Link building is a critical part of SEO. If you know anything about SEO then you will have come across the term link building at some point. Below are 10 link building myths that we address.
- If You Create Good Content People Will Link
Many people believe that if you create high quality content then links will come naturally. This can be true if you are a high traffic, authoritative website but for most websites this is not the case. This method really only is effective if you already have traffic to your website and to get traffic you need backlinks so it’s a catch 22.
- You Don’t Need Links To Rank
This one is worrying, not only is it not true but people believe this. Backlinks are a key part of SEO and really without backlinks there is no chance you will rank. You need links from highly authoritative websites to rank and for most websites you need a decent amount of backlinks coming in.
- Links With Domain Authority Matter
Domain Authority is not the only metric that you should focus your link building on. Websites that are fairly new tend to have a low domain authority but if they are relevant to your website and in the same niche then a link would be very useful. You should focus more on getting links from relevant websites.
- Build Links to Your Money Pages
By this we mean the inner landing pages on your website. This technique can seem like spam unless you have an authoritative website or content that is unique and of a high quality. If you think about it most people will link to the homepage of your website, there really is no reason to link to an inner landing page unless it has really high quality content.
- You Have to Create Informative and Linkable Content
There is a misconception that you should create linkable content, content that naturally attracts links from others. Content like this isn’t easy to create and it will take time to think of the right idea. You are basically trying to create content that is so likeable that people will automatically link to you.
- The More Outreach You Do The More Links You Get
This isn’t completely true. In SEO it is often believed that outreach leads to links and whilst this is true what you need to be aware of is in the real world webmasters often ask for payment for linking to your website. This is of course a no go for Google and sometimes it can be difficult to make the right decision.
Gone are the days when you could submit a guest post and get a link for free. You will find that 9/10 webmasters will want compensation.
- Links Help The Google Algorithm
This is somewhat true but not the only purpose of link building. For example you might want citations or to build brand awareness so for this reason creating links is important and not just for the Google algorithm.
- You Should Only Use Exact Match Anchors
When building backlinks to your website the anchor text used is important since it can influence rankings for keywords. Using exact match anchors for all your backlinks is not something that you should be doing or trying to influence.
If you think about this it makes sense, if backlinks are being built to your website naturally there is no way that you would be able to influence the anchor text, you would get a mix of brand, non branded, exact match and non exact match. It is best to leave the backlink profile looking natural.
- Link Building Requires Technical Knowledge
Link building does not require any technical skills. It is very easy to do in fact most content management systems CMS will have a built in option to allow you to add hyperlinks. For ones that don’t you can use the HTML tag which is pretty simple to work out how to use.
- All Links Are The Same
This is not true. Not all links are the same. Link placement, position and authority of website you are getting link from all make a difference in rankings. A link within the body of the post has more weight to it as opposed to one that is in the author bio box in the footer.
SEO is not hugely complicated and pretty much anyone can do it. It does require a lot of time and understanding of a few different concepts but pretty much anyone can run a successful website. If you find you don’t have the time or want a professional to do the work for you then you can get in touch with us to run your link building campaign.
