Stop Begging for Backlinks: 14 Ways to Get Them Strategically [Infographic]

Oh, backlinks, a treasure in marketing that is so valuable but so hard to get.

The value of getting backlinks is to not only drive traffic but build your domain authority which will help with your long-term organic growth.

But is all that really worth all that work?

A lot of you would probably say no, but with some of these newer ways to approach getting inbound links, maybe this is something your company can start getting return out of in a short amount of time.

The one thing to remember is: the backlinking strategy is a marathon, not a sprint.

My assumption is that most of us marketers, like many of us at IMPACT, have tried the same old thing over and over again when it comes to backlinks.

“Let me reach out to these five companies to see if they will let me write a blog for them or want to do some type of collaboration that will help both of us.”

Or maybe it was “let me just email a bunch of companies and ask them if they’d be willing to link to us.”

My guess is these approaches didn’t see much success.

Well, the good news is, those are not the only ways to get great links to your website.

In the infographic below Neil Patel goes over 14 ways to get backlinks, but first let me go a little deeper into our favorite four.

1. Create Long-Form Guides AKA Pillar Pages

Pillar pages have been ALL the hype over the last year, but if your team is not creating one new pillar page at least every quarter, it is time to put that content machine in drive!

By creating pillar pages not only are you helping your own search strategy but you’re establishing a great way to build inbound links by linking to others.

For example, in our pillar page covering everything you need to know about video for sales, we have over 10 outbound links to companies like HubSpot, Cisco, and Vidyard.

By doing this, we are sending an outbound link to companies with higher domain authorities and in return, hope to get a link back calling out the piece of content that we have referenced them in.

Furthermore, even if you don’t mention/link to one, if you create a high-quality, comprehensive piece of content, people are automatically more likely to link to you without asking. 

2. Interview an Influencer:

This could be very intimidating but if you can get the person to say something new or unique that can get people to start talking, you’ll be more likely to attract backlinks.

A natural way to make this happen is to start a podcast or a video series and ask an influencer to join you as you talk about a topic that affects your industry.

One of the best examples we have seen of this is Drift’s video series, “Coffee with a CMO.”

Dave the VP of Marketing at Drift has put together a platform here that gives a voice to some of the best marketers out there and it’s very simple. He just talks to them about how they have grown their business and what they expect to happen in the future.

It's almost like watching Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee with Jerry Seinfeld.

And again by partnering up and mentioning someone in your content, they are more inclined to share and link to it even if you don’t ask.  

3. Create an Infographic:

I know you might be thinking: “I am not a designer.”

That might be true but listen up.

Creating an infographic that others can use and link back to you is such a great way to build your brand and backlinks quickly.

Even if you don’t have your own designer you can hire one through Upwork or try one of the handy templates on Canva or builder, Venngage.

The biggest work for you as the brainchild behind this project is coming up with the topic and something worthy of being presented as an infographic. Overall, we would recommend creating something that is broad where a lot of companies will want to use it on their own blog and share it with others.

Just like I got the infographic below from Neil Patel, other companies can do the same thing with your infographics.

4. Reviews:

This is our new favorite way of getting links, I mean what companies do not like getting positive feedback from a client in a public domain?

The idea around this is to write a review about the software you use or a company that you work with often and get a link back to your website from them.

For example, if I wanted to write a review for Vidyard it would look something like this.

"If I did not have Vidyard in my life, I think everyone at my company would hate me. The way I communicate sometimes over text can come off harsh, but if I can record a quick video explaining exactly what I am trying to communicate to takes away any confusion and leads to me and the team to have a better relationship."

- David Little; IMPACT

What I have done here is written a review that is very helpful for the Vidyard team and something they can now use in their own sales and marketing efforts and now IMPACT would get a link to our website. 

Where to Start?

Start with creating long pieces of content and when you are doing that, ask for an opinion from others in your industry and you can link back to them.

Then for every pillar page, you should have a shareable image that can be helpful this could be your infographic.

Lastly, something you should do RIGHT NOW. Write a review about a company to love to work with and start building relationships, trust, and links!

Check out the rest of Neil’s tips in the full infographic below!