Links are important for organic search. It’s the third pillar holding up a strong organic performance. No matter how good your on-page SEO is and how well optimised your website’s content is, you need backlinks to improve rankings and authority.
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
Why you should focus on the value, not quantity, of backlinks
How do you currently report on backlink growth? How do you measure your link acquisition? Many of our client prospects ask us about the number of links we can acquire for them, when they should be asking us what the value of the links we’ll acquire will deliver.
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
Sure, an easy way to report on backlinks is by the number. In a straightforward Excel sheet for example, including information such as the Domain Authority the website they’re coming from has and whether the link is followed or no followed. There’s nothing wrong with this, but there is so much more value of backlinks worth reporting on.
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
First, let’s look at the difference in types of backlinks and iron out what each mean from an organic search perspective.
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
Followed links vs no followed links
Followed links
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
Followed links has a direct benefit to your organic search performance. PageRank which increases a websites authority is only transferred via followed links. Followed links passes Page Rank, and traffic.
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
No followed links
Focusing On Backlink Quality Not Quantity
No followed links looks the same as followed links on a web page, you can only see the difference in the HTML code. For organic performance, no followed links do not transfer PageRank, but they bring traffic.
Having a mix of followed and no followed backlinks to your website is healthy. A website with only followed links is a warning sign something isn’t quite right. You ideally want between 60-90% of followed links and the rest should be no followed. Out of the backlinks we acquire for our clients, we tend to see that…
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