paid links Archives

5 White Hat Link Building Practices Essential for Ethical SEO

by Adam Oakley | May 26, 2024 | SEO

When you’re in a crowded conference room, there are usually two types of introductions. You might be wandering about and see someone you greatly admire. You pluck up the courage to approach them and introduce yourself with a statement like, “I love your recent book on marketing, especially your thoughts on the future of AI in marketing.”

Then you wait. The other person may strike up a conversation or respond politely and move on.

Another type of introduction is when a mutual friend introduces you to someone they already know. These are truly valuable introductions because the other person is much more likely to respond favorably, thanks to the reputation your mutual friend built with them already.

Link building is much like networking, except instead of a crowded conference room, you’re wandering the world wide web. External and internal links for SEO connect you to other sites, growing your network and reputation based on the linking website’s established reputation.

While link building can create valuable networks and boost your ranking, unethical practices can cause your ranking to plummet.

Traditionally, marketers refer to these SEO strategies as white hat link building and black hat link building.

What Is Link Building?

Link building practices create a network of SEO links pointing to your website. These links are like introductions from friends. They can build bridges to bring traffic to your website, and they recommend you go to Google.

When another site links to your site, they give their stamp of approval for your brand and content. If that site is already well-established and an authority brand, you can benefit from that site’s authority.

Think of it like shopping for toothpaste. You have generic brand toothpaste that blends in with the competing brands. However, you also have toothpaste with stamps that say “Recommended by dentists.” Because you trust your dentist, you trust their recommendation and may be more inclined to trust that brand.

In the same way, when brands link to your site, readers and Google see it as their recommendation stamp on your site.

The more links you generate from outside sources, the more Google will see you as an authority. Quality links can increase your search visibility by as much as 534%. When you establish yourself as an authority in Google, you are more likely to rank higher in search engine results pages, generating more traffic.

SEO link building is just one of several factors Google’s algorithm uses in ranking. It is also one of the most critical factors for building authority and trust with Google and your readers.

Image from Stan Ventures

White Hat vs. Black Hat Link Building

Because link building plays a crucial role in ranking, content creators are always trying to crack the code. This often leads to unethical marketing practices that generate more links, but hurt the site in the long run.

Traditionally, marketers define ethical and unethical link-building as white hat and black hat practices.

When you watch an old-time cowboy movie, you can always identify the good and bad guys by the color of their hat. The good guys always wear white hats, while the bad guys tend to wear black hats. No one knows if this is the true source of the terms, but it’s a fun way to remember the phrases.

Today, marketers are starting to move away from those terms and simply refer to white hat link building as ethical SEO and black hat link building as unethical SEO.

While we are about to cover some of the best ethical backlink practices, you should first understand some of the unethical practices to avoid at all costs.

Buying Links

This practice has existed since the beginning of search engine optimization, when links started playing a role in ranking. Content creators realized they didn’t need to wait for others to link to them. They could simply purchase fake spam links and automatically jump in ranking.

That didn’t last long before Google penalized spam links while rewarding high-authority links. If you do this practice today, you can easily find yourself cut from Google search rankings.

Joining a Private Blog Network

A private blog network is a connected group of websites or blogs that all agree to link to each other. Websites do not always offer valuable content. Instead, they exist only to link to other blogs and increase authority. Google might not always identify private blog networks, but if the algorithm suspects you are requesting or purchasing links rather than earning them, it will penalize your search engine ranking.

Using Unnatural Link Profiles

Google looks for patterns when analyzing websites for authenticity. Websites with unnatural patterns often signal unethical practices.

A natural link profile will be varied since each person linking will have unique content. However, if you pay for links or create all your links yourself, your anchor text tends to sound similar, or most of the links come from the same place, signaling that all the links were not naturally generated but created to boost your brand authority.

If you do want to link to your own site from third-party sources, be sure to create a variety of link sources and anchor text.

Gray Hat Link Building

Not all link-building practices are black and white. Occasionally, you’ll stumble upon gray areas. For example, link swaps are considered a gray hat method.

You aren’t purchasing links in link swaps, so it doesn’t fall entirely under black hat practices. However, you also aren’t earning those links since you are making a trade, which isn’t entirely ethical either.

While gray hat practices are easy to ignore and continue using, we highly recommend not using these methods. Even if Google doesn’t penalize them yet, it may catch up one day. To be prepared for that day, always focus on the most ethical practices.

5 White Hat Link Building Best Practices

Switch out unethical link-building practices for these five ethical, white-hat link-building strategies for your SEO content.

1. Target High Authority Sites

When creating a link-building strategy, you want to focus on generating links from high-authority websites. While all backlinks can be beneficial, those high-authority blogs will have the most significant impact.

You can begin by linking to those high authority sites in hopes that they might reciprocate with links to your site. You can also offer to guest post on their site or introduce yourself, especially if the site often does top product or service lineups that you could be featured in.

Image from SEMrush

2. Use NoFollow Links Strategically

NoFollow links are links to your site that Google doesn’t count toward your site authority. These tags help weed out links that aren’t beneficial or quality.

You can use NoFollow linking to avoid being penalized by Google for unethical links. For example, social media links are often NoFollow links, allowing you to link frequently to your website to drive traffic without negatively impacting your brand authority.

3. Create Content Worth Sharing

The most effective way to generate links is by creating content worth linking to. If you have original research, unique ideas, and share-worthy snippets, others are likelier to add a link to your content or cite your data.

Quality content not only attracts backlinks but also increases your Google ranking.

4. Link Back to Your Page

While waiting for others to link to your website, you can create your own links.

Linking to your website on third-party sites can easily cross into gray link-building practices, so be careful with how you add those links. Links that you add just for link building are not ethical. Those links don’t add value to the third-party site but are only for your personal benefit.

Instead, use links in your content where they add value to the site—for example, linking to statistics you published on your home site.

You will also want to diversify your links. A natural link pattern has a balance of follow and nofollow links and comes from different content formats.

Image from SEMrush

5. Diversify Your Links

Not all your links have to be used to generate authority with Google. You can create links to increase traffic. That increased traffic, in turn, will help boost your authority.

Some places you can add links back to your site that may not help with authority but will increase your traffic include:

Blog comments on other websites
Social media profiles
Directories
Google My Business page

Build a Quality SEO Link Profile That Will Bring in Consistent Traffic

Backlinks are a crucial part of creating SEO-optimized content. At Express Writers, we create content with value-packed internal and external links that contribute to your link-building strategy.

Contact us to place an order for SEO-optimized content to start link building today.

5 Ways to Get More Success in Web Traffic Without Building Paid Links

by Adam Oakley | Apr 15, 2014 | SEO

Who’s honestly not afraid of the Penguin? In 2012, Google decided to release one of the most terrifying algorithm updates that makes us watch our backs every single time we post or update content on our website. The Penguin, Google’s radical algorithm change targeted websites that featured overly optimized anchor texts stuffed with keywords, dubious link profiles and shady link building strategies. All in all, the not so cute Penguin made us change our perception of endorsement.

Penguin – The Algorithm Update That Makes Us Look at Endorsement from a Different Perspective

In online environments, we are actually permitted and sometimes even encouraged to pay a popular celeb to promote our products on his/her social media channels, but we aren’t allowed to beg, pray or pay for links coming from other sources. Now does this make any sense? It does, actually. Google has always been striving to ensure a flawless web experience for all Internet users.

According to Search Engine Watch, this is the main reason why it does everything in its power to sniff, signal and ban any kind of black hat strategy rolled out by webmasters whose sole purpose is to manipulate search engine results to their best advantage.

To begin with, Google scared the SEO out of us with its Penguin algorithm update designed and implemented to penalize websites that promoted low-quality content. These websites did not do any favors to readers looking for quality information; they just represented a cheap and convenient moneymaking machine for most business owners who did not plan to optimize their content strategies anytime soon. Fortunately, the mighty Penguin made them reconsider. Shortly after Penguin buried many webmasters 6 feet under the ground, Google decided to focus its entire attention of manipulative, unnatural inbound links. According to Moz, the types of inbound links that can ruin your friendship with Google can be separated into different categories:

Paid links
Links with overly optimized anchor texts
Links coming from low-quality webpages
Links coming from sources that are not relevant to your business
Keyword stuffed links

3 Reasons Why Paid Links Are the Forbidden Fruit That Should Be Left in the Tree

If you don’t want to upset Google, it is highly recommended to invest time, money and energy in your content strategy, rather than trying to come up with a counterproductive tactic based on paid links. You may be wondering: why are paid links bad in the first place? Google doesn’t like them much for a number of reasons:

1) Paid Links Are a Form of Cheating. Basically, when you buy links, you pay to help your own page rank higher in search engine results. In other words, you defy Google’s rules and guidelines and put a certain amount of money on the table to see your website on page 1 in Google. Ultimately, you get bonus points from search engines that will consider you a relevant, popular, trustworthy source even if this is not the case.

2) Your Practice Stops Search Engines from Delivering Relevant Results. If all people were to pay to see their website occupy a privileged position in search engine results, how could Google, Bing and Yahoo manage to display relevant, quality results that users are actually interested in finding?

3) Bad Linking Strategies Don’t Help Your Readers. On the contrary, paid links that have no value whatsoever annoy and bore your readers to death, so this is one extra reason why you should avoid them.

5 Ways to Boost Your Website Traffic without Relying on Paid Links

Instead of investing your resources in deceptive optimization tactics, try to stay in Google’s good graces and increase your website traffic rapidly and risk-free. Here are 5 simple ways to attain your goal without jeopardizing your relationship with Google:

1) Maximize the Satisfaction of Your Readers. Moz points out that Google may measure satisfaction every single time users click on a certain page. So the question is this: does your website have what it takes to keep your readers on your side for the longest period of time? If the answer is no, find out what you have been doing wrong this whole time and discover the simplest method to correct your mishap. Update you content, add calls to action, change you tone/writing style, cultivate the feedback of your readers and make sure the topics that you expand one actually address their needs, demands and concerns.

Also, don’t neglect social media marketing opportunities. Improve your social media presence the easy way. Create and publish premium web content enabling you to interact with your fans and followers on some of the most important social media platforms.

2) Proper Video Optimization. A picture is worth a thousand words, but since the online environments have become increasingly competitive, you’ll need more than a great pic to convince users to click on your website. In this case, a video snippet could serve your best interest by stimulating the curiosity of your readers and proving that you are a first-class source of information that is counting on killer multimedia content to stay relevant.

3) Google Authorship (Plus an Awesome Photo of Yourself). Many webmasters are dealing with the same problem: they don’t know that online businesses have to establish real relationships with members of their targeted audience. Since not all the info available online is 100% accurate, users must find a way to separate quality content from written trash. To simplify their process, they take a closer look at the original source. Who is the mighty content creator? You are! In this case, highlight your authority and build credibility and trust by counting on Google Authorship. This way, a short, relevant description and a great photo of yourself will be listed at the beginning of you articles. While you’re going down this road, make sure you rely on a few basic elements guaranteeing your success:

Opt for a picture revealing a real face, not a cartoon character
Go for high-contrast hues that will make your pic noticeable
Post a photo that is audience-targeted: a photo of someone looking like a respectable financial advisor is certainly not the best pick if you want to convince teenage girls to click on your website and buy fashion jewelry.

4) Update Your Content. This is a good strategy that will also help you increase your website traffic. Create new, stellar content and update the old one regularly to attain your optimization goals. Google interprets freshness in different ways, based on several criteria, including your changes to important and unimportant web content, how many new pages you create over a certain period of time and how often you update your content.

5) Industry-Specific Websites. OK, so you have finally reached the conclusion that you shouldn’t buy links. This doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t try to get listed on industry-specific sites. Approach the webmasters and ask them to support your optimization efforts. They will most likely include you, especially if you are a relevant player in your industry and your content is fresh, engaging and rich in information.

These 5 simple methods can help you increase website traffic without relying on paid links. After all, why pay for something that will eventually go against you when you can redirect your resources towards a world class content strategy that will boost your profits, online visibility and your competitive edge without upsetting Google?