Since the late 1990s, Google and other search engines have been using the links pointing at one website directly from another, also known as backlinks or inbound links, as a factor in how they rank those websites in search results. Over the years since, the ways that links are measured and valued by search engines as a ranking signal has evolved significantly, through multiple Google updates and changes.
In this guide, we look at different types of backlinks and what organic visibility implications they can have for your website.
Jump to:
- What are backlinks and why are they important for SEO?
- What types of backlinks actually matter for SEO?
- Factors that influence the value of a backlink
- The role of Digital PR in building high-quality backlinks
- How many backlinks do I need to rank?
- Why link SEO value will always be a case of quality over quantity
What are backlinks and why are they important for SEO?
Backlinks are simply a name for links from one website to another. They are a foundational part of Google’s algorithm and are sometimes referred to as “votes of confidence” for your website.
The idea is that when a reputable website links to your content, it signals to search engines that your page is trustworthy and authoritative. Over time, earning high-quality backlinks for your website can lead to:
- Higher rankings in search engine results pages (SERPs) for relevant terms
- Increased referral traffic when users click on the link and visit your site
- Enhanced brand authority and visibility through the links and brand citations
It’s not quite as simple as it appears though, because not all backlinks offer the same SEO value.
What types of backlinks actually matter for SEO?
Understanding the various types of backlinks that exist and the ways they can benefit, or otherwise, a website’s link profile is essential to help develop an effective SEO strategy.
Editorial backlinks
What they are: These are links naturally placed within high-quality content on another website, such as blog posts, news articles, or long-form guides. They could be referencing your site as a source for information or indicating to users where they can find out more about a specific topic.
Why they matter: Editorial backlinks are among the most powerful because they are often earned rather than requested. They typically come from authoritative, relevant sources and are placed within the flow of well-written content. This ties in with Google E-E-A-T principles, which rewards credible and authoritative websites in organic search results.
Guest post backlinks
What they are: Links included in articles you contribute to other blogs or industry sites.
Why they matter: When done well, by posting genuinely insightful expert content on relevant, high-authority sites, guest post backlinks can drive both SEO value and brand exposure. However, overuse or abuse ( through PBNs or on low-quality blogs acting as ‘link farms’) will potentially damage your online visibility and credibility.
Nofollow vs. dofollow links
What they are:
A standard hyperlink from one website to another is a ‘dofollow’ link. A ‘nofollow’ link is one where the website that is linking uses a specific link attribute in the code to tell search engines not to pass any value to the site being linked to.
- Dofollow links pass SEO value (often called link equity) to your site.
- Nofollow links contain a tag that tells search engines not to pass on authority.
Why would a website use nofollow links?
Google first introduced the nofollow attribute for links in 2005 to help combat link spam and stop SEO value being attributed to every single link. This was originally aimed at things such as forums and blog comments, which were easy to manipulate to create links at scale. Google encouraged websites to use the nofollow attribute to have a measure of control about who their website ‘associated with’ online through links, as it could reflect on their own SEO authority and performance if they had a high number of dofollow outbound links, especially to low quality websites.
Even two decades after this attribute was launched, some websites still have a policy of only using nofollow links, despite things having evolved since then in the world of search. For example, Quora, Wikipedia and YouTube all automatically nofollow all outbound links.
In recent years, Google has introduced more nuance to the nofollow link attributes, implementing tags for websites to use in links specifically to paid content (rel=”sponsored”) and user-generated content like comments and forum posts (rel=”ugc”), as well as the general rel=”nofollow” value.
Why they matter: While dofollow links are generally preferred for sending a stronger ranking signal, nofollow links do still have value too. They can drive referral traffic and diversify your link profile. In recent years, search engines have also become better at interpreting nofollow links as potential trust signals too.
In an ideal world, it’s good practice for websites to aim for a natural mix of both dofollow and some nofollow links with their SEO strategy. A backlink profile made up entirely of dofollow links can appear suspicious or manipulative.
Contextual links
What they are: Links embedded within relevant content, surrounded by related text. For example, a link to an outdoor goods website on a blog that’s about camping is an appropriate and relevant context. A link to the same outdoors website within a blog about luxury hotels… not so much.
Why they matter: Google favours backlinks that are placed naturally within content as opposed to those in footers, sidebars or those that are unrelated topic-wise to the rest of the page. The context surrounding a link helps search engines understand its relevance.
Directory Links
What they are: Links from online directories, business listings, or citation sites.
Why they matter: Local SEO can benefit from high-quality directory links (such as Yelp, Yell, or Google Business Profile, as well as local/regional business listing sites), but low-quality or spammy directories offer little to no SEO benefit and can even harm rankings.
Press Release and Digital PR Links
What they are: Backlinks earned through online press releases or coverage from journalists and media outlets.
Why they matter: We’ll explore this in much more detail below, but digital PR links can be among the most valuable types of backlinks you can get.
Factors that influence the value of a backlink
Even amongst the same type of backlink, there are several more variables that can have an impact on the link equity it brings to the destination website. Some of the most important of these include:
The linking website’s authority
Search engines judge how trustworthy, useful and influential a website is, which is often referred to as ‘authority’. The factors that determine this authority are a whole separate issue, but to cut a long story short, a website with high authority linking to yours has more SEO value than a link that is identical in every way, apart from it coming from a site with low authority.
Authority scores are offered by a number of third-party SEO tools, such as Ahrefs (who use Domain Rating, or DR) and Moz (who use Domain Authority, or DA). These proprietary scores can be a useful indicator of domain strength growth over time, but are never going to be a 100% accurate reflection of how Google views your website’s authority.
As part of your SEO strategy, aiming to earn backlinks from sites with a higher or comparable DA/DR to your own is a great foundation, but a variety of different linking site authorities is usually the most natural kind of backlink profile to have.
It’s important to note that an unnatural linking profile, with a high volume of links built through spammy tactics (such as paid links or mass low-authority directory submissions, which usually appear over a short space of time), can result in an algorithmic or manual penalty from Google.
Topical relevance
Relevance is one of the most important aspects of a backlink’s value. A link from a site in your industry or niche is far more valuable than one from an unrelated sector.
For example, a fintech company’s SEO strategy will benefit more from a backlink that comes from a finance publication than from a general lifestyle blog.
Anchor text
The anchor text (another name for the clickable text used in a link) really matters. When the anchor text used for the link is relevant, descriptive of what is being linked to and keyword-rich (but not spammy), it can help boost your rankings for that keyword.
That said, it’s important not to over-optimise. Too many exact-match anchors can potentially look spammy, which can damage your site’s credibility with search engines.
Link placement
Links placed in the main body of content are generally considered to carry more SEO ‘weight’ than those in footers, sidebars, or author bios. Placement matters because links surrounded by contextually relevant content are more likely to be seen as genuinely useful.
Indexability
If the page linking to you isn’t indexed by Google, the backlink won’t be seen. Ensuring the linking page is crawlable and indexable is essential. This can mean that links behind a paywall (like subscription sites), in gated content (that someone needs to give their details/data in order to access) or links from a site or page that is no-indexed, doesn’t have SEO value.
The role of Digital PR in building high-quality backlinks
One of the most effective and sustainable ways to earn high-quality backlinks is through a carefully planned digital PR strategy.
Why Digital PR works for SEO
- It earns editorial links from high-authority, relevant media outlets
- It helps position your brand as a thought leader on relevant topics
- It creates natural links from trusted sources
- It often results in contextual, dofollow links
Examples of successful digital PR activities to earn links can include:
- Publishing unique research, statistical data or surveys
- Responding to journalist queries and newsjacking
- Running creative, data-led campaigns that earn media attention
How many backlinks do I need to rank?
The honest answer is a bit of an SEO meme: it depends.
There’s no universal number of backlinks to your website required to rank for a keyword. The answer varies based on:
- The competition level of the keyword
- The strength of your competitors’ backlink profiles
- The authority and relevance of the links you earn
- The quality of your content and on-page optimisation
In some niches, a few high-authority, relevant backlinks can help to push you to page one for a specific search term. In others, you may need hundreds of great links just to compete. That’s why understanding the types of backlinks that matter, and building the right ones in the right ways, is far more important than chasing a magic number.
A great place to start strategically is to perform a competitive backlink analysis to benchmark your website against top-ranking competitors for pages and keywords that you want to rank for.
Why link SEO value will always be a case of quality over quantity
All backlinks are absolutely NOT equal.
In order to get the best possible SEO return from link building activity, it’s a matter of earning the right types of backlinks, rather than ‘any links will do’. Prioritise links that come from relevant, high-authority sources, and try to specify specific elements like anchor text and link placement when possible. Of course, balance is always important, and you only have so much control over how other websites implement a link to yours, but asking politely for what you want is often effective.
Long-term SEO success usually requires incorporating digital PR into your strategy, alongside other activities to build quality links. It’s one of the most powerful tools we have for building natural, high-quality links that stand the test of time.
If you want some help with link building, digital PR or any other element of your SEO strategy, we’d love to chat! Get in touch using the form below.
