The vast world of SEO has two major divisions- on-page and off-page SEO. While on-page SEO includes the direct optimization steps revolving around publishing content, off-page SEO focuses on techniques that gather backlinks and popularity from external resources.
No matter how strong your on-page SEO is, it is impossible to gain authority and win top rankings without consistent and well-directed off-page SEO strategies.
Every year, new trends take place of the old ones in the SEO world. There are a few techniques of off-page optimization that have been performing better than others. This article will show you all those off-page SEO techniques, which you can try to boost ranking in 2018.
Blog commenting
Blog commenting is not a new concept in the world of SEO. However, this year has shown a growth in this trend. The fact that this technique brings highly targeted traffic to a site has made this process highly popular among the practitioners.
You manually search for blogs that are relevant to your business and site. Searching SERPs with a few core keywords related to your business or niche can help you find the right blogs to start commenting.
Experts suggest reading the selected blogs to make your comments valuable. The idea is to give additional information to the readers. It should also seem useful to the blog owner, so they allow your comments in their comment section.
Think long-term when using this tactic. Start by just adding information without any links that refer to your site. This will help in building a relationship with the blog owner.
Eventually, you can lead to adding URLs or headlines of relevant articles on your site. This will bring more interested traffic directly to your site. Plus, you will attain chances of winning backlinks in future.
Article marketing or submission
If you have enough time to invest in article marketing, it can bring hundreds of backlinks and upgrade your domain authority. There are different approaches that SEO experts suggest when creating articles and submitting them to different online platforms.
One approach is to create a parent article and produce various baby articles associated with the same topic. These baby articles don’t have a low word count.
In fact, they contain different versions of the parent article that you create. After developing different versions of the same article, you can start submitting them to various blog networks and article directories.
Another approach incorporates posting articles on forums that invite unique content. Such forums allow you to obtain credible backlinks that bring traffic to your site and helps in improving rankings as well.
However, this approach requires high-quality articles. Hence, you need expert writers who understand your business. Or, you can write on your own if your marketing scale is low.
Directory submission
This technique is very popular among site owners to win backlinks. However, you have to constantly keep an eye on the new directories that appear in the picture.
You look for general directories, reciprocal directories, paid directories and others. Among all of them, niche directories are considered most effective, as they help you win relevant backlinks.
The art of winning links from directories revolves around your ability to create appealing description and relevant anchor text. Always include your main keyword in the title, which becomes the anchor text for the link.
Write descriptions with the aim to influence people to visit your website. Keep it short and crisp, but don’t give a vague idea. Choose simple words that clearly explain your web pages.
There are tools out there to help you count the number of backlinks you attain. Such tools are effective in planning your ongoing directory submission approach.
Forum posting
Answering questions on forums is also a great way to drive traffic. You can link your relevant web page with an appropriate answer.
First of all, you have to find the right forums that are suitable for your niche or business. Then, understand the rules and regulations that are followed in a forum. After that, you can begin answering posts along with your profile or signature link.
Most forums provide a list of unanswered questions. Also, you can promote your new content on such forums and develop traffic, backlinks, and rankings.
You can start by posting answers and posts in 5 to 10 forums. Make sure that these forums come under your niche. Eventually, you will gain backlinks and get more forum options to market your website.
Guest blogging
Guest blogging requires an analytical approach to success. You can’t pick any random blog and approach for guest blogging. There are several factors that make a blog suitable for guest posting.
First of all, you should find out the readership level of a blog. Many sites offer guest blogging opportunities in their initial stages. Your job is to find well-established blogs that are relevant to your niche.
The writing part is simple. You have to focus on the core writing values to create an information piece of content. However, the linking process changes a little bit. You need to make sure that the topic presents opportunities to link guest posts with your web pages.
To find guest posting opportunities in your market, you can follow this example:
Core keyword + guest posting
Replace the “core keyword” section with the keyword your niche belongs to.
Few tips when preparing content for guest posting:
- Make sure that your content can offer value to the prospect website.
- Follow a disciplined optimization guideline to help the site owner.
- Use meaningful images along with alt tags and descriptive filenames.
These tips will enhance your chances of getting posts approved. However, the job doesn’t end there. You need to follow all the questions that people ask on that forum. Answering the comments will grow your authority and help to improve the brand power in the digital market.
Using Q&A platforms
There are forums such as Quora and Yahoo where people simply add their questions. These platforms are perfect to build quality backlinks and win traffic. You can promote your content on your own by attaching a reference link to your web pages along with your answers.
It is important to give value to the answer seekers. Don’t just try to lead them to your site. Find relevant questions and genuinely help with your expertise.
Most platforms have regulations regarding link attachments. Being too aggressive can lead to getting banned from posting answers. Hence, it would be better to use two separate accounts and don’t overdo the backlink process.
Answer more and link to a few answers only. Eventually, you will build a strong reputation of your profile and win traffic for your site.
Social bookmarking
Social bookmarking is one of the fastest ways to build backlinks. This simple off-page SEO technique requires very little effort. But you have to give time to attain visibility on the bookmarking site you join.
Starting this approach requires only joining. Then, you can just add a link of your web page and let other people vote for your content. Social bookmarking sites are working in all kinds of niches. You can use your core keyword along with “bookmarking” to find relevant sites.
This technique is really valuable to win quick backlinks. Plus, you start getting traffic as people start taking interest in your content. It is important to include proper tags if a site asks. Such tags will make your links visible to readers who are interested in your niche.
YouTube Marketing
YouTube has become a great platform to win a wide audience and market your site or business. Depending on the purpose of marketing, you can use YouTube for different off-page SEO goals.
For instance, you can create videos related to sales. An appealing headline and clear call-to-action are the basics for any video.
Plus, you have to provide informative content in the video, so that, people see, like and share your video content. Such videos also become a promotional element on forums, bookmarking sites and other platforms. You can use paid marketing approach to get more visibility for sales videos.
Many site owners create informative content in video medium and promote it via YouTube. Thanks to modern video creation tools, you just need to spend a few minutes to make a video on your site-related topic. You can provide a strong description and link your official web page along with it.
Social media networking
This might be the most effective and most difficult off-page SEO technique. Almost every site uses social media profiles for online reputation and branding.
Platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Pinterest, LinkedIn, and others have become a valuable space where business can tap into community interactions.
A successful social media reputation requires time and a well-directed approach. Every platform is unique, so you have to change your marketing approach.
The first step is obviously to create SEO optimized profiles on each platform that are most relevant to your niche. Include links to your site while creating social media profiles and complete all the information required.
Consistently post content that engages audiences. You can use relevant keywords and attach site and web page links whenever relevant in a post.
The idea is to provide information and create curiosity to achieve link clicks at the same time. With time, you gain followers who help in promoting your content all over the social network.
Data-driven Infographics
The boost in the popularity of data has given rise to infographic marketing approach. Infographics are generally a visual demonstration of data. This data can include valuable numbers, research, surveys or even informational text.
Graphical representation of information makes it interesting and more engaging. This is why it attracts influencers who share and link back to your infographics.
There are many platforms nowadays providing free as well as paid versions of infographic creation tools. You can get your subscription and create promotional content for an enhanced exposure.
Many SEO professionals provide exclusive infographic content pieces. So, you can hire professionals if your marketing scale is high enough.
Data-driven infographics immediately get attention. You can use such content pieces on your web pages, social media platforms, forum posting and even when answering questions on a Q&A site.
This will bring traffic from all directions to your site. Plus, search engines give importance to web pages with infographics while ranking.
Press release
Press releases also help in gaining valuable backlinks. This approach allows you to win links and promote your site at the same time. Also, the linked pages get an immediate traffic boom. You can diverse that traffic to other pages on your site via internal linking.
You can search for platforms that offer press release opportunities for free. One Google search will lead you straight to a perfect press release site. But this is the easy part.
Creating valuable press release is much harder than people realize. You have to follow a correct format of such content and focus on benefits instead of the features of your content idea.
The format of a high-quality press release:
- Headline
- Release date and location
- Introduction (answer what, why, when, who and where)
- Content body
- Boilerplate
- Contact information
If you have a business, it would be better to hire professional copywriters to write press releases for your business.
Web 2.0
Every online business and site owner is leveraging this off-page SEO technique.
Platforms such as Blogger and WordPress have high reputation and domain authority in the digital world. You can use such platforms to build links and attain higher rankings. The best part is that you attain complete control over the backlinks that you create.
The process requires creating a well-optimized blog for content and creates links to your official site.
Tying It All Together
Hopefully, you have understood these actionable techniques that are working in 2018. However, it is important to remember that the success of any off-page SEO technique depends on your ability to implement. Make sure you follow the tips and guidelines that make every tactic successful.
Consult an SEO professional to know more about how to win backlinks and improve domain authority.