What Are Backlinks In SEO?
Published by Daniel Dahlen on
Getting back to basics in my local SEO series of posts, today I want to look at backlinks and their use & role in local SEO.
In my dozen+ years of working in the SEO world, there may not be a more widely debated topic than links (and specifically backlinks) – and for good reason: it’s why the “web” is “the web”.
Links are what connect digital pages, websites, platforms and other online entities together, and ultimately form the world wide web as we know it.
A link from web page to another forms an association between the two, whether those two pages intended to, or not.
As you’ll see below, those associations may be useful indicators for search engine algorithms for understanding a page’s importance for a particular topic or search query.
What Are Links?
A “link” in this context is short for hyperlink, which is a clickable (or tapable) reference in an digital document (source) that points to another digital document or resource (target).
If you click this link for Wikipedia’s hyperlink article, for example, it will open the Wikipedia document entry for the term “hyperlink”.
This is a useful way to provide readers additional information about a topic, person, place or thing, without having to include that information within that article.
The text that is used when linking from the source article is called anchor text. More on that term below.
What Are Backlinks?
Now that we know that a link connects two web pages, let’s quickly define a backlink.
A backlink, quite simply, is the inbound link that points to a particular web page.
For example, the Wikipedia link mentioned above in this post would be considered a “backlink” for that Wikipedia page.
In other words, when discussing backlinks you’re talking about links from the point-of-view of the link’s target page. That is, where the link points to (where you end up after clicking or tapping a link).
Why Could Backlinks Be Important In SEO?
As I mention in this organic search engine ranking explainer post, the most important and relevant pages for a particular search term are placed at the top of search results pages.
Understanding the backlinks to a particular web page can be useful in understanding that page’s importance or relevancy about a topic.
If a particular web page has thousands of backlinks from several different source web pages, it could be a sign that it’s a useful, important page.
If those backlinks use specific anchor text (the text that you click or tap) when linking to a target page, then it may be a sign that it’s useful or important for searches that include those anchor text words.
Optimizing the anchor text used for backlinks and increasing the number of backlinks to a web page (link building) is a common tactic that’s been around since the very early days of SEO.
As with many traditional SEO tactics, as you’ll see below, linkbuilding can be prone to abuse and manipulation.
Are All Backlinks Good?
If you notice in my choice of words above, I use words like could and may when referencing the importance of the quantity of backlinks and anchor text used for those backlinks.
This is because you can’t say “this page has the most backlinks, so it’s the most important and should rank first”.
If that were the case, then it would be a race to get the most number of backlinks from the most number of web pages — no matter what those web pages were about; even from spam or lowest quality sites.
This, as you can imagine, can lead to abuse. Is that page the most relevant or important? Or do they just have the most resources to acquire the most number of links?
As search engines have evolved over the years, it has become increasingly important to not just build the quantity of backlinks, but also the quality of backlinks.
Quality, in this case, means where the backlinks comes from (the source web page).
The definition of a “quality” backlink can obviously change depending on the topic, person, place or thing.
A high quality link, for example, could come from a reputable organizational website — like a government, educational institution or other website that is associated with higher authority or more trustworthy content.
Or it could come from industry-specific organizational websites, news outlets or associations.
In short, not all backlinks are created equal; where those backlinks come from can help determine if it’s useful for a particular web page.
About Backlinks For SEO In 2022 (And Beyond)
In an update just posted from Google just last month, they mention this about backlinks:
“backlinks as a signal has a lot less significant impact compared to when Google Search first started out many years ago.”
Does this mean you shouldn’t worry about backlinks for your small business website?
I would say it’s still important to develop a healthy, natural set of backlinks to your website (or hire a local SEO company to help you), regardless of their overall impact on your rankings.
Backlinks from industry-relevant and/or niche directories, local business organizations, verified business listings and other trustworthy sources could be a place your ideal customers might find you organically online or use to research and verify your company’s activities & associations.
After reading this post, I hope you have a better understanding of what links & backlinks are, how they may be used for SEO purposes and where you might be able to pick up some for your local business website.
