Who should I reach out to for external links?
-
As a web designer, who should I reach out to for external links, other than former clients?
-
Have you considered contributing your expertise to existing sites? We've all heard that "guest posting is dead", but my site, for one, still commissions and publishes (and pays for!) articles by knowledgeable people in our niche. Find a few high-authority sites, send them a good pitch for a post you could write for them, and generally become active in your community.
-
I would look at what sites are out there which are placed as industry authorities. I would also look to identify who the influencers are in relation to your niche and I would look at starting to interact with all of these on social media. I would comment on what they are doing and get involved (followerwonk is a good tool for identifying these on Twitter as you can search for key terms such as web design). That way you will build a relationship up, then I would look at creating some decent content that people want to share. Some how to guides in relation to what you design in for instance. You could look for common problems or mistakes and then create a simple post on the solution. Then you need to make sure you spend time pushing it - push it to the influencers you have built a relationship with, push it to relevant groups. One tip I would give is look at getting involved with and sharing your content on large Google Plus communities, this will help with your exposure. Following through with this process will take time but you will benefit from earning links, social shares and more traffic.
One other tip that I would like to give you which will help is this - if you struggle for what to write about but you have competitors doing a good job at it then run them through socialcrawlytics.com and have a look at the content they have which has the largest number of shares. This will give you a good base for creating your own unique content based around a specific area that you know has been well received.
Essentially there is a lot to go at in order to earn links and earn is the key word. Spend time building your own profile and relationships up and then place you content in front of these connections. You will find this will lead to links and more.
I would also look at building my profile up by trying to get content placed on other sites such as well known web design resources as this will lead to you being recognised as an expert in your niche. Then you can further leverage this to help earn links,
Hope this helps - if there are any specifics don't hesitate to ask...
-
This is my first post on the community here but as a web designer, there are definitely way more resources than just the portfolio of clients. Try other networks/community, such as Behance, Dribbble and showcase your work. Try blogs that talk about web design (there are plenty out there).
It's okay to start with your client base but if the content is great and it's posted on communities, you'll definitely get picked off by larger sites with more authority.
I'd also suggest forums, there is a lot of critique requests over there, dofollow links, if you're genuine, you'll get the feedback you need + a backlink.
Hope this helps,
Sergiu
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
SEO & URL parameters on external links
Hey guys! I've got a quick question: We are getting some guest posting opportunities with a few big sites in our space...
Link Building | | floriannin
In those guest posts we will also have to chance to link back to 1-2 articles of ours and to our main site. Should I use UTM parameters to track how many clicks we get or will this in any way negatively affect our SEO benefits? Hope you guys know what I mean. I found tons of articles on this but mostly about inbound links... which isn't the case here. Thanks in advance 🙂0 -
What causes total external links to fluctuate so much?
On my dashboard, external links refers to links on other websites pointing to my own website, correct? If so, I'm seeing some interesting data on my report this week. Apparently I have 129 external links. This is down by 380. What the heck happened here? I've been doing nothing differently, just chugging along, producing good content. What on earth would cause 380 links to my website just up and disappear? I'm also tracking a competitor. This competitor currently has 3,262 external links. But this is up by 1,900 from the previous update. What the heck happened here? I know it's probably impossible to tell for sure, but what could have caused such a meteoric growth in my competitor? I can see if they already had 50,000 and they increased by 1.9k, but 1.9k is a significant fraction of their current external links.
Link Building | | project.rockhopper0 -
How to link build?
Hello all. I've been having intense conversations with an experienced SEO, who has told me that the only way to get consistent links to your website, and to build you business through the web is through blogger outreach, and then paying the bloggers to put your appropriate content on their high Page Ranking website. To me, this may well be right. But it sounds dull as anything. Any thoughts? William
Link Building | | wseabrook0 -
Link or Ad
I recently requested a link back from a site that is ranking 2nd for a term that i'm working on and they said they would gladly give me the link and remove my competitors but would also like me to have an ad on the same page for an annual fee that i could link to a landing page. I know that paying for links is no good and google can penalize you. so do i pay them and do a no follow to the landing page from the ad and call it a day? and how does google differentiate an ad from a link?
Link Building | | CHiP_RuN0 -
Dodgy link profiles?!?!
Just started working on a new pharma based client in the UK. I have been carrying out some link profiling on page one results for several key terms and have discovered that almost all of the sites ranking in top positions appear to have all kinds of rubbish links (links in irrelevant content / articles, links in forum signatures, single page blogs and sites that appear to have little association with their products). These links seem to be about the only links some of them have yet they rank top! It seems a very difficult prospect to build a decent white hat link profile if everyone else is STILL capitalizing on the sort of rubbish links that Google is supposed to be getting tough on. Are online pharmacies the world that Google forgot or is this a really common issue?
Link Building | | nicc19760 -
Blog traffic / link ratio? (Esimated of how much traffic will result in a link)
Hi, Was wondering if people could please tell me some estimates of how much traffic is likely to gain links to a blog post? For example 1,000 hits = 1 link, Hence 10,000 hits = 10 links to a blog post? I understand there is no magic ratio I just want to know what people have achieved. I’m after averages not just a one off really successful blog post too. Please specify the topic you achieve this in e.g. SEO, photography, business, heath... etc.
Link Building | | charles10 -
No Follow and reciprocal links
I just wondered by adding no follow to a reciprocal link (one link only not the link on both sites) does it become a one way link? I have some reciprocal link partners who are more interested in traffic from my site than link juice which is irrelevent to them. Am I better adding no follow to those links at my end?
Link Building | | SamCUK0 -
Linking from Blogs
Hi I like to link from blogs on similar keywords on a regular basis but I am thinking about changing tactics as it can appear monotonous and un natural. What are peoples experiences in linking from blogs ?
Link Building | | onlinemediadirect0