Link building is used in the field of SEO and refers to any actions which are taken with the goal of increasing the number or quality of inbound links to a given webpage. Simply put, link building involves building relevant hyperlinks from various external websites to another website.
Link building can be a versatile way of creating powerful offsite signals to Google and other search engines, and as a result bolstering the rankings of a website across a number of target pages. It can also help to increase brand awareness and is a recognised marketing tactic in this respect. Used well, link building can help to build and sustain relationships with other organisations or professionals in the same industry, and increase traffic to the website which can be converted into sales.
Link building almost always plays an essential role in any SEO strategy, as increasing the volume or quality of inbound links can improve a webpage’s ranking under search engine criteria.
Today’s search engines use sophisticated algorithms which analyse the quality of links connecting a website or webpage to other websites, as well as the anchor text and content on the linking page, which they use as a factor in determining rankings. Links must therefore be both relevant and from respected authoritative sites in order to be seen as strong ranking signals, which helps to mitigate against the risk of a website gaining a high ranking by spamming search engines with high volumes of inappropriate, poor quality or automated links, all of which represent techniques of the past.