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Link Building For SEO: The Definitive Guide

This is a complete guide to link building in 2024.

So if you want to build authority backlinks to your website, you’ll enjoy the actionable tips in this new guide.

Let’s dive right in.

Link Building for SEO: The Definitive Guide

What Is Link Building?

Link building is the practice of building one-way hyperlinks (also known as “backlinks”) to a website with the goal of improving search engine visibility. Common link building strategies include content marketing, building useful tools, email outreach, broken link building and public relations.

Why Are Links So Important?

To understand that, you’ll need to hop in your Delorean and go back to the pre-Google days of the internet.

Back in the day, search engines like Yahoo! and Alta Vista were the dominant players. And they ranked their search results 100% based on the content on a webpage.

Enter: Google.

Their now-famous PageRank Algorithm changed the game. Instead of simply analyzing the content of a page, Google looked at how many people linked to that page.

Google Page Rank Algorithm

And they were right. Nearly 20 years later, links are STILL the best way to determine the quality of a webpage. That’s why backlinks remain Google’s go-to ranking signal.

That said, thanks to updates like Google Penguin, Google now focuses on link quality (not just link quantity).

You might be wondering:

What is a high-quality link, exactly? And how do I build them?

That’s what I’m going to cover in the next chapter.

Keep reading…

Authority of the Page

Is the page linking to you a PageRank powerhouse? If so, that link is going to have a BIG impact on your rankings.

In fact, from years of testing, I’ve found that the authority of the page linking to you matters more than any other factor.

That’s because links from authoritative pages pass more authority (also known as PageRank) to your site.

Effect Of High Authority Pages

(Note: Although Google doesn’t share PageRank information publicly, they still use it as the foundation of their algorithm.)

You can easily check a proxy indicator of PageRank (“PageRating”) using Semrush.

Just pop a URL into Semrush and check out its “Page Authority Score”:

SEO techniques post – Page authority score

Authority of the Site

A link’s quality is also determined by a domain’s sitewide authority.

In general, a link from a site like NYTimes.com will have a MUCH bigger impact than a link from a no-name blogger.

While these links are tough to get, they’re well worth the effort.

Again, Semrush comes in handy here. Enter a site root URL into the tool and check out its “Authority Score”.

Semrush – Domain authority score

Relevancy of the Site

When it comes to links, a site’s authority matters.

But that site’s relevance also matters.

For example, let’s say you run a website about The Paleo Diet.

And you get a link from an authoritative site… about unicycles. Will that link still count?

According to an interview from an ex-Googler, not really.

According to that Google engineer:

“…getting a link from a high PageRank page used to always be valuable, today it’s more the relevance of the site’s theme in regards to yours, relevance is the new PageRank.”

In general, you want to get links from authority sites…specifically, authority sites that are closely related to your site.

Link’s Position on the Page

Is your link embedded in a piece of content?

Or is it buried in a page’s footer?

Backlinko Footer

It turns out that your link’s position on a page is important.

Specifically, links stashed away in footers and sidebars aren’t worth nearly as much as links found smack in the middle of a page’s body content.

Bottom line? You want your links to appear within the main body of a webpage.

Is the Link Editorially Placed?

No matter where your link appears on a page, you should ask yourself:

“Was this link editorially placed?”.

In other words, did someone link to you because they thought your site is awesome? If so, that’s an editorial link.

Or did you create a profile on a random site and drop a link? That’s not an editorial link.

As you might expect, Google puts MUCH more weight on editorially-placed links.

Quoth thy Google:

“…creating links that weren’t editorially placed or vouched for by the site’s owner on a page, otherwise known as unnatural links, can be considered a violation of our guidelines.”

Link Anchor Text

Anchor text is the clickable text section of a link.

As it turns out, Google uses anchor text as a ranking signal.

For example, let’s say you get a link to your site with anchor text: “paleo desserts”.

Anchor Links

Google sees that anchor text and says: “Hmmm. That site used the anchor text: “paleo desserts”. The page they’re linking to must be about “paleo desserts.”

Of course, like anything in SEO, keyword-rich anchor text has been abused. Today, building lots of exact-match anchor text links is considered spammy.

Here’s an example of what I’m talking about:

In short, I don’t recommend building links with keyword-rich anchor text. But if you DO get a link with your keyword in the anchor text, it’s time to celebrate.

Link Co-Occurrences

Co-Occurrences are the words and phrases that appear around your link.

Google likely uses co-Occurrences as “baby anchor text”.

Link Co-Occurrences

This makes sense if you think about it:

The text around your link also gives clues to what your page is about. So why wouldn’t Google use it?

Is the Link From a Guest Post?

A few years ago, Google came right out and said:

Matt Cutts

“So stick a fork in it: guest blogging is done; it’s just gotten too spammy.”
– Matt Cutts, Former Head of Google’s Webspam Team

Is that true?

Well…it depends.

Here are some red flags that can make guest posting spammy:

  • Someone is paid to publish the post
  • The post contains exact match anchor text
  • The site exists solely to publish guest posts
  • The site is unrelated to yours

But what if you publish a mind-blowing guest post on an authoritative, relevant site? In my experience, that link CAN help you rank.

Nofollow .vs. Dofollow

rel=”nofollow” is a tag added to a link that tells search engines: “Don’t count this link as an endorsement.”.

Obviously, when it comes to SEO, you want to get normal, “dofollow” links whenever possible.

Now that you can know how to size up a link’s quality, it’s time to start building them.

Chapter 3:How to Get World-Class Links With Content Marketing

Content Marketing

Its no secret that content is the key that unlocks amazing backlinks.

But here’s the deal:

Simply publishing content isn’t going to land you any links.

As it turns out, certain types of content work best for link building.

And here are the 4 types of content that tend to generate the most links:

#1: Visual Assets

What It Is:

Visual assets are:

  1. Images
  2. Diagrams
  3. Infographics
  4. Charts and other visual-oriented pieces of content

Why It Works:

Visuals are super-duper easy to link to. For example, when you publish a chart on your site, you get a link anytime someone shares that chart on their site. This powerful “share my image and link to me when you do” relationship simply doesn’t work for text-based content.

Real-Life Example:

A few years ago I published this visual about Google CTR on my site.

Google organic CTR – Breakdown by position

To date, this visual has been linked to dozens of times (many of which came from authoritative sites in the marketing niche).

Sure, some of these links would have come in even if I had listed the same data in a table.

But a good chunk of these links (I’d estimate 75%) were created because I presented the info as a visual.

In fact, lots of my links came from people directly posting my visual on their site (and linking back to me as the source):

And the funny thing is, even though it’s been several years, people STILL link to my visual every month. That’s the power of creating visual assets.

#2: List Posts

What It Is:

A numbered list of tips, techniques, reasons, myths…or just about anything.

Why It Works:

List posts pack a ton value into digestible, bite-sized chunks.

In fact, when BuzzSumo analyzed 1 million articles, they discovered that list posts generated more backlinks than other content formats… outperforming quizzes, videos and even infographics.

Buzzsumo Study Referring Domains List Posts

Real-Life Example:

This list post, 19 NEW SEO Techniques, is one of my all-time most popular pieces of content.

Yes, it’s generated a ton of shares…

SEO techniques – Post shares

…and comments.

SEO techniques – Post comments

But most importantly, that post is a link magnet.

It has over 4,000 links.

Ahrefs – SEO techniques post – Backlinks

And because the page has so many links pointing to it, it ranks in the top 5 for the keyword “SEO Techniques”.

Google SERP – SEO techniques

#3: Original Research and Data

What It Is:

Content that reveals new data from industry studies, surveys or original research.

Why It Works:

Statistics and data are highly linkable. When someone cites your data, they link to you. These links add up QUICKLY.

Real-Life Example:

Some time ago, I published the largest Google ranking factors study ever.

Backlinko – Search engine ranking study

Needless to say, this post contains a boatload of original data.

That’s why the post has accumulated a whopping 18.9k links so far.

Ahrefs – Search engine ranking – Backlinks

Like I mentioned above, most of these links come from people citing a particular statistic from our study:

#4: In-Depth Ultimate Guides

What It Is:

A comprehensive resource that covers everything there is to know about a given topic (and then some).

Why It Works:

Ultimate guides pack an insane amount of information in one place. This makes your guide THE go-to resource for that topic.

Real-Life Example:

I used to get emails from people asking me for keyword research advice on a daily basis.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have anything on my blog that covered that super-important topic.

So I created one: Keyword Research for SEO: The Definitive Guide.

Backlinko – Keyword research

Because this multi-chapter guide covers keyword research like no other resource online, it’s been linked to over 37 thousand times.

Ahrefs – Keyword research – Backlinks

Now that you’ve created a piece of link-worthy content, it’s time to build some links.

How?

With good ol’ fashioned email outreach.

Chapter 4:How to Build Powerful Links With Email Outreach

Email Outreach

If you want to build white hat links in 2024 (and beyond), you need to use email outreach.

The question is:

How can you reach out to bloggers and journalists without ending up in their spam folder?

Read this chapter to find out.

1

Find “Likely Linkers”

As the name suggests, Likely Linkers are people that are likely to link to you.

I’ll show you a bunch of techniques for finding Likely Linkers in Chapter 6. But for now, let’s use a simple strategy to identify them: reverse engineering.

First, search for your target keyword in Google.

Paleo Desserts SERP

Grab the URL of the first result and pop it into a link analysis tool (I’m using Semrush in this example).

Next, hit “Backlink Analytics” in the sidebar and then “Backlinks”:

Semrush – Backlink Analytics – Backlinks

The sites listed here are all Likely Linkers.

Paleo running momma – Backlinks

(How do you know which sites to target and which to ignore? Check out Chapter 2).

2

Find Their Email Address

Now that you’ve found a Likely Linker, it’s time to dig for their email address.

Pro Tip: Use a site’s contact form only as a last resort. It’s a black hole.

Here’s how:

Use Hunter.io

Hunter.io is perfect for reaching out to small sites and one-person blogs.

Simply enter a site into the tool…

Hunter Email Search

…and it’ll show you all of the email addresses associated with that domain:

Email Results

But what if you want to reach out to a massive site? Combing through this list is going to be a pain.

That’s why, in those cases, I recommend VoilaNorbert.

VoilaNorbert

Instead of popping in a URL, with VoilaNorbert.com you enter a person’s name and the domain they work at.

That way you’re reaching out to the person that can actually add your link to their page.

And it’ll show you that specific person’s email address.

3

Send Them a (Personalized) Script

If you want to scale outreach, you’ll need to use scripts.

The trick is to make your script not look like a script (more on that in the next step).

But now, here’s an example of one of my best-performing email scripts:

Notice how the script allows A LOT of personalization without a whole lot of effort.

Google Penguin

What It Is:

An algorithmic penalty that specifically targets sites that use spammy link building techniques (like shady guest posting and blog comment spam).

How to Avoid It:

Only build white hat links. There’s data to show that you can dodge Penguin by minimizing exact match anchor text (I say anchor text is part of the story…but it’s more about trust). That said, the easiest way to avoid Penguin is to avoid shady links (regardless of anchor text).

Manual Penalty/Unnatural Links

What It Is:

A manual penalty from someone at Google. Unlike Penguin, Google will send you a message via the Google Search Console:

How To Avoid It:

No one outside of Google knows how sites get targeted for manual penalties. My take is that an algorithm spots a website that’s potentially gaming the system. And they bubble that site up to someone at Google for a manual review. So the best way to avoid a manual penalty is to have a squeaky-clean link profile.

Also, unlike with Penguin, you can recover from a manual penalty by disavowing links and filing a reconsideration request.

Resource Page Link Building

First off: what are resource pages?

Resource pages are pages that link out to awesome content on a given topic.

Here’s an example:

Because these pages exist for the sole purpose of linking out, they make PERFECT link building targets.

With that, here’s the step-by-step process:

1

Find Resource Pages

Use these search strings in Google. They’re designed specifically to unearth resource pages:

“Keyword” + inurl:links
“Keyword” + “helpful resources”
“Keyword” + “useful resources”
“Keyword” + “useful links”

2

Size Up The Page

Here’s where you (quickly) answer the question:

“Is a link from this page worth the effort?”.

(Hint: Use the tips from Chapter 2 to make this step a breeze)

For example, this resource page has a decent URLRating of 12. Not bad.

Resource Page URL Rating

It’s also on an authoritative domain.

And my link will end up somewhere on the body of the page. Looks like a winner!

3

Find “Best Fit” Content

Look:

Your content can be the best in the world…

…but if it’s not a good fit for that resource page?

You’re not gonna get a link.

So for this step, find content on your site that’ll fit that resource page like a glove.

Once you’ve ID’d that content, move onto step #4.

4

Send This Tested Script

Here’s the script I recommend:

Pro Tip: Like all outreach scripts, make sure to personalize this script as much as possible. You can use a script as long as it doesn’t LOOK like a script.

Broken Link Building

Broken Link Building is one of my all-time favorite link building strategies.

Why?

Instead of straight-up begging for links, with Broken Link Building, you add value to someone’s website.

Here’s how to do it:

1

Install Check My Links or LinkMiner

Both of these tools quickly find broken links on any page (from within your Chrome Browser).

I’ll show you how to use them in a minute.

Check My Links

2

Find Pages With Lots of Outbound Links

The more links a page has, the more likely one of them will be broken.

Resource pages work great here. So feel free to use the search strings above to bring up resource pages.

3

Check For Broken Links

Here’s where you run the extension you installed in the first step.

They’ll reveal broken links on that page:

Check My Links Results
4

Email The Site Owner About Their Broken Link

Finally, let the person that runs that page about their broken link (or links),… and pitch content from your site as a replacement.

Here’s the script I recommend:

The Skyscraper Technique

This video will walk you through the step-by-step process:

Once you watch the video, it’s time for the next chapter:

Awesome link building case studies!

Chapter 7:Incredible Case Studies

Incredible Case Studies

Now it’s time for me to show you real-life examples of link building in action.

The best part?

I’ve never shared any of these case studies before.

Case Study #1

How Julie Used The Skyscraper Technique to Boost Organic Traffic By 194.1%

Julie Adams’ blog, Our Beautiful Planet, was struggling.

Sure, Julie was publishing great content. But in her words: “No matter how awesome my content was, no links came.

That’s when Julie decided to try The Skyscraper Technique.

So instead of publishing another piece of great content…she created something AMAZING. Here it is:

And instead of publishing this content and hoping for the best, Julie used email outreach to build backlinks.

And this landed her a handful of links from authority sites in the science space:

These white hat backlinks boosted her organic traffic by a legit 194.1%:

Why does The Skyscraper Technique work so well?

According to Julie:

“The thing that makes this so successful is that it’s just as much about building relationships as it is about building links. People won’t link to your content unless they know it exists, and they won’t know it exists unless you tell them about it.”

Well said.

Case Study #2

Broken Link Building Pays Off

Last year I decided to run a broken link building campaign. So I followed the steps that I outlined in the last chapter.

First, I used search strings to bring up pages with lots of outbound links.

And I used Check My Links to find links that weren’t working.

Then I emailed the person in charge of that content to give them a heads up about broken links that I found:

(Note how uber-personalized that email is)

When they replied, I sent them the URL of the broken link…and a piece of content from Backlinko that would be a 1:1 replacement:

And most folks were more than happy to add my link:

Case Study #3

How Matt Built Links to His Ecommerce Site

Let’s face it:

Link building for ecommerce sites isn’t easy.

But it’s possible. Just look at Matt Lawry.

Like most ecommerce site owners, Matt had trouble building links to his ecommerce website (an Australian site focused on gifts).

After all, who wants to link to a site made up of 100% product pages? That’s when Matt realized that he could use content to generate links to his ecommerce site.

Specifically, Matt published an amazing piece of Skyscraper content on his site: “Australian Gin: The Ultimate Guide”.

Of course, Matt didn’t sit back and wait for the links to roll in. He promoted his content via email outreach:

History of gin

Because Matt reached out to the right people (and sent them personalized emails), many people OFFERED to link to his guide.

History of gin

And all of these links boosted Matt’s rankings for a keyword that directly results in sales for his ecommerce site: Australian Gin.

Get Easy Links With Link Reclamation

Whenever someone mentions your brand in an article, they link to you…right?

Wrong.

I mean, they should link to you. But it doesn’t always happen.

Here’s what I mean:

But with a gentle nudge, most site owners are happy to turn your unlinked mention into a link.

How do you find these unlinked mentions? BuzzSumo works great.

Buzzsumo – Unlinked Mentions

Get “Bonus” Links With Reverse Image Search

Do you publish visual assets like infographics and charts?

If so, there are probably sites using your images without attribution right now.

Don’t freak out. In fact, you should celebrate. Just like with link reclamation, a friendly email can turn many of these opportunities into links.

And you can use Google reverse image search to find peeps that are using your images without a link:

Reverse Image Search

Send Emails In the Afternoon

Here’s one thing I’ve learned from sending THOUSANDS of outreach emails:

Send your outreach emails in the afternoon (in the recipient’s local time).

Why?

When you send your message in the morning, it gets lumped together with the 93 other emails that person has to deal with.

But when you send in the afternoon, there’s much less competition in the inbox.

I recommend Gmail’s built-in scheduling feature to help time your outreach emails:

Afternoon Emails

Create Visualizations of Concepts, Ideas and Strategies

Here’s an example of this in action from Backlinko:

Backlinko Simple Visual

Believe it or not, but lots of people have linked to me thanks to this simple illustration:

Backlinko Visual – Reverse Image Search

Why does this work so well?

Well I COULD have simply described the APP formula with text. But that would have made my content much less shareable.

On the other hand, when you create a visual, you have something that bloggers will happily use in their content (and link to you when they do).

Send Out Feeler Emails Before Going For the Close

Should you ask for a link in your first outreach email to someone?

Short answer: maybe.

You may get better results with a two-step process (Backlinko reader Mike found that feeler emails CRUSHED asking for a link straightaway):

Feeler Emails

The other benefit of this approach is that it saves you TIME. Instead of personalizing outreach messages that no one will ever read, send brief “feeler” emails.

Then personalize the heck out of your next series of messages.

Get Interviewed on Podcasts

Yes, guest post links have their place.

But they have one big problem: they take a ton of time to write!

Enter podcasting. Instead of outlining, drafting and editing a guest post, you just show up and talk about what you know. And – boom! — you get a link.

The best part?

There are podcasts on EVERY topic.

Here’s an example of a link I built by appearing on a podcast:

Interviewed On Podcast

Use “Link Intersect” To Uncover Likely Linkers

If someone links to your competitor, they’re likely to link to you…right?

Right.

And if someone links to TWO of your competitors, they’re even more likely to link to you.

How can you find sites that links to more than one of your competitors?

Semrush Backlink Gap tool

Just list out 2-3 of your biggest competitors along with your website.

And this nifty tool will show you who links to all of ‘em.

Backlink gap – Prospects list

Use “Pre-Curated” Lists of Link Targets

There’s no denying it:

Finding high-quality link targets is HARD.

That’s the bad news.

The good news is that someone else already curated these high-quality sites for you…

…in the form of “best blog” lists.

Here’s an example:

Baking Blogs

Needless to say, if you run a baking blog, every single one of the sites listed here would make a great link opportunity.

You can find lists like these using search strings like: “best [topic] blogs” or “list of [topic] blogs”.

Conclusion

Conclusion Link Building

That’s it for my guide to link building in 2024.

Which strategy from today’s guide do you want to try first? Or maybe you have a question about something.

Either way, let me know by leaving a quick comment below.

533 Comments

  1. Andrii Avatar Andriisays:

    Another great post Brian.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Andrii

  2. Hey Brian,

    thanks for that post! This awesome ressources are a real killer! I plan such things too!

    Greetings from Germany
    Vladislav

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Vladislav.

    1. Brian is always on the spot and writes perfect articles.

  3. Chris Avatar Chrissays:

    Another stella post/guide Brian. This site is fast becoming my “go-to” link building resource. Keep bringing the awesome!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      🙂

  4. Edgar Avatar Edgarsays:

    You’re an animal Brain! 🙂 — great stuff you’re always putting out man! Thank you for that!

    Just out of curiosity, how long did it take you to put it together? And what software did you use to create the graphics/diagrams?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      No problem, Edgar. Glad to hear that you enjoyed the guide. Like anything worth doing, it took a lot of hours to create this guide.

    1. as for the graphics, they can be done in Illustrator for he/she has the skills.

    1. Roman Avatar Romansays:

      If you do not have the skills to work with graphic editors, then these 2 services are suitable for creating infographics: https://infogram.com and https://creately.com. It can be used for free 🙂

  5. Hey Brian…
    Superb, detailed and useful information. All in one place.
    Thanks!
    ~ Louie

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re , Louis! Now its time to get some links 🙂

  6. How have I missed this site?! Feels like I’ve found the Holy Grail! Geez Brian, these tips are worth their weight in gold…you should be charging an entry fee to your site. I totally agree with Jason Bax – but damn grateful nonetheless 😉 Thanks such an incredible site, post and all the other awesome content and advice.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      I try 🙂 . As a sign of appreciation you can buy me a beer the next time I’m in New Zealand. Sound good?

      1. Definitely! Just make sure you join us on the South Island. Ski and snow in winter…surf and jet boating in summer. We’re in Christchurch but usually head to Queenstown and the West Coast in July and December. You’ve got my email address…just let us know when you’re visiting. Chat soon and thanks again for the great info.

        1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

          Sounds good, Dean. Talk to you soon.

  7. Mikk Avatar Mikksays:

    Sweet post again.
    Keep em’ coming!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Mikk 🙂

  8. Ronee Avatar Roneesays:

    Thanks for this article, Brian. My husband has one of many websites that he has sort of turned over to me. It is a food blog. I am not that technical when it comes to marketing a website. I am going to refer him to this article, and see if he can help me sort out this challenge of getting quality backlinks.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Sounds good, Ronee.

  9. Wow! What a resource to learn link building.
    You must’ve done some extensive research to develop this resource. Thanks a lot 🙂

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re right about that, Abhay

  10. Hey Brian, this is an *Awesome* guide 🙂 Already tweeted and now subscribed ^_^

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Nice!

  11. Susan Velez Avatar Susan Velezsays:

    Hi Brian,
    This post is like gold, especially for someone who gave up SEO for a while. My sites got slapped by Google and I lost my rankings and income overnight..so I ventured into other methods to drive traffic.

    However, I have been wanting to get back into SEO for my sites so I could get more traffic from more than one method.

    I will be using some of these methods that you discuss and I will be back to read some more. Thanks for sharing these tips.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Glad you got so much value from the guide, Susan.

  12. Thank you for your guide Brian. I saw/read your Backlinko Interview and then I found your very interesting blog.:)

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Sounds good, Robert.

  13. Whole lot of matherial. Wanted to workout it through one single session and now my brain is going to blow 🙂
    I have a questions though. Do you recommend to nofollow outbound links to “authority” pages? What about link mass at all. I find so many SEO “experts” quite obsessed with inbound to outbound link ratio nowadays.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Ivan.

      I recommend linking out to authority sites with dofollow links. I don’t obsess over any inbound/outbound ratio. I just focus
      on linking out to helpful, relevant resources.

  14. Yet another awesome post! I read this one earlier and actually came back to leave a comment and ask a question. I lost a couple of site to the Penguin update and I am not sure if it is best to leave them be or try to revive them and do better next time around?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      That’s a tough answer that depends on a lot of different variables. Getting out of Penguin is no joke but can be done. Question is: is it worth it vs. starting fresh?

  15. Awesome guide Brian. I think you have some of the best link building guides anywhere online. You are a great teacher and from the looks of it, one hell of a link builder too.

    Thanks for another awesome guide!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Travis. I appreciate that.

  16. Very nice post 🙂
    A quick thing I spotted – the guide itself is not that much responsive. It was close to impossible to read on my Galaxy smartphone…

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Nicolai. Should be all good now.

  17. Mohd Haider Avatar Mohd Haidersays:

    Awesome details Brian, you have brought the complete SEO guide under one roof.

  18. Cheers from Romania, Europe Brian!

    I was looking for a long time for a guide like this on link building strategies and now that I found it I am very happy to see so many tips that are useful!

    Cheers my friend!

  19. Kur Avatar Kursays:

    Hi Brian, I like how you linked all the resources in 1 page! I cant remember where i read it, but you said something like USA sites with links from Russian sites etc are spam… Somewhere along those lines. So I just want to know, I’m from Malaysia, for a local business, is it alright to have USA backlinks if they are good links or is demographics a bigger factor in ranking?

    Thanks!

  20. Looked for some ideas for backlinks and was blown away by your guide. Thanks so much Brian. You’ve got yourself a fan.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Mike

  21. Ashley Parvone Avatar Ashley Parvonesays:

    Perfect – just the kind of thing I was looking for! I’m an SEO beginner and whenever I search for linkbuilding guides, I’m overwhelmed with giant walls of text and jargon. This breaks it down perfectly, without skimping on detail – thank you!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Boom!

  22. You are taking designing the blog post to a whole new level and some fantastic updates 🙂

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      I try, Udit.

  23. Bulky list posts are great sources for link bait. Tools like hrefs are also great for link building. BTW you must have put hours of effort into this post!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      True dat, Joe. This guide was a ton of effort. But a labor of love 🙂

  24. Another incredible read, Brian! With the inevitable rise of importance of social signals, I do think it would be good to include a chapter about social signals and how to boost social media shares in the next version of this article though.

    I always run extensive social promotion on my articles before beginning the link outreach, and often use that as social proof for tier one influencers that the article is worth checking out.

  25. Brian, thanks for this update. You are my reference for SEO. Now I’ve got some link building work to do 😉

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Go get ’em Steve!

  26. Brian ,
    I want to know this very badly. How do you create this inforgraphics from which you can also copy text.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Soham, this page is custom designed and coded. It’s not easy!

  27. Ken Roberts Avatar Ken Robertssays:

    This guide is EPIC. Any tips on how I can find a baller designer like yours?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Ken, I recommend freelance sites like Upwork and 99 Designs. A bit of a crapshoot but there are some gems on there.

  28. Shrikant Avatar Shrikantsays:

    I’ve not read it yet (It’s huge), but by seeing it I can say it’s very informative and useful. Thanks brian for such a nice post.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Shrikant.

  29. Wow Brian, this is, again, really impresive! Especially your find best fit content suggestion has worked in the past very good in my case for my content for renovation.

    Cheers!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Sounds good, Peter. Now its time to implement 🙂

  30. John Avatar Johnsays:

    Practice what you preach at its purest 🙂
    Grat post Brian!

    Right now I’m struggeling most finding a good content builder for creating posts like this guide. Also finding a graphic designer who illustrates in the right way is a pain in the ass.

    Do you have any recommendations?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      John, we custom designed and coded this guide. Not an easy task an not one most WordPress content builder plugins can handle.

  31. As usual an excellent guide. What I really appreciate Brian is that you continue posting despite having a large readership already :). A habit getting lost by many bloggers usually…

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Jochen, you’re right: many bloggers fall off after a few years. I’m just getting warmed up 😉

  32. Brian this is an AWESOME update. I have to say, I died and went to nerdy SEO heaven after seeing you posted a case study of my site. Keep up the good work!!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Julie. And BIG props on your success.

  33. Tom Avatar Tomsays:

    Lovely stuff Brian, thanks so much for putting this together.

    With case study #3 I find it curious that the creator is outranked by someone simply repurposing his content. Is that something you just have to suck up while you improve the standing of your website as a whole?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Tom. Yup, with image-based content that kind of thing can happen if the domain has way more authority than you do.

  34. Maxi Jazz Avatar Maxi Jazzsays:

    Hi, Brian!
    Definitely the most amazing… I’d say educational post on Backlinks.
    Because I’m one of your STW subscribers (I’m in the FB group), I’d like to make a suggestion regarding reverse image search. Google does that but it is pretty weak. It might be helpful to replace it with tineye.com. It finds way more images than Google and the algorithm is light years ahead of Google. I don’t know how this happens, it just does. Tineye is able to find even portions of an image. Results are quite stunning. You should definitely add Tineye to the guide.
    I have nothing to do with Tineye.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Hey Maxi, thanks for the suggestion. I haven’t used tinyeye in years. Last I used it, the tool was about the same as Google Images. Sounds like they stepped things up. I’ll check it out 🙂

  35. Thanks for another great guide!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Scott.

  36. So many ideas!!!

    It doesn’t matter how much SEO knowledge I think I have…. You always teach me more! Thank you for your hard work.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Marc

  37. This is article is just amazing,i got to learn lot like how should i build links and what is important when it comes to dominating the google first, Brian i always learn something new from your post , please post something on anchor distribution that where i have little doubt hope soon i will see post on anchor distribution from your end.

    thanks in advance

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Samir

  38. Awesome stuff as usual Brian, thanks!

    Do you ever do any PR based link building? We recently tried this with some data led content and then reached out to Journalists to see if they would like to cover it. Had some decent results.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Richard. I have in the form of “Original Research and Data” (mentioned in the guide). Got some great features.

      What did you guys create and promote?

      1. We took the official UN list of real world issues and found out how many times each one was Tweeted about in 2016 then got some infographics made to visualize the data.

        We are still doing it actually. We have had some good placements but I was wondering if you have any tips to really maximise the number of placements?

  39. Matt M Avatar Matt Msays:

    “Quoth thy Google”, haha.

    nice post Brian, thanks.

    Also appreciate you responding to my email about proven topics the other day.

    When do you think STW 3.0 will come out?

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Matt. I just started laying the groundwork. I expect to release STW 3.0 in the next 3 months.

  40. Brain thanks for such a great guide. I stumbled on your website when I was search for link building and on-page SEO and you ranked No.1 and on page #1 of Google. That was last year. I took action on your on page SEO tips and I was able to move from position 100+ to page 3 within 1 week and I just did an email outreach base on your tips from one of your blog post and now I ranked on position #2 on google. After watching your recommendation for PR THAT CONVERTS, I also studying its blog posts and taking action. I am so glad I stumbled on your website and my traffic for long tail keywords has increased greatly. Thank you so much Brain.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Ndifreke. And congrats!

  41. Brad Avatar Bradsays:

    Thanks for everything you do. I am just getting started, and have read and researched so much that I might explode.
    I hear a lot from other sites that the hoth or some other link building sites are good to use.
    I don’t know if you have tried using something like that, but I was wondering what you thought?
    Also, I get a lot of training from your site.
    Thank you

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Brad, You’re welcome. I’d start out with the strategies from this guide.

  42. Hi Brian, any chance you can make this guide into a pdf?

    Thanks.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Hi Peter, its in the works.

  43. Yet another awesome post Brian (and team)! I just made a list of all the key points and sent them to my team as reminders. Keep up the great work.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Nice!

  44. Usually I don’t use mail often. But after read this article, Now I can clearly understand how to use mail and how to get authority backlinks by mail.

    I definitely execute these tips for my blogs.

    Thank you Brian Dean for this useful piece of content.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      No problem, Tamil

  45. Quinton L Avatar Quinton Lsays:

    Awesome guide, Brian! For those who think this guide is amazing, you should have joined his SEO That Works 2.0 class 😉

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Nice! That’s true Quinton. This guide is great, but its nothing compared to Module 3 of STW!

  46. Currently this page has 4585 words and ranks #4 in Google for “Link Building”. The pages that rank 1-3 have 1405, 2374 and 2538 words respectively.

    No doubt that backlinks are the most powerful factor in rankings, but authoritative content (and word count) plays a huge role as well. We’ll see if this update will push you into the top 3.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      That’s true, Jason: authoritative (thorough) content is also important for cracking the top 3 for a competitive keyword like this.

  47. Yet another awesome post Brian. They just keep getting better and better.

    Cheers

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      Thanks Gary. Glad you enjoyed this one

  48. This guide is so so informative and the best part is that it is not selling expensive subscription tools. Simple things that folks can do without a lot of investment. Thank you Brian!

    Psst: there are many email newsletters I have subscribed to but few I really read. Yours is one of them!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome, Anks

  49. Great content Brian, thanks for sharing!

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      No problemo, Ewerton. Glad you learned some new stuff from today’s guide.

    1. Brian Dean Avatar Brian Deansays:

      You’re welcome.

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