The Role of Content in Link Building - 1.1. Link Building Course

Hey, it's Sam Oh and welcome to the first module, which is on the fundamentals of advanced link building. In this first lesson, we're going to talk about the role of content in link building. Now, the reason why I want to explore this first is because content and link building are inseparable. And while many get this in theory, they don't put it into practice. Let me paint a picture for you that I see time and time again. So people will often start with keyword research. They'll research subtopics and create content hubs because structure is important. They'll hit the publish button and then be like, oh yeah, we're going to need links to rank for these topics. So they look at who's linking to the top ranking pages for their main topics. Then they export backlink profiles, filter prospects by metrics, and then do some sort of shotgun approach where they send a gazillion emails hoping for a 0.5% link acquisition rate. Then to excuse themselves from blatantly spamming the population of a small town, they say, link building is a numbers game. You just got to keep on sending those emails. Now, assuming you're not paying for links or doing link exchanges that scale, your content should dictate your outreach pitches. Your content is actually what gives you a good reason to contact someone and ask for a link. It sets context for your first conversation around a common interest or belief. Now, quick disclaimer, I'm not saying that link building is not a numbers game, but I don't think we should be bragging about 0.5% link acquisition rates because it doesn't have to be this painful or spammy. And I'm not saying that paying for links or doing link exchanges are ineffective. These are just blatantly against Google's terms of service and we don't practice that at Ahrefs. Plus, on a personal note, the harder link building gets, the more I love the game. All right, now let's dig a bit deeper into the content aspect. Your content type matters in terms of success rates. As a very general rule of thumb, informational content like how-tos, tutorials, and data studies are going to be easier to get links to than product pages, affiliate posts, or anything commercial for that matter. Why? Because there are a lot more opportunities to bake value into informational content. And again, value should be tied to your pitch angles. Whereas commercial content is tougher to insert value, specifically for things like product pages, where the only real beneficiary of value is the recipient of the link. Now, because this is only meant to be a foundational lesson, I won't expand on baking value into informational content right now. Because first, we need to understand why people link to pages. Actually, seeing as a link is essentially an author sharing information through their website with web visitors, it's easiest if we ask ourselves, why do people share the things they share? So as an example, a friend might share the latest news article or a recipe because they recently had a conversation about it. Parents share things with kids to sometimes pass down nuggets of wisdom. Kids often share things with parents seeking wisdom or expressing a complaint. In all of these examples, there's a relationship. Now, if we put this in the context of link building, why does an author share another person's page via a hyperlink with their readers who are mostly anonymous strangers? And while there's no set list of reasons, here are some common ones. Number one, they link to pages to reference or support their point. Statistics are probably the most common. For example, if we look at the anchors report for our SEO statistics page, you'll see that nearly all of our links are a result of specific stats that were mentioned. Number two, they reference something they don't need or want to expand on. For example, Teamwork.com wrote this guide on SEO project management. And under the heading, what is SEO project management? They say, an SEO campaign encompasses various tasks such as technical SEO, a content audit, keyword research, et cetera. And for each area of SEO, there's linked to a guide, including our posts on keyword research. For a topic like SEO project management, there's no point in expanding on these techniques because it's easier to direct readers to a place where they can learn more about it if they want to. Number three, it makes them look good. People often link to things like high profile mentions because it helps them build credibility and social proof with visitors. For example, this site has an in the press page where most links are from listicles on things they value and or make them look good. So things like best gift sets is saying, see, our product is awesome. Or top native owned businesses tells us a bit about their values and roots. In fact, creating pages that mention and portray a person or company in a positive way is a link building tactic on its own. Often referred to as ego bait. Basically, SEOs create content like this where they mention influential people which often baits people into linking to them. It doesn't always work for mega lists but it has worked exceptionally well for Inc's list of the Inc 5000. Inc magazine publishes a list of the top 5,000 most successful companies in the US annually. And as a result, they earn hundreds or even thousands of links every single year. And if we look at the backlinks for their 2021 list, you'll see that tons of these links are from homepages where companies are showing off their award. And the fourth reason is that there's a relationship whether it's explicit or implicit. Implicit relationships are usually content super fans. And while it's tough to build a content fan base, they're super effective in link building because they trust what's written on a site without a shadow of a doubt. When they guest post, they frequently link to you. When they go on podcast interviews, they frequently mention your content which often gets linked to in show notes. Explicit relationships on the other hand are your online friends who you talk shop with. And what often creates these professional relationships is respect and admiration for each other's work. As a result, you want to link to each other's content whether that's on your own site or on other people's sites. This is one of the most powerful link building advantages you can have because the bottom line is that you want to help each other succeed. Now, a few commonalities with most of these reasons are A, people link to things to prove that they're not making stuff up. B, they link to things to add credibility to themselves or their companies. Or C, they link to things they trust. These are three main things you need to consider when you're reaching out for links because if you go in with your own agenda to satisfy your needs and only your needs, then your intentions will be quite clear and your chances of getting a link without paying for it will be very slim. Now, this might seem all meta and unfortunately, knowing why people link usually won't be enough to get you links. It's just foundational for your outreach pitches and this list is far from exhaustive. You need to dig into the data and the best place to start is by analyzing how similar pages got their links because by understanding the how, you're able to infer the why which also helps to form your angles of attack for your link outreach pitches. So in the next lesson, we're going to talk about competitor analysis, specifically analyzing how similar pages got their links and this will give you a good gauge whether a target's links are replicable for your own content with your own link building campaigns. I'll see you there.