links or incoming links, are essentially links that take you from one website to a page of another website. Backlinks can be both internal (taking you to a page of the same website) or external (taking you to a page of a different website). Simply put, backlinks can be equated with votes such that a webpage with a greater number of backlinks ensure a higher organic search engine ranking.

The presence of a backlink is a great way to assure the search engines that your webpage has high quality, reliable content. In fact, backlinks are relevant enough to be one of the top three factors taken into consideration while establishing search engine rankings.

Now, is it enough to just have multiple backlinks? The answer is no.

It is evident through analysis that one good quality backlink can be as powerful as, if not more, several poor-quality backlinks. So, what constitutes to be a good quality backlink ?

First and foremost, a good quality backlink will be relevant to the niche of your website. There is added benefit if the backlinks come from your competitor’s website. Secondly, it is important that the backlink comes from a website that is trustworthy in its niche. Following that, it is important that it is placed strategically within the content of the website, and not in the sidebar. Links that appear in the top part of a webpage and are surrounded by other relevant links perform better and bring in more traffic than links placed at the sidebar or footer.

An influencing factor that is taken into consideration while ranking your website is the age of the domain of your site’s backlinks. It should be noted that older backlinks carry more weightage since it assures Google of the authenticity of your website over a period of time and makes you appear more trustworthy. This factor results in high rankings for your website.

Another relevant factor that is taken into consideration while ranking your website is the Domain Authority Score (DA score) of the website linking to your account. This is a particularly important factor that analyses how much weightage the linking website has with reference to similar websites in the same field. Backlinks from websites with more weightage will result in better rankings for your website, therefore backlinks from websites with a higher DA score will generate better rankings and more traffic to your website than websites with a comparatively low DA score.

There are also certain webpages that are considered to be an authentic source of data or information termed as “hubs”. Acquiring quality backlinks from such hubs that are reliable sources or information automatically establishes your website as a reliable source of information, which results in better rankings.

Along with these factors, it is important for you to remember to pursue getting links from websites that are otherwise difficult to get. There is a clear right and wrong way to get quality backlinks for your website. And while it is possible to get quality backlinks by trading or paying for them, it must be noted that this is an unethical practice and doing so will result in you getting caught. The best ways to get backlinks for your website from reputable sources are as follows:

Enlist your website on reputable directories: Websites such as dmoz.com and Yahoo can be a great platform to put out your information. Having your links on such relevant platforms can help you with powerful backlinks.
Collaborate: Collaborating with a trustworthy website as a guest blogger and churning out authentic content can be a great way to bring in good quality backlinks for your website.
Reciprocal Linking: Reciprocal linking can be a way to promote yourself as well as another website by providing backlinks for each other. However, this practice is only acceptable when done in moderation for trustworthy and genuine websites.

In addition to these, there are many other methods that can be used to get more quality backlinks for your website. These include promoting your website on social media platforms, creating one-way backlinks, building more internal links, creating more linkable content, writing testimonials, etc.

To summarize, quality backlinks are an extremely powerful tool in the field of SEO and Content Marketing, and can essentially change the trajectory of the rankings of your website if used strategically. Backlinks from reliable websites not only bring more traffic to your website but also help in establishing the reliability and authenticity of your website. Since Google takes all of these factors while ranking your website, it is safe to say that the ability to bring in good quality backlinks from relevant websites is tool that must be in every SEO expert’s arsenal to exponentially increase your website’s ranking.