The Secret to Building High-Quality Backlinks in Three Minutes

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Backlinks (external links) are an inevitable topic in search engine optimisation (SEO). People are concerned about them, but often avoid discussing them openly. Compared to keywords, the concept of backlinks is less clear and is often used for cheating. In fact, some people believe that manipulating backlinks is an inevitable method of increasing a website’s authority. Over the years I’ve noticed that people often focus on how to get better backlink sources, but overlook the correct way to build backlinks. This is putting the cart before the horse. That’s why I want to discuss this “age old” topic with the readers of this article. I believe that healthy, correct and valuable backlinks are the true reflection of a website’s evergreen value.

In the first half of this article, we will explore how to understand backlinks, why they are important and how to avoid falling into the trap of backlink manipulation. In the second half of this article, we will use examples to show you how to build quality backlinks correctly and reveal the secrets behind them.

This article will provide general methods for backlink building and I will share my personal experiences. Share your work experiences with me. Share your thoughts on backlinks in the comments – other readers will benefit from your insights. We are all in this together, and sharing our insights will help us grow.

Any link that contains information about a target page can be considered a backlink. The most common forms are plain text URLs, hyperlinked URLs and anchor text URLs. Let’s illustrate this with the following examples:

  • Plain Text URL: https://www.shiftnimbus.com/ – This is a non-clickable URL displayed as plain text. Users need to manually copy and paste it to visit the site.
  • Hyperlinked URL: https://www.shiftnimbus.com/ – This is a clickable URL displayed as a hyperlink. Users can directly click on it.
  • Anchor Text URL: Shiftnimbus Marketing Website – This is an anchor text URL displayed as a hyperlink. The text part provides context for the link, and search engines can understand it.

Depending on the context, backlinks (External Links) can be expressed in various ways:

  • Backlink: A link from another website pointing to your site, commonly used in SEO.
  • Inbound Link: A link from an external website pointing to your site.
  • External Link: A link from one website pointing to another website.
  • Referral Link: A link generated when another website references your content.
  • Incoming Link: A link imported from an external source to your site.
  • One-way Link: A link from another website pointing to your site without reciprocity.
  • Friendship Link: A link exchanged between websites, usually based on a cooperative relationship.

These terms are used in different contexts, but they all involve links from external websites pointing to your site. We call them “backlinks”. The distinctions between these terms are not always clear, especially between backlinks, inbound links, external links, and one-way links. The external link is the one you will see most often. While you don’t need to focus too much on these terms, it is important to understand the effect of the different types of backlinks.

First, let’s review the nature of backlinks (external links). No matter how Wikipedia or others define them, we need to understand their nature to understand how they work.

Backlinks (external links) are a concept of the Internet. Links themselves are meaningless unless they are part of a search engine like Google. So what is Google? Essentially, Google is a giant library, and each web page is like a page in a book (note: a web page, not a website). Backlinks are the links between these pages. When you see a page with a link to another page, you can click on it to quickly navigate to that page, just like a link between pages.

Web pages are relatively static, but information flows through hyperlinks. People jump from one page to another, moving between different websites (books), which is the essence of web activity. Google has adopted the citation mechanism from the scientific community and treats links from one page to another as “citations”. The more citations a page has, the higher its perceived value.

But is that really the case? I’m not sure. We often come across low-quality links that take us to strange, low-value pages, don’t we? But this is Google’s logic, and we have to follow it. At least in most cases, it’s a reasonable logic: the more your page is cited, the more valuable it is.

Specifically, having enough reliable backlinks means that other websites on the internet recognise the value of your site. This will bring more traffic and improve your page’s ranking in search engines. For example, if a user searches for “toothpaste” and your page about toothpaste has a high ranking, it will be displayed first. This is the search engine’s reward for high quality pages.

Google uses a metric called PageRank (PR) to assess the value of a web page. The PR score is based on the number and quality of backlinks. High-quality backlinks carry more weight, and weight is like a ‘like’. If a lot of people like you, it means you’re good. Highly ranked pages are like celebrities in the human world. If many people like an actor, that actor becomes a star because enough people have liked him.

People are always trying to promote their websites and pages to increase visibility and get more pages to link to them. This is a natural state and something search engines encourage. However, over time, people focus solely on increasing the number of links to their pages, ignoring the actual meaning and value behind those links. This behaviour quickly turns into blind link exchanges or even buying links, violating the search engine’s intentions.

Backlinks are crucial for PageRank, yet people still ignore search engine warnings and try to manipulate their page rankings through cheating. These methods include:

  • Buying Links: Paying for a large number of low-quality or irrelevant links to quickly boost rankings.
  • Link Farms: A network of websites linking to each other to manipulate rankings.
  • Hidden Links: Hiding text or links (e.g., making them the same color as the background) to deceive search engines.
  • Automated Link Generation: Using software to generate a large number of low-quality links.
  • Spam Comments: Posting spam comments on forums, blogs, etc., with links.
  • Mirror Sites: Creating multiple websites with identical content and linking them to boost rankings.
  • Excessive Link Exchanges: Exchanging a large number of irrelevant or low-quality links.
  • Fake Social Media Links: Using fake accounts to post a large number of links on social media.

The internet is like a vast river. Some people prefer to float slowly, while others want to drift quickly. Everyone has different ideas, and I’m not criticising those who manipulate backlinks. If you want to build a reputable website that will last for decades, you must cherish your site and avoid trying to gain short-term traffic through cheating. In the long run, backlink manipulation is a form of website suicide that will ultimately destroy your site.

If your cheating is discovered by search engines, the consequences can be severe. Your site may be penalised or even removed from the index, making it impossible for users to find your content via search engines. Your site will effectively disappear from the web. Many people hope that search engines won’t catch them, but unfortunately search engines always know. It’s just that they’re slow to react, and by the time they do, you won’t have a chance to appeal (we all know that appealing to Google is almost impossible).

If you realise that cheating is not a good idea and decide to clean up those low-quality backlinks, you’ll find it a daunting task. It’s not easy to break the ties with those low-quality links, and it will take a considerable amount of time and effort. So, don’t cheat in the first place. Even after cleaning up spam links, you’ll still need to wait a long time for search engines to regain trust in your site.

Rome wasn’t built in a day – that’s a fact. Success requires patience and diligence. Rushing will lead to the opposite of what you want. Give yourself enough patience and allow your website time to grow; it’s like planting a tree. Water, fertilise and prune it, and then leave the rest to time and sunlight.

Getting backlinks is a natural process, but that doesn’t mean you don’t need to do anything. We should treat backlink building as equally important as content creation, because according to Google’s rules, high quality content combined with high quality backlinks leads to better PageRank scores.

First, we must create original, valuable content. The internet’s most important core value is originality. Everything else serves original content. Originality doesn’t mean being completely unique or rare; it means creating content that comes from you. This could be specific content or your personal opinions, like this article, which is my original work. It comes from my thoughts, so it’s original because it contains my ideas and perspectives.

To evaluate the quality of original content, we must consider its value to readers. We should consistently ask ourselves if users can gain helpful information or practical knowledge from the content we provide. It’s important to regularly assess our original content and aim to deliver true, practical value. When users find your content genuinely valuable, it is more likely to be referenced by other websites, resulting in natural backlinks.

Is this strategy sufficient? If our original content doesn’t come from a well-known industry website, while it may be appreciated by readers, it is unlikely to attract active links, correct? This is a realistic concern. Relying solely on high-quality original content may not generate enough natural backlinks.

Therefore, we need more methods to obtain backlinks and to ensure that these methods are appropriate and comply with search engine rules. Here are some examples:

  • Guest Blogging: Publish articles on blogs or websites in related fields and include links to your site. Choose high-quality, relevant websites to ensure the links are authoritative and relevant.
  • Resource Page Links: Look for websites in your field, especially those with “Resource Pages,” and contact the site owners to suggest adding your site as a useful resource.
  • Social Media Promotion: Share content on social media to attract more visitors and shares. While social media links don’t count toward SEO rankings, they can increase exposure and indirectly attract natural backlinks.
  • Collaborations and Interviews: Collaborate with bloggers, media, or experts in your industry. Include links to your site in interviews or collaborative content.
  • Submitting to High-Quality Directories: Submit your site to authoritative industry directories or classification directories (e.g., Google My Business). Avoid low-quality directory sites to prevent being flagged as spam by search engines.
  • Creating Tools or Resources: Develop free tools, templates, or resources (e.g., ebooks, Chrome extensions, WordPress plugins). These resources are more likely to be referenced and linked by other websites.
  • Forum and Community Participation: Actively participate in discussions on relevant forums and communities (e.g., Reddit, Quora). Include links to your site in your signature or answers (if allowed by the platform).
  • Press Releases: Write press releases and distribute them through legitimate channels to attract media coverage and links.
  • Competitor Analysis: Use tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush to analyze your competitors’ backlink sources. Try to obtain backlinks from the same sources.

Take a look and see which methods you can use. You don’t have to use all of them; focusing on just one or two can yield excellent backlinks. Some methods aren’t listed here, such as publishing an article on a university website with a link to your site if you have academic connections. Links from .edu domains are always considered highly valuable by search engines.

I believe that backlinks represent influence, and influence comes from long-term, consistent “promotion”. Let me use an analogy: I have to push a cart to the top of a bridge. The top of the bridge represents my website being recognised by Google and achieving a high ranking. Once I’ve reached the top, I’ll effortlessly gain a lot of traffic. However, the hardest part is pushing the cart to the top. This process requires us to promote our website until it reaches this point. So before you enjoy the rewards of search engines, work hard to promote your site and build your influence.

Looking at the methods listed above, you may notice a problem: each method has at least one drawback. Some are too expensive, such as interviews and press releases, while others require asking for favours, such as links on resource pages. So, is there a way to build quality backlinks while maintaining control?

You might think that guest blogging is the easiest method, right? We can use third party platforms to build quality links. Or maybe you’re already doing this. But what most people don’t realise is that many of the backlinks they create are low quality and not recognised by search engines. You can track these backlinks, but you won’t know their true quality or whether they’ll improve your ranking.

For example, many people like to use the “one article, multiple platforms” approach. You have a standalone site, write an article and then publish it on various third party platforms, cleverly adding a link back to your site. You think this successfully builds backlinks, right? Unfortunately, this is wrong. It does create backlinks, but the quality is low for the following reasons:

  • Google and other search engines focus more on naturally generated backlinks, not links you create yourself.
  • Duplicate Content Issue: Reposting articles has little effect on boosting your site’s ranking and may even harm it. Google might consider the platform’s version as the original and your site’s version as duplicate content, causing your site’s ranking to drop.
  • Weight Distribution: If the platform has a high authority, Google might prioritize indexing the platform’s version over your site’s version.
  • Lack of Canonical Tags and Redirects: Most platforms don’t allow the use of canonical tags or redirects, making it impossible to declare your site’s version as the original.

Therefore, the “one article, multiple platforms” approach is not a good idea for building quality backlinks. If we were to write a completely different article (with less than 30% similarity) on a third platform and then link to it, this would comply with search engine rules. However, this is too costly as you’d have to write a unique article for each platform.

So, what should we do to effectively use third-party platforms while building genuine, high-quality backlinks? The answer isn’t hard to guess, but we need to organize our thoughts:

First, consider the article on your standalone site—the one you want to boost—as the answer to a specific question. The core of this article is to provide an answer to that question. Then, on a third-party platform, write another article that poses the question but doesn’t answer it. Instead, reference your standalone site’s article as the answer.

Let’s use this article as an example. What is this article about? It’s about how to build high-quality backlinks.

Next, I’ll go to a platform like Quora and publish a new article in my personal column. This article will discuss common mistakes in backlink building, such as “7 Common Mistakes in Backlink Building.” I’ll write it in an inquisitive tone and, at the end, mention that I found a detailed guide on backlink building that was very helpful.

If you notice, the article I write on Quora is about backlinks, and the referenced link (this article) is also about backlinks. This ensures topic relevance. Then, I’ll use anchor text like “Guide to High-Quality Backlinks” to reference this article, making it clear to search engines what I’m referencing. The article on Quora has no duplicate content with this article, with a similarity rate of less than 1%. Now you see my intention: by publishing an article on a third-party platform and sharing my thoughts, I’ve achieved the goal of building high-quality backlinks. There are three key points to keep in mind

  • The less similar the platform article is to your standalone site’s article, the better.
  • The platform article and your standalone site’s article should belong to the same topic area.
  • The platform article should pose a question, and your standalone site’s article should provide the answer.

So, in this backlink building example, I publish an article on Quora entitled “7 Common Mistakes in Backlink Building“. In the first half, I discuss common mistakes and establish the article’s relevance to backlink building. In the second half, I ask questions and share my thoughts, linking back to the article with anchor text such as “Guide to High-Quality Backlinks“. This whole process builds quality backlinks for the topic. If possible, I can also reference the Quora article on other platforms, creating a cycle of references that boosts the ranking of both the referenced and referencing articles.

With this approach, you can write short platform articles for backlink references on a daily basis. The advantage of platform articles is that they don’t have to be long, as platform users prefer concise, to-the-point content. Focus on the key points and include your thoughts, placing the backlink within your thoughts.

We can see that this method of building backlinks keeps us in control. We can also frequently modify these platform articles to increase their readership. This backlink building process is sensible, legal and supported by the search engines, making it a high quality method. However, it’s important to note that both the articles used for “traffic generation” and the articles for which you’re building backlinks should emphasise originality and provide real value to users. Always follow the search engine rules and create value for the users, because that’s what gives us value.

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