17 Proven Link Building Strategies That Work

17 Proven Link Building Strategies That Work (With Outreach Templates)

Building high-quality backlinks is essential for boosting your website’s authority and improving search engine rankings. In fact, in 2024, 95% of businesses are prioritizing link building, up from 85.3% in 2023.

To ensure your site rises in the rankings and earns valuable organic traffic, you need an effective link-building strategy. In this guide, we’ll cover 17 proven link-building strategies you can implement, whether you prefer organic methods or manual outreach. We’ve also included outreach templates to make your efforts easier and more successful!

link building strategies 
link nuilding

1. Boost Backlinks with Social Media Engagement

Social media isn’t just for boosting brand awareness—it can also be a powerful tool for link building. By engaging with influencers, reporters, and bloggers in your niche, you can foster relationships that may lead to backlinks.

Tips for Social Media Link Building:

  • Use Hashtags Effectively: Use relevant hashtags so journalists and influencers can find your content.
  • Monitor PR Requests: Keep an eye on hashtags like #journorequest to find linking opportunities.
  • Engage with Key Industry Figures: Regularly interact with bloggers and influencers to increase your visibility.

2. Use Broken Link Building to Secure Valuable Backlinks

Broken link building (BLB) is an effective and straightforward strategy. It involves finding dead links on websites and offering your relevant content as a replacement.

How to Find Broken Links:

  • Use search modifiers like inurl:resources or inurl:links alongside your keywords to locate pages with broken links.
  • Offer your content as a better, updated alternative to replace the dead link.

Pro Tip: Personalize your outreach emails by referencing the broken link and explaining how your content adds value.

3. Spy on Competitor Backlinks for New Opportunities

A little “competitive research” can go a long way in link building. By examining your competitors’ backlinks, you can uncover sites that are already linking to similar content—and potentially reach out to them to link to your own.

What to Look For:

  • Use tools like Ahrefs to find your competitors’ top-performing pages and backlinks.
  • Analyze their most popular content and backlink sources, then target those same sites with your outreach.

4. Build Your Brand’s Online Visibility for Link Success

One of the most effective ways to attract links is by increasing your online visibility. By focusing on off-page SEO, you can establish your brand across multiple platforms.

Visibility-Boosting Strategies:

  • Ensure your business information is accurate on directories and platforms like Google My Business.
  • Use local SEO tactics to attract links from local businesses and publications.

5. Keep Track of Your Backlinks for Strategic Growth

Monitoring your backlinks regularly ensures that your link profile remains strong and relevant. This allows you to see who is linking to you and where you may have additional opportunities for outreach.

Why Link Relevancy Matters:

Google values relevant backlinks more than general high-authority ones. Ensure that the sites linking to you are in your niche, as this signals to Google that you’re a trusted source in your industry.

6. Tap Into Forums for Backlink Opportunities

Forums like Reddit, Quora, and Facebook Groups are valuable spaces to share your content and generate backlinks. When used correctly, forums can help you build a reputation and earn quality links.

How to Use Forums for Link Building:

  • Always contribute meaningfully to conversations.
  • Answer questions, offer advice, and provide valuable content before sharing your links.
  • Follow forum rules to avoid being flagged as spam.

7. Reclaim Lost Links with Simple Outreach

Link reclamation involves reclaiming lost backlinks or getting credit for unlinked mentions. This strategy is especially useful if your brand or content is mentioned on another website but without a link.

How to Reclaim Links:

  • Use tools to find mentions of your brand that aren’t linked.
  • Reach out politely and request that the mention be updated with a backlink.

8. Build Authority with Guest Blogging

Guest blogging is one of the most well-known link-building tactics and still highly effective when done right. By writing guest posts for authoritative websites, you can build backlinks to your own site.

Guest Blogging Tips:

  • Focus on sites that share relevant content and have a strong readership.
  • Craft high-quality, educational guest posts to provide value, not just to earn links.
  • Use unique, non-duplicate content when guest posting to avoid penalties.

guest blog 
link building with guest blog

9. Generate Passive Links with Evergreen Content

Instead of manually building every link, focus on creating evergreen content that naturally attracts backlinks over time. Content that provides value, like comprehensive guides or how-tos, often gets linked to without any outreach.

How to Spot Passive Link Opportunities:

  • Use tools like Ahrefs to find content that has high traffic and a steady influx of links.
  • Create similar types of content that will naturally attract backlinks over time.

10. Use Infographics to Secure More Backlinks

Infographics are highly shareable and can be an excellent addition to your content strategy. When done right, they can attract valuable backlinks from blogs and websites.

Outreach Tip for Infographics:

Offer a preview of the infographic in your outreach emails, highlighting its relevance to the recipient’s audience. Make sure to include a link back to your site as a credit.

11. Target Resource Pages for Easy Link Wins

Resource pages are often overlooked but can be a goldmine for backlinks. Websites with resource pages are actively looking for high-quality content to link to.

How to Find Resource Pages:

  • Use search modifiers like intitle:resources or intitle:helpful-links with your keywords to find sites that might link to your content.
  • Offer your content as a helpful addition to their resource page.

12. Create Roundup Posts to Maximize Linkability

Roundup posts are a fantastic way to gather insights from multiple sources and earn backlinks. These posts are shareable and often cited by other websites.

How to Maximize Roundup Posts:

  • Feature insights from industry leaders or top blogs.
  • Make sure your content is high-quality and valuable to encourage backlinks.

13. Engage in Newsjacking for Fast Links

Newsjacking involves taking advantage of current events to gain attention for your content. If you can provide a timely, unique angle on a trending topic, you may attract backlinks from news outlets and blogs.

Pro Tip:

Stay on top of industry trends and news stories, and be ready to publish relevant content quickly.

14. Conduct Surveys for Data-Driven Links

Publishing survey results is a great way to attract backlinks. Data-driven content is highly valuable and often cited by other content creators and journalists.

How to Use Surveys for Links:

  • Conduct surveys within your niche and share the results in an in-depth post.
  • Reach out to relevant websites to share your findings, offering them a linkable resource.

15. Collaborate with Thought Leaders for Authoritative Links

Partnering with industry thought leaders is a great way to build links. Joint content, interviews, or expert roundups can help expose your content to a broader audience while earning valuable backlinks.

Collaboration Ideas:

  • Co-author blog posts.
  • Conduct interviews or host webinars with experts in your industry.

16. Publish Original Data Studies to Attract High-Authority Backlinks

Unique research and data studies are incredibly valuable in the SEO world. If you publish new data, other websites will often cite your research and link back to your original post.

How to Maximize Data Studies:

Make your data visually appealing and easy to digest by including charts, graphs, or infographics.

17. Conduct City-Specific Studies for Local Links

City-specific content can attract backlinks from local businesses, publications, and bloggers. Localized studies, such as rankings or reports, provide value to a specific community and can lead to many backlinks.


With these 17 proven link-building strategies, you’re well-equipped to grow your backlink profile, boost your SEO, and improve your website’s authority. Start implementing these techniques today, and watch as your rankings and traffic improve!

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