What they are and why Google cares
Google’s founding idea was that the web votes for itself: a page many other pages link to is probably worth more than one nobody mentions. Twenty-five years on, links are one signal among many, but they remain the main way Google gauges whether a site is trusted rather than merely relevant. Two pages can say the same thing; the one from a site other sites vouch for ranks higher.
Not all links are equal. A link from a relevant, established site in your area or trade is worth more than a hundred from unrelated pages. A link marked “nofollow” or “sponsored” tells Google not to count it as an endorsement. And a pattern of links from sites that exist only to sell links is a signal too, in the wrong direction.
How many the sites above you have
When we audited our own market, the agencies on page one for the Manchester head terms had between roughly two hundred and well over a thousand referring domains each. A single named designer held second position with a few hundred, outranking agencies with three to four times his links. Our own domain had a couple of dozen, most of them on junk extensions and pointing nowhere useful.
Two lessons in that. A single named individual outranks agencies with three to four times his links, so links are not everything. And our own couple of dozen were worthless, because whoever built them bought them: the domains are junk and the links point nowhere useful. Quantity from the wrong places is zero.
Five honest ways a small business gets them
- Suppliers and manufacturers. Most have a “find a stockist”, “approved installer” or “our partners” page. Ask to be on it. It is relevant, established and free.
- Trade bodies, chambers of commerce and local business groups. Membership usually includes a directory listing that links. These are among the most trusted links a local business can have.
- Clients and partners. A “website by” credit in the footer of a site you built; a “supplied by” mention on a client’s about page; a case study on a partner’s site. Five real clients is five real links.
- Local press and community sites. Openings, awards, anniversaries, charity work, a genuinely interesting job. Journalists need stories and link to the businesses in them.
- Publishing things worth citing. A cost guide with real prices, a measured result, a piece of first-hand data. Other people writing about the topic link to the source. This site’s guides exist partly for that reason.
What not to do
- Buying links, in any form, including “sponsored posts” that pass ranking signals. Google’s spam policies call it a link scheme and its systems detect the patterns.
- Link exchanges (“link to me and I will link to you”) at scale.
- Guest posts on sites that exist to publish guest posts, with a keyword-stuffed link in the author line.
- Automated submissions to thousands of directories and forums.
- Private blog networks: clusters of sites owned by one seller, linking to clients. This is what produced our 29.
“How to get backlinks” carries one of the highest click prices of any SEO phrase. That price is a warning about what is being sold.
How to check yours
Search Console’s Links report lists the sites linking to you and which pages they point at, free. Paid tools give a wider view and a measure of each linking site’s own strength. Read the list for two things: are the linking sites real and relevant, and which of your pages do they point at? A site whose only links point at the homepage has done no off-page work for anything else.
If you find junk, you do not need to do anything. Google says it ignores links it recognises as manipulative, and the disavow tool exists for cases where a manual action has been applied. A couple of dozen junk domains are a nuisance, not an emergency.
