While link building is central to your SEO strategy, the process is complex. Many people tend to make mistakes, especially if they are not professionals. If you’re unsure about the process, agencies like Digital Marketing Service Pro can be of great help in most cases. Costly link-building mistakes include low-quality content, link spamming, and broken links. Below is an elaboration of the mistakes and how to avoid them.
Table Of Contents
Low-Quality Content
Even if you get the linking correctly, low-quality content will deny you the desired results, and you might not get the backlinks. Poor quality content also affects your overall ranking significantly since most users don’t want to be associated with platforms that offer zero value. To have quality content, ensure that it answers questions users are looking for. To improve content for search engine ranking, consider the following:
Compelling Content
Your customer and Google expect high-quality content. The content should be informative, adding value to the readers. The content should be precise, professional, and well-written to meet the users’ requirements.
Reader’s Persona
When writing content, put yourself in the shoes of the reader and searcher. Look at the most popular search terms related to your niche and incorporate them into your content.
Updated Content
Quality content should be updated for readers’ to see the relevance. Updated content ensures that readers find the right information, as it demonstrates that you are a reliable source who provides accurate information.
Link Spamming
It might be tempting to include more links in your article, but it can be costly. When you spam your article with links, Google will likely penalize you. In most cases, penalties related to links affect the overall website ranking. In extreme cases, Google can remove your website from the indexing algorithm, which will affect your general website traffic. To beat this challenge, you can leverage link monitoring tools to spot harmful links and remove them.
Link Trading
Trading links is a common practice among content creators. Trading links can be beneficial for both parties to some extent. However, it is important to note that the current Google algorithm does not support link trading. Once detected, you will likely lose your Google ranking, resulting in a massive hit on your traffic.
It is advisable to link content using the natural method that offers relevance to your content. Any SEO expert will advise sharing links relevant to what is mentioned in the article and should come with any expectation like a backlink. Buying links can also be costly. In most cases, search engines cannot detect bought links compared to natural ones. However, the algorithm can detect a pattern that points to buying of links. Once caught, it can be damaging to your website’s organic traffic.
Links From Irrelevant Websites
To get the right visibility, it is important to focus on incorporating links from websites and web pages relevant to your niche. The links should drive interest among your audience. One mistake is that most people focus on quantity instead of quality. The results will be of low quality, affecting the overall website ranking. You can also leverage domain authority tools to determine the relevance of the website.
Broken Links
Broken links can be very frustrating to visitors. Your internal linking structure should be optimized for crawlers to avoid these mistakes since it will ensure the right people interact with your content. Taking care of broken links is important because once a crawler encounters a broken link, there is termination, and it will be unable to proceed to pages linked to the affected page. Depending on the size of your website, you can detect broken links manually for smaller sites. For larger websites, you can take a technical approach by leveraging tools for detecting broken links.
Incorrect Anchor Text
Anchor text offers an opportunity to get valuable backlinks. The right anchor text enables Google to understand the contents of the linked page in return for determining the page’s relevance. When using the anchor text, it should naturally fit the context of the paragraph where it appears. If the text is spammy or awkward, Google might be alerted resulting in undesired results. You can also mix up the anchor text to establish a natural-looking backlink. The keyword of your choice should also be directly relevant to the content being linked.
Endnote
Overall, SEO link building is an extensive task by factoring in the importance of search engine optimization and you can feel overwhelmed getting it right. Most brands dedicate more time and resources to link building. However, they are faced with common link-building issues that can end up in costly mistakes. Therefore, it is vital to understand the basics of link building to avoid missing out on valuable traffic. If your internal team is not sure, it is vital to consult experts in the field.