What makes a good backlink? The answer includes relevance, diversity, location on the page, keyword usage and placement. While you can’t directly control your off-page SEO, it is important to understand how the construction of the backlink affects how search engines view you as the link destination.
Backlink Relevance for SEO
It is often said that you need relevant inbound links…but what is relevance?
Relevance has a lot to do with industry alignment. Let’s say that you had a website about lawn care and you got a backlink from Scotts-the manufacturer of lawn food-to a page on your website. From an SEO perspective, that is a good link since there is a strong industry alignment.
Now let’s say that you got a backlink from Home Depot, an even larger overall site with an even a higher Domain Authority than Scotts. Would that link be a better backlink? Or since Home Depot is only remotely connected to the lawn care industry, is this a less valuable link? The answer is – it depends.
Because Home Depot has more link juice than Scotts, based on its higher Domain Authority it has more link juice to give. However, Scotts is a more relevant link since it shares the same industry, so the link has greater relevance than Home Depot. In this case, the ultimate value of these two links will depend on both the formatting and type of link.
Text or Image Links for SEO
Search engines value text links over image links. Text links with a more descriptive anchor text also have greater value. Therefore, if the backlink from Scotts was an image link as opposed to a text link, and the Home Depot backlink was a text link with a well-scripted anchor text, the nod would go to the Home Depot link as being better.
However, if the inverse was true in that Scotts used a text link with a well-scripted anchor text and Home Depot used an image link, the nod would likely go to Scotts.
If both backlinks were formatted the same as either text links or image links, then the increased relevance of Scotts might just make up for the additional Domain Authority possessed by Home Depot.
Diversity of Backlinks for SEO
A dozen backlinks to your site from one domain are not valued as highly by search engines as one link from a dozen different domains.
Inbound links from sites that have a higher Domain and Page Authority, as we shared earlier, pass along more link juice than an inbound link from a site that has lower authority. This is true even if they come from your own site. Therefore, when a search engine sees many different domains linking to the same content, they value the destination page as having more value. They also reward the page with a higher Page Authority.
Position of a Backlink on the Page for SEO
The position on the page where the backlink originated from can impact its value, based on what the search engines call prominence. Often, search engines place a little more value on a link that appears earlier on in an article, than one that appears near the end or in the footer.
Keyword Placement in Anchor Text for SEO
The location of the keyword in the anchor text of a link has an effect on assigning a value to it. Let’s say that you were trying to rank for “Buyer’s Utility Map” and for “Map Tool”, and you used a text link that linked to a tool that you referred to as your “Buyer’s Utility Map Tool” in your copy.
The search engine would apply more value to the keyword “Buyer’s Utility Map” based on this prominence, or the fact that it appeared before the keyword “Map Tool”. To make the search engines give more prominence to the “Map Tool” keyword, you would be better off making the anchor text “Map Tool: Buyer’s Utility Map”, or just making “Map Tool” the anchor text.
Link Placement on Page for SEO
When it comes to the value of a link, its location on the page provides some valuable clues to the search engines. When the link appears in the body text of a page, the search engines assume that it is directly connected to the content of the page. However, if the link appears in a sidebar or in the navigation, they may assume that the link is not as valuable since many sites sell backlinks or include affiliate links in sidebars.
Non-Visible links
An old black-hat trick that all search engines are wise to and will penalize a site for using is the use of non-visible links. Some developers would try the game the search engines by including links where the anchor text was in the same color as the background, therefore making them non-visible to the user but creating a backlink to another page to share link juice. Today, search engines are wise to this black-hat tactic, and when they are discovered they will penalize the site.
Links to Home Page or Landing Page for SEO
The home page is the default landing page when someone enters your domain.com. Many backlinks tend to be more generic and include a site’s homepage as the link. Search engines know this, so they do not value this as highly as a link to a specific landing page. When a backlink specifies a specific landing page on a site, the search engines interpret that as a more relevant link and value it more highly.
The Perfect Link
While it is not possible to have a perfect link, here is a quick summary of the kind of backlinks you want:
Links from high authority sites
Links from high trust/low spam rated sites
Fewer no-follow links so you can get their link juice
Follow links from pages with few other links so you get all their juice
Text links over image links
Links that are in the body text and not in sidebars or navigation
Links that come from closer to the top of the originator’s page
Your keywords at the front of the anchor text
Links from relevant sites
Links from a distribution of different type of sites
Visible links
Links that point to pages and not always to your home page
