3 SEO Links Hacks That You NEED To Know About
I know this sounds pretty sad, but if you’re anything like me, you love SEO! After all, I’m a bit of a geek! But there are LOADS of things that really frustrate me at times, and to be honest, SEO doesn’t seem to be getting any easier. With what seems like thousands of different ranking factors, new algorithms, and various optimization strategies, sometimes I get a headache just from thinking about it all. But guess what? I’ve found a simpler way to improve your search rankings – and it’s a lot easier than you think. Forget about the complicated stuff for a moment – here are 3 super-simple SEO strategies that you can use to increase your page ranks almost instantly. The result? More click-throughs, more traffic, and more visitors! Sounds good, right? Well, read on…
1. Realize your linking potential
I’ve wasted so much time trying to implement new link building strategies that sometimes I forget that a regular website has powerful link equity. If you want to leverage pages that have authority to boost other pages, it’s pretty simple. The best way to do this? Keyword-rich anchors. Let me explain.
First you’ll need to find out which pages you can leverage, so use an SEO tool like Ahrefs to find out which of your webpages have the most social and link activity. You can then build internal links on your most powerful pages in order to give the others a much-needed boost. For those who don’t know, Ahrefs is a great resource if you’re serious about your SEO. Here you will find website analysis tools, social media tools, and much, much more. It’s also really easy to use, and a great place to start if you’re trying to find out particular information – such as the current status of your website links.
Another way to leverage link equity is to find any 404 error pages on your website, put them through a link analysis tool, and then redirect those pages that have links to a different location on your website. Again, using something like Ahrefs can be a great help here. You’ll be able to use their Broken Backlinks tool to identify these pages. Google can also tell you where you need to improve, so head over to Webmaster Tools, and click on the Crawl section to find a list of crawl errors.
You can download the 404 pages to run a batch analysis through something like Majestic or Ahrefs. Again, this is pretty easy to do and shouldn’t take too long. However, the great thing is that once you’ve identified pages that have great link authority, you can decide where to direct them.
Finally, when it comes to link leverage, it’s a good idea to stop letting any dead outbound links ruin your rankings. These could be lying in places you’ve forgotten amount, such as comment sections or older articles. Replace them or remove them – just do something about them! Use a tool like Ahrefs to find where your dead outbound links are hiding. You can do this by clicking ‘Broken Links’ in the Outgoing Links section
2. Index, index, index.
Getting your links indexed should be of prime importance to you if you’re serious about improving your search rankings. A lot people spend time building citations for example, but tend to put off indexing their links for some reason. This is a big no-no, and indexing is definitely something you should be doing.
You might have some trouble indexing links at first – especially if you’ve never done it before. However, with a bit of practice, this should come as second nature to you. The best way to do it is to build tier two links, which can help get your links indexed and help to build authority. As you increase your page authority, you will slowly increase the authority of your entire website. Google loves websites that are authoritative, helpful and address the searcher’s query. This could have a positive effect on your search rankings, and increase the number of people who visit your website. In short, indexing is where it’s at – give it a try and see a real difference over time.
3. Don’t build links to your website
This might sound a little surprising, but, yes, don’t build link to your website. OK, I know this sounds confusing, but let me go into further detail. Basically, a lot of people are obsessed with acquiring as many links to their website as they can. However, they don’t consider building the authority of the links that are already on their website. And guess what? It’s a lot EASIER to increase link authority than spending time trying to acquire brand new ones
But that’s not all. Tier two links and social signals can also help you a great deal. Social signals can sometimes be a challenge when tying them to your tier links, but you can do this if you produce good quality content. Building a layer of tier one links and then spending some time trying to increase the authority of links can be a lot more effective than just trying to acquire new links. Alongside indexing your links, and leveraging your link potential, increasing link authority can be a great way to increase your search rankings on the SERP.
Final word
Looking to incorporate more effective linking strategies into your websites? Trying not to rush in and focusing on the basics can often be a great place to start, and soon enough you’ll see changes. The key is to keep your links authoritative, and work on what you already have, rather than starting afresh and potentially doing damage to your current position on the SERP. Despite what you read online, some of the best SEO strategies really are the most simple. And the great thing about the tips in this article is that they can be implemented by pretty much anyone – even if you don’t have an extensive knowledge of SEO.
Let me know if you’ve used any of the above SEO strategies when it comes to your links. Did they work? What did you find useful? Do you have any alternatives?