Are you struggling to get your website to rank through Search Engine Optimization (SEO) in 2023?
If you’ve been in the SEO Industry long enough, you would know that link-building has been integral to most companies and SEO agencies strategies over the past decade.
But recently, especially post Google’s September 2022 Core Algorithm Update and the Helpful Content Update; there has been an increasing discussion around whether link building is dead or will be dead in the foreseeable future.
So is link building dead?
John Mueller says Link Building is losing its relevance to SEO
As Google and its algorithms continuously evolve, there is growing noise that is link building even important and relevant when it comes to ranking through SEO.
John Mueller a Google Search Advocate mentioned and we quote below on a recent SEO podcast:
“Well, it’s something where I imagine, over time, the weight on the links. At some point, will drop off a little bit as we can’t figure out a little bit better how the content fits in within the context of the whole web. And to some extent, links will always be something that we care about because we have to find pages somehow. It’s like how do you find a page on the web without some reference to it?”
“But my guess is over time, it won’t be such a big factor as sometimes it is today. I think already, that’s something that’s been changing quite a bit.”
https://searchengineland.com/links-may-be-less-important-to-the-google-search-ranking-algorithm-in-the-future-389364
As algorithms evolve and better understand the context behind each search and the intent behind it, actual on-page content gains more and more importance.
It is a potential softening of the impact of some backlinks
Backlinks make or break your SEO and Content Marketing strategy.
If you’re webpages and articles are getting many relevant and high-authority links, Google knows your content is worthy of getting better SERP positions and visibility.
On the contrary, if you’re building links by the dozens and that too from Spam Link Farms then you should expect your authority to sink and also your rankings for content on your domain.
Generally, the better links are those that your site gets from reputable and relevant websites and do follow backlinks.
Links are used to distribute authority around. If you’re a SaaS Business like DotNetReport, Healthtech like Kaya, Social Commerce App like Markaz, or an Online Ordering System for Restaurants or you definitely need website authority to scale your organic search results.
Higher-quality backlinks eventually provide signals to search engines that the origin website recommends the destination website.
Hence, if it’s relevant, engaging content that’s linking back to your webpage that will give all the signals that your website is all traffic worthy.
Here are some pro backlinking tips for SEO’s that would facilitate any search campaign:
- Backlinks from websites in your niche
- Links from Authoritative websites
- Do Follow links from webpages with high-quality links already on it
- Links are placed at the top of the original website or article.
- Links with proper and contextualized anchor texts
- From In-Depth and Valuable Content
- Avoid no-follow links
Common characteristics of low-quality backlinks
- Avoid links from dangerous websites with high spam scores
- Coupon Website Backlinks
- Private Blog Networks
- Irrelevant Low-Quality Backlinks
Why is the backlink still relevant in 2023?
We’ve pretty much provided relevant details about what is backlinking, characteristics of good and bad quality backlinks so you should be quite confident now that backlinking is till relevant in 2023 and link building is not dead.
Here are some proofs that backlinks are still important:
Better SEO Performance for Powerful Sites
Let me give you a pro tip just to help you understand that Google does enable more authoritative sites to perform better in SEO.
So go to Google and search & install a chrome extension called Moz Bar Chrome Extension.
Once it’s and activated; simply search on Google with any keyword.
For this exercise let’s suppose your an up and coming SEO Agency based out of or targeting NY, USA.
So search for a relevant keyword like “SEO Agency NY” and check the first three SERP Results.
Here is what I get:
As you can see the DA or Domain Authority for the first three results is 68, 45 and 51.
If you’re a DA < 30 website and want to rank for this focus keyword then you’re in for a tough and long ride.
If we were the SEO Agency executing search campaigns for you we would definitely recommend not going ahead with this focus keyword but instead looking for a more long tail keyword variation with less authoritative websites as opponents.
But that’s a longer discussion and outside the scope for this particular topic.
So let’s say you were adamant you want to go ahead with this existing focus keyword then you need to head to your SEO Tool; SEMRush in my case and assess the top ranking SERP results and see whether backlinks could be the differentiator for better SERP Results.
As you can see from the snip above, out of the top 5 SERPs in Google USA, 5 have a Page Authority of more then 35 and have relevant higher authority backlinks pointing to their page.
We’ll write a more detailed case study of how backlinks and search traffic, SERP Results are correlated in the future but I believe you should be confident that by now the question, “Is link building dead” should be clear in your mind as to what the answer looks like.
It’s a NO – Link Building is not dead.
In a recent study by Backlinko they also found out that a websites overall link authority strong coorelates with higher SERP results and rankings.
If you’re looking for expert SEO Advice; be it On-Page, Technical SEO or Link Building you can reach out to us at [email protected] for facilitation, consulting or implementation services.
