8 Small Tweaks That Can Deliver Big Link Building Results

About this time every year I reflect on my progress thus far and start thinking about what I want to do differently in the second half of the year.

Consider taking a good, hard look at your link building campaigns. Even if your strategy isn’t six months old, making changes to your plan multiple times throughout the year keeps your tactics fresh.

When it comes to adjusting your link building strategy (or any marketing strategy, for that matter), the biggest misconception is that you have to make these grandiose changes in order to see any sort of impact. The reality is that the smallest changes, the ones that may be imperceptible to your client or your CMO, will make the biggest difference.

Check Your Most Popular Posts

Take a look at your blog posts from the past few months and see which ones have gotten the most page views and links. Then, make sure any relevant products or services you want to promote are linked from that page. The authority will trickle down from your blog posts to all pages it’s linked to. Bonus: This is also a great way to build authority to e-commerce product pages.

Repurpose Old Versions

Similarly, go through your archives and update your well-performing posts from years back that surfaced a lot of links for you. Then, reach back out to the inbound link sources from the original post, letting them know that you’ve updated the content. Since they linked once, they’ll be more likely to link again.

Talk To Your Sales Team

In most cases, they’re the closest you get to your customers. The sales team knows your customers’ pain points, their challenges and how they heard about you. They can give you some serious insight into new content pieces you need to create, what content works particularly well, and who you could target for partnerships.

Reach Out To Local Media

I’m not recommending staging an event just to get press; but if you’ve done something good in the community recently, they probably want to hear about it. Local newspapers and blogs crave content and love when there are success stories of a homegrown company. This could be anything from working with local schools to having a hiring spree.

Online-only local media is even better. If your city has a Patch, that would be the first place I’d go.

Focus On Traffic Over Juice

This should go without saying in 2014, but the links that will bring you the most traffic are the most valuable links you can have. It’s what search engines are valuing more now, too. Stop talking in terms of Domain Authority and Linking Root Domains, and go after sources with an already-established community.

Update Your Internal Links

If any part of your navigation has changed, you need to update your internal link strategy — not just to check the pages are physically linking to the right URL with no redirects, but that your most important pages are at the top in your hierarchy and that each page is relevant to the one it’s linking to. Would a user on Page A find the information on Page B relevant? Would someone reading Page A also want to read Page B?

Stalk Your Competitors

Competitive research is a pretty common first starting point for most, but after that first analysis, how often do you go back and check up on your competition? Just like you, they’re not taking any time away from your link building in fear of the consequences. That means they have gotten new links, and that opens up more sources for you.

Add “Will Literally Change Your Life” To Your Blog Posts

I’m kidding. We can all see through your click bait, and no, what that puppy did when he met that zebra will not, literally, change my life.

Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.

About The Author

Erin Everhart

Erin Everhart is an experienced digital strategist, content developer and search marketer. She's currently the Senior Manager, Media Strategy for The Home Depot and has previously worked agency-side for mid-sized business and Fortune 500 companies. She speaks regularly on digital strategy, content development and inbound marketing at conferences nationwide. Follow her on Twitter @erinever.