Does Link Building Increase Organic Traffic? Importance of Link Building in 2022 Proved
Link building is an important element of every SEO strategy. Although it’s frequently disregarded, it can bring spectacular results when done properly – we managed to achieve 800% revenue growth! Selecting appropriate keywords and obtaining backlinks from thematically related websites will help you boost organic traffic to your site. Need proof? Read today’s article based on real-life examples!
Table of contents:
- Importance of Link Building – When It Can Save Your SEO Strategy
- Why Is Link Building Important? It Can Improve the Site’s Performance & We Have Proof
- How to Create a Link Building Process that Works?
- Does Link Building Really Increase Organic Traffic? The Takeaway
Did you know that on-page optimization doesn’t have to be the most effective SEO component? Contrary to many popular beliefs and myths, quality backlinks can increase organic traffic.
Why is link building important? Keep reading to learn how even the most competitive industries can make link building a major driver of increased traffic and business revenue.
What Will You Learn?
- Why sometimes on-site optimization can’t be the center of an SEO strategy
- Why you shouldn’t believe in myths about the off-site process
- Real-life examples of results generated by link building process alone
- Proven link building strategy scheme that will make your backlinks beneficial
Importance of Link Building – When It Can Save Your SEO Strategy
In an ideal scenario, as an SEO agency with a hands-on approach, we start cooperation with a client, the client grants us website access and gives us permission to implement the necessary modifications and optimize the page in accordance with the previously conducted SEO audit.
We build a real dream team – our client is an expert in their field, and we’re experts in SEO. We work together, but at the same time, everyone focuses on their area of expertise.
Increase your website traffic and get more clients – try our link building services!
Unfortunately, we then wake up and realize it’s all been a dream.
Want to know what it frequently looks like in real life? Well, it turns out that the above-mentioned scenario isn’t always the case, and more and more challenges arise during each consecutive day of cooperation.
What do I mean?
- During a kick-off call with a client, I learned that they don’t have the dev team, and I won’t get access to the CMS. Why? Because it’s custom and complex. They don’t want external agencies to do anything on the page, so they’ll implement all the modifications in-house.
- Taking into account the preferences of the client, I focus on creating and optimizing quality content that could saturate the website. Since I don’t have access to CMS, I send the texts to the client for publication.
- Since I can’t make changes on the page myself, I don’t have full control over the SEO process. Even though I prepare comprehensive recommendations, guidelines, content, and other elements, it’s up to the client to implement the necessary modifications.
When trying to overcome each of the above challenges, I’ve tailored the strategy to the goals and client’s industry.
Since I’ve had limited access to the page, I could either send the recommendations to the client, and wait, or take matters into my own hands and get the ball rolling.
This is why I’ve decided to focus on link building that can be fully controlled and can bring real benefits.
Now, I’ll show you why off-site optimization is the superior choice going forward, and why you should devote more time to it.
Why Is Link Building Important? It Can Improve the Site’s Performance & We Have Proof
On many occasions, you might have heard that link building is only an addition to the optimization process – an element that doesn’t play any crucial roles. But believe me, it’s not true!
Contrary to what you may think, properly done, link building can be the real driving force of the SEO process.
With its help, you can significantly boost the traffic and conversion rates of your online store.
Still, having doubts?
We have examples that will prove to you the importance of link building. Let’s look at our clients!
Do Backlinks Increase Traffic?
Yes, they do!
To show you that it’s not a stroke of fortune, I’ll describe the link building process for three of our clients: Ovoko, a CBD online store, and a client from the ecommerce sector. Forgive me if I don’t mention the exact clients’ names – they prefer to stay anonymous. The competition never sleeps ;).
It’s not a one-time success, but an actual repeatable trend. Regardless of the market or industry, backlinks can increase traffic.
Want to learn how? Let me introduce you to our clients and their performance and then we’ll show you how we made it happen!
OVOKO
A client operating in the Polish market, in the highly competitive automotive industry. We haven’t performed almost any activities on the website. We focused only on link building itself.
This is how the organic traffic, the overall website traffic, and revenues from the organic search have increased. As you can see, the number of sessions improved by 82.3%, and the revenue increased by 808.87%.
Not bad right? All this just in six months of off-site SEO.
Here, you can see how the positions of keywords important for the client have improved at the same time:
Want to learn more? Read our Ovoko case study!
CBD Online Store
This is another client from the highly competitive CBD industry. In this case, we’ve been performing link building activities on four markets – Finnish, Danish, Polish, and Swedish.
Effects on the Danish market:
As you can see, the most important business keywords are ranked in the TOP10.
Website visibility when we started link building:
Effects on the Finnish market:
Visibility:
Keywords:
As you can see, even keywords that were out of the index at first, made their way to TOP4 search results.
What does it mean? This translates into better traffic and reaching more potential customers.
If you’re wondering what the mysterious volume phrase denotes, it’s the number of times people enter a specific query in Google per month. So, the higher the search volume, the more popular the keyword.
Consequently, ranking in TOP10 for phrases whose volume reaches 4000, translates into tangible benefits like more website sessions, and more finalized transactions.
Check out our case study and explore the importance of link building in more detail!
Ecommerce website
Here is an example of a large ecommerce client for whom we conducted activities on several markets simultaneously. Check out exemplary effects below.
Effects on the Lithuanian market:
We’ve improved the positions of all important keywords that reached TOP5.
Effects on the Latvian market:
Effects on the Estonian market:
All of the above screenshots accurately show the importance of link building.
A well-chosen strategy and consistent actions are the keys to success, aka improved positions in the SERPs.
How to Create a Link Building Process that Works?
Now that we’ve shown you why link building is important and that it really does deliver results, it’s time to learn how to create a process that works.
Of course, it’s crucial to focus on long tail SEO, and the characteristics of the industry that you operate in.
If you’re an expert in the industry, it should be easier for you. Why? Our link building process for Ovoko was conducted by a person who is familiar with the industry.
As a result, this specialist was able to create quality, comprehensive content, and select appropriate link building websites, and keywords.
All this boosts the effectiveness of backlinks and shows Google that we’re experts in the field who have much to say. It’s a signal that our website deserves to be displayed higher.
Now, to the part where we show you how to create an effective link building strategy in just a few steps, taking into consideration:
- Correlation between link building & keyword research
- Pre-made link base for initial domain boost
- Link building direction to business profile
- Broad link building approach
- Link diversification
- Sponsored links and content
- Ongoing control you should have over the process.
Correlation Between Link Building and Keyword Research
There’s a close correlation between keyword research and link building processes.
Both of them involve the same elements and categories. These categories can be created either based on the website structure (e.g., homepage -> services -> products), or based on thematic clusters. The second approach is how we’re doing link building now.
At the beginning of the cooperation with every client, we select keywords that are assigned to specific categories. The division may look in the following way:
- Brand keywords,
- Homepage keywords (usually generic phrases such as second-hand car parts, or used car parts store chosen for Ovoko),
- Long tail keywords for specific product categories, or service pages.
At this stage, it’s crucial to ensure that individual keywords correspond to the search intent of users.
Keyword research with division into categories. We analyze thematic clusters on the website and choose relevant keywords based on them.As the process continues, we choose long tail keywords and assign them to specific categories and products. These may be phrases describing e.g., used parts for given car manufacturers.
When doing keyword research, it’s important to select the main keyword and complement it with extra long tails that will allow you to build a link anchor cloud. Such a keyword research approach is also reflected in the link building process.
First, we create backlinks to the homepage, then we move further and focus on subsequent categories.
In link building, we focus on the “opportunities”, meaning keywords that are displayed high in the Google Search Console and whose positions we can quickly improve with a few quality backlinks.
Additionally, we also do a keyword gap analysis to select the best “competitor keywords” that should be included in the process.
Create a Link Base for the Initial Domain Boost
Before the process starts, it’s good practice to create a link base for the initial domain boost. This can be used later for each client.
The link base is built taking into consideration the high parameters of individual domains. Obtaining backlinks from such pages will help you quickly improve the positions of individual keywords.
Depending on the initial parameters of our client’s website, we have different link bases that are tailored to the Domain Rating and Page Authority parameters of our client.
The lower the parameters of our client’s page, the more basic websites we include in the link building process.
When creating a link base, it’s essential to make sure that the pages we want to obtain backlinks from have higher parameters than the page of our client.
As part of the client’s link analysis, first, we check if the client has a backlink from a given page, and then we obtain the missing links.
If you are looking for quality pages for link building you should check social media.
Linking from platforms like Facebook, or Twitter is a piece of cake! At the same time, they’ve high parameters, so if you aren’t active there yet, it’s high time to change it.
Remember that a link base should contain various, diversified types of pages. The list needs to include NAPs, catalogs, bookmarking sites, social media, and marketplaces.
Let’s keep the exact content of our TOP list a sweet secret 😉
What effects can you expect?
If your link base includes quality pages, then you’ll easily pass the link juice to your website. Consistent and persistent link building is a recipe for improving your page parameters and authority.
Before we started the link building process:
After the first few months of the link building process:
We pay particular attention to link building mainly during the first three months of cooperation with a client. During this time, website positions and parameters grow, and we wait till the page reaches its momentum.
Adjust Link Building Direction to Business Profile
Website parameters aren’t the only thing you should take into account when preparing a link base. As well as them, you need to pay particular attention to the industry and characteristics of a given business.
If a page has high parameters, it’s crucial to search for new link building sites and use extra tools such as sponsored articles.
Remember that moderation is the key to success. The number of backlinks to the site should increase gradually. Otherwise, your page can be penalized by Google.
A pre-made link base won’t be enough in this case.
On the other hand, if a client runs a local business, it’s important to ensure that pages chosen for the link building process will help us reach more potential customers.
Broad Link Building Approach
What does a broad link building approach mean?
It means that you should always take into account what’s currently happening on the website.
An example?
If you publish a new category description, you should obtain backlinks to this category to boost the effects, and encourage Google to visit and index your category page.
To make your link building effective, you shouldn’t focus only on one keyword.
Instead, pick the main phrase and select relevant long tails to complement it. You can also test combinations such as long tail + brand and check which approach brings the best results in your case.
Our tip: Anchors are great, but when doing link building, it’s important to remember about clean URLs. This way, the links will seem more natural to Google. After all, average users don’t choose anchor texts that ideally describe your product range.
Such links are typically used by internet users. That’s why they look natural to Google.
Link Diversification
To convince Google that backlinks to your website are natural, you should keep the right proportions. For this purpose, it’s essential to diversify link forms and sources.
The number of backlinks to the site should increase gradually. Google may consider it manipulation when you create hundreds of links one day.
Remember that link building is part of the SEO process. And SEO takes time.
See the screenshots above? This is an example of bad practice. Too drastic decreases and increases in the number of linking domains won’t make your website credible for Google.
Check out the parameters of this page:
As you can see, even 83 referring domains don’t improve the parameters of the website. This boils down to the fact that the parameters of these domains are low.
Sponsored Link and Content
When should you invest in sponsored content? When your keywords rank in the TOP 10 and reach higher positions, it gets much easier.
As a rule, you can reach the first page in the SERPs by following good practices.
On the other hand, if you’re already in the TOP10, sponsored articles and links can determine your position in the ranking and may help you to reach the TOP3.
Once again, to make sure that sponsored content brings you benefits, you have to obtain backlinks from websites that are thematically related to your page. If you run an online store with used car parts, it’s pointless to get backlinks from the blog of a store offering swimming suits.
Don’t overuse sponsored content and remember that moderation and diversification are the keys to success. Many agencies focus only on paid links and articles, but it’s not the best approach.
As evidenced by the study conducted by SEMrush sponsored content is one of the main reasons for Google’s penalties.
Ongoing Control
Once you complete all the above-mentioned steps, you have to regularly check what’s going on in the link building process, and monitor which solutions work best.
It’s also a good idea to keep an eye on your market rivals and the situation in the market. This way, you can focus on activities that can truly benefit your website and business.
How to obtain information about your market rivals?
For this purpose, you can use paid tools such as SEMrush. It’s enough to select the backlink gap tab from the menu on the left and insert your and your market rivals’ URLs. You’ll get a list of pages that link to your competitors’ websites but don’t link to yours.
Keep in mind that backlinks can be a decisive factor in giving you a competitive advantage over your market rivals.
If a few websites are optimized and have similar DR and PA parameters, obtaining more quality links to your site can help you outdo other companies in the industry.
Does Link Building Really Increase Organic Traffic? The Takeaway
Link building is an important and often underestimated part of the SEO process. Choosing the right keywords and a strategy that takes into account the client’s business goals and industry characteristics is the key to success.
With quality backlinks, you can significantly increase organic traffic to your website and reach more potential customers.
Need help with your link building process? Contact us!
