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Netlinking

Definition

Netlinking, also known as “link building” or “external linking”, is a fundamental SEO technique for improving the visibility and popularity of a website. It consists of “building” a whole network of links, i.e. multiplying the number of external links pointing to your website to make it rise in the Google search results.

Gestion du netlinking d'un site

The value of netlinking in SEO

Netlinking: a lever for organic SEO

Netlinking is an essential SEO strategy that no website can do without if it wants to rank well in Google search results. Moreover, this strategy makes it easier for users to navigate the web.

Indeed, external links allow Google’s robots to discover new pages and websites, and therefore to make them appear in the search results. Similarly, they allow users to be redirected to new pages when reading an article or another type of web page.

Not only does this give visibility to the pages on your site, but it also makes it easier for users to navigate the internet. Users can access the answer to their question directly by simply clicking on an external link embedded in the content of an article. By providing a relevant answer to their question, you improve their user experience, and therefore the popularity of your site.

Risks of a poor netlinking strategy

Since a netlinking strategy will give your site visibility to Google robots, it is very important to adopt a good one. Indeed, a bad netlinking strategy will have negative effects on your referencing and popularity. If you do not respect Google’s guidelines, you risk receiving a penalty from Google.

In other words, a netlinking strategy is considered bad if it consists of obtaining poor quality links, i.e. links on sites with a low Trust Flow, Citation Flow, and Domain Rating, or links on sites that are not thematically coherent with yours.

In April 2012, the Google Penguin filter was created to remove from Google’s search results all sites seeking to climb up in these results using a poor netlinking strategy. So it is now important to pay attention to the quality of the links pointing to your site.

How to run a netlinking campaign?

Linkbaiting

Linkbaiting consists of capturing external links naturally, i.e. without negotiating. This is the most natural netlinking strategy, and therefore the most to be favoured. The implementation of this technique is relatively simple. All you have to do is create original, interesting and qualitative content to make other sites want to redirect their audience to your page.

Negotiating links

Link trading is a very common and effective netlinking technique. This exchange can take several forms:

  • Exchange of backlinks: You can set up partnerships with websites that are thematically close to yours. The principle is simple: you obtain a link to your site, in exchange for which you place a link on your site pointing to theirs. However, be careful to use this technique sparingly so as not to be penalised by Google.
  • Buying backlinks: There are platforms such as Rocketlinks or Ereferer, where you can buy links from sites. In exchange for a certain amount of money, a site commits to posting an article in which it will have inserted a link pointing to your site. As with link exchange, this technique is not very natural and should be used sparingly.
  • Social backlinks: This technique consists of sharing links to pages on your website, generally articles, on social networks. This gives them visibility. A little bonus: sharing quality content on your social networks can allow you to obtain natural backlinks to your site.

Whatever technique you use, make sure it looks natural to Google. To do this, pay attention to the thematic relevance to your site of the sites you link to. In addition, avoid placing several links pointing to your site in a single article. Instead, ask to insert one or two links to authority sites, such as Le Monde or Le Figaro, to make your link appear more natural. Finally, vary your link anchors: don’t just have optimised ones, but also opt for semi-optimised and de-optimised anchors.

Posting links

Another common technique is to post links to your site on forums or in the comments of certain sites. However, this method is less effective because it is often not very natural. Comments containing links are often deleted.

To maximise your chances of Google and site moderators not realising your strategy, you should make your comments as credible and natural as possible. On forums, for example, if you start a conversation between two fictitious people, make sure that they look real and that their conversation is natural.

Buying expired domain names

Buying expired domain names can bring you traffic. Once you have purchased your domain, you can either set up a 301 redirect to your site, or you can put the domain back on its feet, and link to your site to bring in link juice.

The most popular definitions

backlink
backlink dofollow
backlink nofollow
Sponsored article
Anchor link
citation flow
Link exchange
Link juice
Toxic link
Netlinking
Keyword occurrence

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