Let us first understand what link building is to get better insights on the topic.
Link Building is the process of earning and creating backlinks to a website, page, or a piece of content. This is usually done by adding links manually from another website or page to your own website, asking other website owners to link back to your content, and so on.
Any well-trained SEO professional would know that link building is an important strategy in off-page SEO services. But the real question is: what matters more, quality or quantity of backlinks?
Google and other search engines rely heavily on these links to determine your website’s authority and where it should rank in search results pages.
Earlier, when link building was a young concept, people tried to build as many backlinks to their website as possible through various methods like directory submissions, blog commenting and more. The more links a site had, the better were its chances to rank highly in the search results for target keywords and queries.
Though it is important to have a lot of links, times have changed a lot and we simply cannot rely on the volume of links to rank in search engines. The focus of search engines has shifted to relevance of links, rather than the volume. It can recognize “unnatural” and “suspicious” links easily.
When you start earning high-quality backlinks, Google will start recognizing your brand as trustworthy and credible and should rank your website accordingly in search engines.
Building high-quality links
Since search engines are capable of recognizing relevance as well as intent and patterns in linking, this has changed the mindset of those who create links. Instead of focusing on acquiring links from all possible sources, the majority of link builders attempt to get links from reliable sources with a higher PageRank or are perceived as authoritative sources.
Gaining a link from a website with authority or trust will not only increase the amount of exposure the content or website linked gets: it will also add a powerful boost to the authority of the linked site. For example, if a national news website covers a topic and links to one of your pages as a resource, it shows that they trust your site. Hence,readers will also trust it, and so will search engines.
How to Find A High Quality Backlink?
Relevance to the Topic
Question yourself if the context for this link seems to be reasonable? It is important to make sure that the position of your link is logical for both users and search engines. The content’s text is linked to the hyperlink as well as the meta tags on the linked page.
Backlink Location
The backlink must be in a “natural” location on the page, at least in the context. Links in the sidebars or in the footers must be avoided. The link should not appear like the link was “placed” but rather occurred naturally.
Natural Anchor Text or Branded Anchor Text
The anchor text shouldn’t be a perfect match. It should be natural within the overall context. It should be ideally a mixture of anchor text that is branded and certain long-tail keywords. If you control that anchor’s content, you should be able to incorporate the keywords that you want to be ranked in natural flow content instead of the exact match. Be careful not to create repeating anchor text on your backlink profile, if you have any control over the editorial content.
Verified Link Source
The hyperlink is on an authoritative website within your niche or industry. Do search engines or users believe the information provided on this site to be trustworthy?
Link diversity
Don’t place all your eggs in one basket. The search engines would like to see a diverse assortment of backlinks from various sources in your profile of backlinks.
Does the number of backlinks matter?
It is true that quantity is crucial. The higher the quantity of hyperlinks your site has, the better Google will regard you as an authoritative source in your field and will rank your site according to that. But, the quantity doesn’t mean anything if all links to your site aren’t worth any time.
The most effective method to build an impressive number of backlinks is getting to work. This may sound simple, but link building is a process that takes time, and the sole way you can build an impressive portfolio of backlinks is to work at building links and build your reputation as time passes. However, these processes aren’t something you can rush. If you’re hoping to see excellent results over the long term you must do the work right now.
Backlinks: Quality Vs. Quantity
If your site has earned backlinks from reliable and trustworthy sites, Google will reward you with higher rankings, more visitors and conversions.
If you can narrow your focus and make sure you build backlinks to trusted websites and avoid Google penalties and boost your site’s success in the long term.
Conclusion
Finding high quality backlinks could be time-consuming and competitive, so it requires a lot of perseverance and determination. The best way to do this is to concentrate on creating links of high quality and establishing your brand’s image.
Hiring an SEO agency is always a good idea as a professional understands SEO and search engine ranking factors, and hence will be able to assist you in a better manner.