What are Backlinks?

  For company and consumer alike, it’s all about the first page. Type “puppy adoption” into a search engine and the consumer will consider the first page of results and call it a day. Search engines use an algorithm to sort out quality content, and it has yet to prove unreliable. The algorithm grants first-page status. The process of beating the crowd is called SEO, search engine optimization. There are many ways to achieve solid SEO, and a company’s webpage must use them to compete for a top spot. So now, we’ll focus on backlinks. What is a backlink? Backlinks: links on other webpages that are directed to your site. Sometimes referred to as “inbound links,” quality backlinks are building blocks to good SEO. So what is a quality backlink? Relevance A quality backlink is relevant to the content on the inbound page. If your page is about puppies, but have multiple inbound links from a page about home appliances… red flag. Backlinks are factored high in an algorithm because they are hard to manipulate and influence search engines. The formula can pick up if your page is stacked with links from pages unrelated to your content. The criteria for a quality backlink has increased due to hidden links and link farms—auto-generated pages with the sole purpose to source backlinks. Stay white-hat and trustworthy! Anchor Text The words used in the link are important. Incorporate keywords in the text of the hyperlink—none of this “click here” business. Anchor text is an important, underestimated key player in backlinks. Quantity A high number of backlinks is an indication to a search engine that your website is popular and holds important content. They’re given more credit and considered higher relevance in their result pages for a search query. BUT… jam-packing a website with low-quality backlinks is a no-no. Quality above all! Reciprocal Linking Some websites will exchange links with other sites and use reciprocal linking. Again, this is good and well, as long as the buddy-sites are relevant to each other. Don’t hesitate to scope out the sources of your backlinks. Online tools make it possible to track backlinks, and it’s highly recommended. You want to know what sites are sending people your way and the words they’re using to do it. A website with quality backlinks will find itself on the glorified, first-page.