How related to your industry do your links need to be?
-
Hello,
Some of the hottest link building techniques right now are guest posting, viral content, and link bating.
But I often see SEOs produce content that has very little relevance to the actually industry they are in. For instance, a dentist might build links by guest posting on a tech site, an attorney might create an infographic on color psychology, and an accountant might venture into celebrity gossip.
While more advanced SEOs try to make sure that the content they produce has some relevance to their industry (even if it's marginal), where is the line drawn?
-
I prefer to think in terms of the audience where the backlinks are coming from. Will they be interested in what I have to offer? If not I don't see a massive amount of value in that link, so Google probably wouldn't either if they found a way to accurately judge that in their algorithm. I bet they're already capable of doing so by tracking bounce rates from links, and whether anyone bothers to click them. Of course there are exceptions; no one would say no to a massive viral hit that resulted in hundreds of links. Just think about whether it seems natural or not - Tom gives some good examples.
With your own examples, an accountant could have written about celebrity finances and a lawyer about how the colour of their office improved client's success rate in court...but again are these links for links sake or targeted to an audience who might be interested in your product?
-
As you may (disappointingly) expect, there is no definitive line in the sand on this, and it's very much down to opinion.
In my view, relevancy is a very important factor for links. To that end, I would rather spend twice the time researching partners and producing content for a related niche with, say, a PA/DA of 45, than a completely unrelated niche with a PA/DA of 60 (figures off the top of my head).
Of course, there would be exceptions. Should one of the sites I'm working on be included in a YouMoz post here and the post takes off, then there's no doubt the link would help, despite it not being that relevant at all. Very high authority blogs are worth pursuing - provided, of course, you have something of worth to say.
There's also crossovers between niches. Say if you were doing work for a dentist - a blog about social media might not strike you as immediately relevant, but it is if you're launching a new health awareness campaign, or a technology blog might be relevant if you're talking about how the business functions. In this case, I'd say that DA/PA 60 blog would be worth investing that time in - but, once again, only if you have something worthwhile to say and isn't considered a stretch.
Just my two copper on this and would love to see your opinion and others' on the issue.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Link conundrum - losing nav/footer links in mobile view
Hi Moz folks! I'm currently moving a site from being hosted on www. and m. separately to a responsive single URL. The problem is, the desktop version currently has links to important landing pages in the footer (about 60) and that's not something we want to replicate on mobile (mainly because it will look pretty awful.) There is no navigation menu because the key to the homepage is to convert users to subscription so any distraction reduces conversion rate. The footer links will continue to exist on the desktop view but, since Google's mobile-first index, presumably we lose these important homepage links to our most important pages. So, my questions: Do you think there is any SEO value in the desktop footer links? Do you have any suggestions about how best to include these 60-odd links in a way that works for mobile? Thanks!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | d_foley0 -
ECommerce website with link to manufactures site for ordering - Should these links be follow or no follow?
Dear Mozzers, I have a couple of questions regarding link juice and whether I should have do follow or no follow links ? We have an affiliate eCommerce website and on our product pages we have a "Order online " button which will go our subdomain on the manufactures site in order for the user to complete the online ordering process So it's - www.ourcompany.co.uk - "Order Online Button" - www.manufactuer.ourcompany.co.uk Should this " Order online Button" be a Follow or No Follow link ? I ask this as currently from looking at Majestic seo , these "order online " buttons on my product pages seems to be Follow links so am I losing potential link juice by sending it externally ? Am I correct in assuming by changing it to be no follows, I would increase the link juice going elsewhere internally? thanks Pete
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | PeteC120 -
Links Questions and advice?
I have a website which has a fair few link assets that are doing very well (a lot of really powerful sites have link to them with follow links) but my commercial pages are not doing as well as a lot of sites without any other investment than (mediocre) links direct to there commercial pages with at least 10% of them carrying the money anchor text. Even pages we have had a few links for with generalized real anchor text and reasonable links do not do as well as the above due to none of them carrying the money keyword? Is it me or does google still rely on links to the commercial page and keywords with anchor text to match the money term?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | BobAnderson0 -
What is the best way to find related forums in your industry?
Hi Guys, Just wondering what is the best way to find forums in your industry?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | edward-may2 -
Do my redirects on my homepage need to be 301?
Our domain name is something like www.I-am-cool.com but most people just type in iamcool.com After doing some research I found that those are 302 redirects and I think they should be 301. If I am correct do I need to redirect www.iamcool.com and iamcool.com or just one or the other?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | EcommerceSite0 -
Links on My website
I am looking to create some more trust on my website by subscribing to BBB. I have heard that my site is penalized and loses "link juice" if I place the BBB logo link in my page footer on every page of my website. Does anyone know how much I am penalized? Should I only put it on my conversion pages and maybe my main 10 sub pages? My main goal is to assist in getting conversions but I don't want to do it at the expense of getting a penalty. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thank you, Boo
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Boodreaux0 -
Help Needed With .htaccess RewriteRule
Hello Fellow Mozzers, I would really appreciate a little help as I have been banging my head against a wall for the last few hours trying to create a .htaccess RewriteRule. I have around 300 URLs that I need to 301 redirect following a site re-build, they are in groups of similar urls but infortunately not broken down in to folders. Here is an example of a few URLs:- https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-ellwoodii_2.htm
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | AdeLewis
https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-ellwoodii-200225cm-6670.htm
https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-ellwoodii.htm
https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-ellwoods-gold.htm
https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-lemon-queen.htm
https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana-yvonne-200cm-66.htm All of the above URLs need to redirect to a new URL:- http://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana Here is the RewriteRule that I currently have but it isn't working:- RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^(.*)_chamaecyparis-lawsoniana$ https://www.domain.co.uk/chamaecyparis-lawsoniana [R=301,L] Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks
Ade.0 -
Link anchor text: only useful for pages linked to directly or distributed across site?
As a SEO I understand that link anchor text for the focus keyword on the page linked to is very important, but I have a question which I can not find the answer to in any books or blogs, namely: does inbound anchor text 'carry over' to other pages in your site, like linkjuice? For instance, if I have a homepage focusing on keyword X and a subpage (with internal links to it) focusing on keyword Y. Does is then help to link to the homepage with keyword Y anchor texts? Will this keyword thematically 'flow through' the internal link structure and help the subpage's ranking? In a broader sense: will a diverse link anchor text profile to your homepage help all other pages in your domain rank thematically? Or is link anchor text just useful for the direct page that is linked to? All views and experiences are welcome! Kind regards, Joost van Vught
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | JoostvanVught0