Backlinks are an important factor for ranking in Google search results. And we aren’t the ones saying that. This tweet from Google’s Gary Illes proved it.
Yet, 66.31% of pages don’t have backlinks. (Phew! That probably means a lot of your competitors are already out of the race.)
But the pages that rank #1 on Google tend to have an average of 3.8 times more backlinks than the pages that rank between #2 to #10. So, the competition is tough too.
You have to compete against pages that have thousands of backlinks pointing to them.
Can’t you quickly buy backlinks and get done with it? Well, it costs an average of $361.44 to buy one backlink.
How about paid guest posts? You’d have to shell out $77.80 for that too.
So, what do you do then?
Add to the 66.31 % crowd with no backlinks? Definitely not.
You need to earn high-quality backlinks.
Note: This guide is not about link-building strategies but link-earning strategies.
Link Building vs. Link Earning
Link building involved link-building outreach that means being on the constant lookout for link-building opportunities and taking multiple efforts to build backlinks. It is something that isn’t possible without white hat link building contractors.
Link earning includes the following strategies that would get you backlinks without having to ask for them.
But before we begin…
What are High-Quality Backlinks?
All backlinks are not the same. Some take you to the top of SERPs. And some get penalized (backlinks from the 3P sites – Porn, Pills, and Poker).
High-quality backlinks have the following characteristics:
- They are from sites with high domain authority.
- The link is relevant to your website.
- They are unique links. (Your competitors are unlikely to have them).
- The backlink is from a page with high traffic.
- The link is non-sponsored.
- The backlink is through a suitable anchor text.
Getting backlinks isn’t tough. But getting high-quality backlinks is not easy either.
But, we have seven strategies that can help you earn quality backlinks.
7 Ways To Earn High-Quality Backlinks and Boost your Rankings in 2024
1. Design Stunning Visual Content
A picture speaks a thousand words.
This interactive map showing State-wise Favourite Reality TV Shows in the US has 71 root domains linking to it.
See how the time and effort that goes into creating a visually-appealing infographic, a dope meme, a comparison chart, or even an interactive map gets rewarded?
Others would also like to use the visual content that you have created. And when they use it, you’ll get credits and backlinks.
(Ideally, the users should add an image source below the visual content they use. But if you find someone using images from your website without linking back to you, you can send outreach emails and politely ask them for a backlink. Given that they already like your work enough to use it, that won’t be an issue)
You can also submit your infographic on directories like Visual.ly or Flowing Data.
2. Generate Evergreen Skyscraper Content
At the heart of link earning (or even SEO, for that matter) is great content.
Now, how to create evergreen content that is way better than anything else that’s written on the Internet?
Step 1: Find your competitor’s high-ranking content with a high volume of backlinks. Use can use tools like Ubersuggest for that.
Step 2: Understand why the content has multiple backlinks. (What makes it worth citing for others)
Step 3: One-up that content. Use more images, write 10x better content, develop a more engaging title and meta description, keep the word count high.
Step 4: Once your perfect content piece is ready, promote it like crazy. Use your social media channels and email marketing lists.
Step 5: Watch how one stellar content gets shared and cited online and brings you quality backlinks.
And don’t stop at doing it once. Keep repeating the process and keep getting more and more backlinks.
3. Develop and Name Unique Strategies, Tricks, or Tactics
One of the most popular link-building strategies is one that makes use of 404 errors on other sites. You find broken links on sites that you want to get backlinks from. Then you email the webmaster telling them about the broken links you found. You’re just helping them out. And then you suggest replacement links (links to your websites). And because you are helping them, they are much more likely to consider your request for a backlink. That’s smooth, right?
Well, that link building strategy is called the Moving Man strategy, and Brian Dean from Backlinko coined the term.
Now, the strategy that Brian mentioned was a link building strategy. But when he named it, other people started giving him backlinks when they mentioned the strategy (Just like we did!). And that’s an example of a link earning strategy.
You develop a unique strategy, trick, or tactic → Give it a name → Get backlinks when people cite your strategy/trick/tactic. That’s even simpler than the Moving Man strategy for link building, right?
4. Carry Out Original Studies
The statistics you read at the start of this piece… we didn’t do the preliminary research for it. Ahrefs did. And because they spend the time, money, and energy to do that, they’ve got five quality backlinks from us. (4 at the beginning of the content, and you’ll find one more in the very next line). And thousands of other backlinks from others.
Like they carried out the Backlink Growth Study, you can do original research, surveys, and studies relevant to your business.
And when others use the data you generate, you’ll automatically get citations, which are spotless sources of high-quality backlinks.
5. Curate Comprehensive Resources
Picture this. A company generates a long-form content piece that contains everything that is to know about a particular topic. From the definition of the key term to its advantages, disadvantages, history, evolution, best practices, FAQs, and more – everything is available in one place. Plus, it is rich in images, data, and quotes.
And every time another blogger or writer creates content about that topic, they stumble upon this long-form content and pick up data, quotes, or images from it. Ultimately giving backlinks to the original content.
Now, you can be that company too. Short and sweet messages work on social media, but long-form content isn’t dead yet. Google ranks it better because it is relevant for more people (because it has more information.) And it gets more backlinks too, which, in turn, helps the content keep ranking higher. This cycle continues indefinitely.
Listicles and how-to contents are the two top-performing formats of content that you can use for this strategy.
6. Give Interviews, Host Podcasts, and Attend Events
Spying on your competitor’s backlink profile to get hints, ideas, and even similar backlinks is a common practice. This means your competitors can also dig up your backlink profile and beat you at your own game.
But how likely are your competitors to be present at the event that you attended?
What are the odds that the interviewer who interviews you also interviews your competitors?
Pretty slim, right?
You can also host podcasts yourself that have zero chances of featuring your competitors.
And all these steps will get you unique backlinks.
Your podcast (no matter on which platform it is) will link back to your site.
Your interview (video or print) would point back to your website. And the PR for the events that you attend would also have links to your website.
Say yes to as many events as you get invited to. Don’t shy away from going on record and learn how to host a free podcast ASAP.
7. Create Free Tools or Quizzes
Interested in knowing what kind of potato you are? Well, Buzzfeed has a quiz for that.
Before you go and take the quick to find out, know that creating that quiz gave Buzzfeed, engagement, social shares, and backlinks (we gave them one right when we mentioned the quiz!).
Just like Buzzfeed, you can also create quizzes that your customers are interested in. Or even free tools. They are interactive experiences that engage users. And they get shared, which means you get backlinks.
That’s a double win – engagement and backlinks – at the cost of one quiz, tool, or even game that you create.
Just Park, a British company, developed an interactive game that identifies users’ ages by their reaction time. And it got over 2000 backlinks (one of which we have given them.)
However, make sure you stay relevant. If your tool, quiz, or game isn’t relevant to your users, you will get nowhere.
Getting Started
The strategies that we have mentioned right here are quick and actionable. But they sure do require expertise, experience, tact, and skill.
If you don’t want to spend time in trial-and-error, you can get link building services from experts like Uppers. They have a global team of experts who can build links for you and also implement these link earning strategies. Plus, they have years of experience in the big bad world of link-building business.
No matter if you try these strategies yourself or get experts to help you out, you’d get guaranteed results. And once you do, we’d be glad to get backlinks from you as a sign of gratitude.