Learning how to get backlinks is one of the oldest and most effective SEO tactics. It is also one of the most productive ways to increase organic search traffic.

But you need to be careful how you create quality backlinks.

Links have been an important part of how Google and other search engines determine how trustworthy a website is from the very beginning.

It’s basically impossible to beg, borrow, steal, or buy quality backlinks in a way that increases rankings. For site owners who used to rely on shady link building tactics, this is bad news.

But if you’re willing to put in the time it takes to get valid links, it’s still entirely possible to increase your credibility (and rankings).

That’s why in this post, I’ll explain six smart ways to get high-quality, legitimate backlinks that will help show Google and other search engines that your site is worthy of high rankings.

Guest posts

“Guest posting” is the practice of contributing free content to another website or blog in exchange for a link to your own site.

These links can be placed in the author’s biography section or used to cite information within the body of the publication.

This has long been a popular link building method, as it is beneficial to both sites – one gets free content to share with your audience, while the other gets a high-quality link.

So how can you use this tactic correctly?

The first step is to identify the appropriate sites that you can contribute to.

The seemingly obvious choices here are well known industry publications. If there’s someone in your niche who accepts article submissions, that’s a good starting point.

But traditional publishing sites are not your only option, not even your best option.

And one of the easiest ways to discover those other options is by examining your competitors’ guest posts.

Public relations

To some digital marketers, “public relations” may sound more like a traditional marketing strategy.

And in a technical sense, it is.

But in the context of link building, the term simply refers to the practice of using the same methods of getting backlinks that you could use to get the press.

One of the best ways to do this is to get cited as a source in a news article or other online content.

In the past, the only way to do this was to hire a publicist with connections to prominent journalists and publications.

Today, you can eliminate the need for this third-party help by registering with Help A Reporter or HARO. This service allows journalists to make calls from sources within their daily newsletter.

Indicate what areas you have expertise in and you will receive a daily list of journalists’ needs related to your skills directly in your inbox on a daily basis. You can then contact these journalists, and if they are interested in what you have to say, they will cite you as a source.

You can also consider classic PR moves like press releases.

Bloggers and journalists are constantly looking for new information, so whenever your business achieves something significant, make the announcement and details easy to find.

Broken link building

Even reputable and well-maintained websites suffer from broken links.

Every link on a site originally links to another page online. But because websites often move their content, some of those links will eventually “break” or point to pages that no longer exist.

When a user clicks on a broken link, they will land on a 404 error page telling them that the content they are looking for no longer exists.

This not only provides a poor user experience, but also makes it difficult for search engines to crawl and index websites efficiently.

Building broken links fixes this, and is a great way to build valuable links.

This strategy involves finding broken links on other websites, identifying the content they originally referred to, and then offering the site the opportunity to replace your broken link with a valid link to relevant content.

That content, of course, will be on your site.

With this strategy, everyone wins. The site owner will have fewer broken links. Your visitors will see more up-to-date and useful content and fewer 404s. And you’ll get a high-quality backlink.

Skyscraper content

The skyscraper is the process of finding content in your space and then getting over it.

This concept was originally popularized by Brian Dean of Backlinko and is still a great way to generate valuable content ideas that will generate links to your site.

In fact, after running this process on an already popular post on Google ranking factors, Dean dramatically improved the backlink profile of the page.

So how can you achieve similar results for your site.

A simplistic way to do this might be to think: “Hmmm, 101 ways to improve your email marketing are doing incredibly well. I’ll make 1,001 ways and clean!

It could work. Or you could create something that is bigger without being better.

More points, more words and more images do not always mean more value for the user.

Instead, look at the content you are scratching and ask yourself:

• What questions remain unanswered?
• What instructions are difficult to follow?
• Who is not served here?

Shoot for quality, although it’s the hardest to quantify, and you’re more likely to get by.

If you have a specific competitor in mind, you can start building skyscrapers by using the Ahrefs Site Explorer to search for parts in your niche that are doing particularly well.

Build a resource

Many of the links you build to your site will be to blog posts and other informational pages. They are usually made up entirely of your own original content and are an effective way to build credible links.

But the content you create to earn links doesn’t always have to be 100% original.

Of course, I am not advocating plagiarizing or republishing content from other sites.

Instead, you can look for ways to collect research and other information relevant to your industry in a useful and user-friendly way.

Essentially your goal here is to create something of value and then give it away for free.

Find competitors’ backlinks and “steal”

I mentioned earlier that if a site links to a competitor, it will likely link to you as well.

And while we’ve looked at ways to determine which sites are linked to specific competitor domains, you can also use tools to identify additional sites that rank for your target keywords and determine how they have reached your authority level.

Start by identifying the top ten sites for each keyword you want to rank for. Do a Google search and choose the top ten domains. Investigate with tools like Ahrefs or Semrush which sites you link to.