Broken link building is an often overlooked yet highly effective SEO strategy for building a strong backlink profile. This technique can improve your search engine ranking and help you build valuable relationships within your niche, so it is a smart strategy for improving your online presence. Essentially, broken link building is the process of finding broken links on an external website and suggesting your own as a replacement. This post will take you through the key steps involved in this strategy.
Finding Broken Links
Obviously, the first step involves finding broken links. These are any links that lead to a non-existent page, often resulting in a 404 error. Fortunately, you do not have to go through the painstaking process of clicking on every link yourself! You can use tools like Check My Links and SEMrush to scan websites for broken links. You want to identify high-authority sites from your niche and scan these for broken links, as these will give you the best SEO boost.
Analyse The Context
Once you have a list of broken links, you need to analyse the context. Obviously, not every broken link will fit seamlessly with your content, so you want to identify the broken links that would be a good fit for the content you have to offer from your link.
Repurpose Or Create New Content
Following this, you need to ensure that any link you offer is relevant and high-quality. This could mean repurposing existing content to suit the broken link better. In cases where you have a broken link from an authoritative source but no relevant content, you could create something new specifically to replace this link. Just make sure that the content is high-quality and valuable for the external site.
Create An Outreach Message
Next, you need to contact the webmaster and persuade them to replace the broken link with your own. You need to personalise each email, but make sure that it is concise while explaining how your content would be a valuable replacement. Of course, not all webmasters are the same, so some might be responsive and replace the link straight away, while others might not respond. If you have a webmaster who does not respond after a week or so, send a polite follow-up message.
Keep Track
Finally, it is important to have a system in place so that you can keep track of your broken link-building efforts. This could involve creating a spreadsheet containing a list of all the broken links you have found and what steps you have taken. You can then analyse your success rate and make adjustments to your approach if required.
These are the main steps involved in broken link building. This can be a highly effective SEO strategy that helps you build a strong backlink profile and boost your online presence. You might be surprised at how many broken links are out there, so this is a smart strategy to use when looking to improve your online visibility.
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