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How To Get First 100 Backlinks for Your SaaS Website

Links are the currency of the web! All links are not created equal. Whether you’re a B2B or B2C SaaS marketer, you need the right links to improve your performance in the search engines.

Search engines have the best source of traffic.

According to Outbrain, “search is the #1 driver of traffic to content sites, beating social media by more than 300%.”

If you’re struggling to rank high in Google, it could be possible that your web pages lack valuable links.

Marketers usually face two common challenges:

There are several SEO tactics you can use today to drive targeted traffic to your site. Among these tactics, 59% of organizations have built inbound links and 93% of them have done the keyword research.

Links are important!

The word “internet” means interconnected computers. In other words, it means computer networks that connect together.

This is link building at its best!

You may think that links are losing its value, however, Matt Cutts, the head of webspam at Google said that excluding links from Google’s algorithm would make search results worse.

Yes, it may not be fair, but Google can’t do without links.

But the real challenge is how to get the right type of links that would impact your search engine rankings and organic search traffic?

If that’s been your major concern, you’ve come to the right place.

I want to quickly show you the 5 simple and effective ways to get your first 100 quality links.

Use Advanced Guest Blogging

How much content do you produce for your own blog and other authority blogs?

Do you know that 39% of marketers are planning to invest heavily in content marketing?

With guest blogging, your content investment will never be a waste. It’s the best way to get a significant ROI.

Guest blogging is a great way to build authority and get published on trusted blogs in your industry.

46% of site owners find it easier to generate links through guest blogging.

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Alex Turnbull, founder of GrooveHq generated over 10,000 email subscribers and visitors to his website by publishing guest posts on Buffer and some other authority blogs.

Here’s the chart:

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Oli Gardner got his guest post published on Moz and got over 200,000 people to download his PDF landing page guide. Guest blogging has proven to be a powerful growth driver for digital marketers.

Glen Allsop of ViperChill used advanced guest blogging to rank on the first page of Google for the keyword plugin development“. At the time, his ultimate link building, traffic generation, and branding technique was guest blogging.

However, you have to know that content marketing is constantly evolving, and so is guest blogging. A lot of software tools are available. These tools can change how you approach SEO, but the rule is still the same – quality content rules.

A research study by Nielsen and AOL in 2013 found that 27 million pieces of content are shared daily.

To ensure that your guest post gets the right attention, you should conduct proper research on the best blogs to contribute.

Here are simple steps to find out:

Step One

Visit Google.com – Plug your main keyword, in this case: “headline writing strategies” or headline idea “how to write powerful headlines” that you’d like to write about into the search box.

Search for it.

See the result screenshot:

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You’ll notice that the web pages in the screenshot above are from authority and trusted blogs. Advanced guest blogging is all about targeting top blogs. Trusted blogs that are already dominating the search engine top pages.

Step Two

Study the popular posts – click on one of the web pages that you found in Google for your main keyword.

When you get to the blog, look at the ‘popular posts,’ because you’ll need to leverage one of them in the next step.

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Try to find out patterns for what is popular. This will help you while writing your posts.

Apart from studying the popular posts, another strategy that you can use is to improve on one of the posts that got the least social shares or comments.

Step Three

Upgrade the posts – since you’ve identified the popular posts on the blog, it’s time to craft compelling headlines, but this time you’ll go the extra mile.

Here’s one of the popular headlines on HubSpot’s blog:

  • 7 Quick Ways To Free Up More Time In Your Day

Now let’s craft a better headline than the above:

  • 9 Quick and Smart Steps To Free Up More Time In Your Day
  • 13 Quick Ways To Write Better Content If You’re A Busy Blogger

Guess what?

With any of these 2 compelling headlines, your chances of getting a “YES” from HubSpot’s editor is very high.

In your pitch, let the editor know that you want to expand on one of their posts (Share the post URL).

That’s exactly what authority blogs are looking for.

Remember that top blogs usually belong to a larger network. These networks could include PR sites, public directories, and huge social media connections.

When you get one of your articles published there, you may end up getting over 5,000 visitors to your blog in the first week, and generate powerful 20 – 100 quality links as well.

In summary, here are the simple ways you can upgrade a popular post or make a less popular post gain more traction through your advanced guest blogging technique:

  • Get into details. If the popular post is 1000-word; when you write your own guest post on a similar topic or headline idea, make sure that yours is 2000+ words.
  • Write practicable. In other words, make it easy for readers to apply your tips.
  • Improve visual assets. You have to recognize that the human brain processes visual information (e.g. images, screenshots, infographics, videos) 60,000 faster than plain text. So make sure that your visuals are clear, relevant and well positioned.
  • Change outdated advice and replace with current one.

Trust me, if you follow the advanced guest blogging technique as laid out in this article, no blogger or editor will reject your guest post idea based on quality.

Of course, you can link to your web pages from within the article, not just only at the author profile or bio.

Broken link building is one of the most reliable techniques for building high-quality links. Several Google algorithm updates such as Panda, Penguin and Hummingbird paved way for legit link building best practices.

Broken link simply means a link that no longer works.

A dead link.

A useless link that appears on a resource page, a list post or other important web pages.

There are bloggers and site owners who don’t know they have broken links to fix.

According to SiteImprove, 32.8% of all scanned web pages have broken links.

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If you can find such dead links and let the site owner know about it, you can generate natural links because that broken link can be replaced with yours.

Here are simple steps to find a broken link:

Step one

Go to Google and find a resource web page. This is usually a page on a site that linked out to 10, 20, 30 or even 100 relevant web pages.

The truth is that some of these links may be broken already as the domain name no longer exist or the page is taken down.

You can find marketing resource pages by searching with this search string:

resources link + marketing

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Go ahead, click on the highlighted link to visit the web page. The moment you do that, move on to step 2.

Step Two

Use a broken link checker. Plug the resource URL into the search box.

Click “find broken links” button:

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Once you find a broken link, you should notify the blogger or site owner.

They’ll be more than willing to replace the broken link with yours.

I’ve done this on so many occasions and it works.

If you want to find broken links easily, a simple resource to help you is Wikipedia. When an editor finds a dead link, they don’t remove it. Instead, they will add a note next to it that says ‘dead link.’

Here’s an example:

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You could use this search string to find places with dead links on Wikipedia related to your keyword.

site:wikipedia.org [keyword] + “dead link”

Start visiting the results and see the links that are dead. Create another resource that is similar or better from it. Then edit the article and add a link to your post.

But that’s only one link.

You could also try to find out the people who linked to that specific page and contact them about the dead link.

They’ll be happy to link to your post if it’s useful.

Expert Roundup Article

Ego-baits!

Bloggers and digital marketers are always looking for a name drop, brand name mention, retweet, or an interview.

You could ask a simple question to a select group of experts in your industry (e.g. email marketing) and use their feedback (answers) to create a top-notch blog post.

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These posts are great for generating traffic because people find these posts valuable, and the majority of the experts you interviewed will be happy to share the post.

Here’s how you could apply it:

  • Contact at least 20 experts in your industry. The more the better.
  • Ask them a simple question and feedback. If you’re in the search engine marketing industry, you could ask 20 PPC experts this simple question, “How do you write Google Ad headlines?”
  • Compile the answers you got into a post and link back to their blog pages or products. When the post is live, send the link to them and ask them to share it. The majority of them will.

Brian Lang of Small Business Ideas created a roundup post about content promotion. He asked 40 experts to share 1 tip they use on a regular basis to generate more traffic.

See how he linked to the experts:

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The roundup post generated 180 links, over 2.2k tweets, and 400+ likes.

It was Buzzsumo’s most shared post for the week.

Roundup posts are great to help you increase your authority, and funnel valuable and natural links to your web page.

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If your niche is blogging, here are some headline ideas for your expert roundup post:

  • 25 Blogging Experts Reveal How They Write 2000-Word Posts
  • 30 Young Bloggers Under 30 Share Their MOney Making Secrets
  • 50 Expert Bloggers Who Make 6-Figures Doing What They Love

Leverage Viral Posts Using The 3Es (Excite, Entertain, Educate)

Getting links is a lot easier when your post goes viral.

But it’s a 50/50 thing.

Most of the successful content went viral even though the author didn’t plan for it beforehand.

Viral posts are already successful. There is nothing more to add to it. Right?

Wrong!

If you find a post or article that got thousands of social shares and likes, you can make it a lot better using the 3Es:

  • Excite
  • Entertain
  • Educate

The idea is very simple.

Find a post that is proven to be popular, expand on it leveraging the 3Es (excite, entertain, educate), and then email all who shared & linked to the initial viral post.

Here is a more detailed guide.

Step One

Dig Buzzsumo.com for viral posts. Find a post that has generated at least 500 social shares. On the homepage, type in your main keyword into the search box.

Click the “Go” tab:

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Step Two

Expand on the viral post. Model the viral headline and craft yours. Make your headline better and you’ll persuade the right people to link to you.

For example, the viral headline above is from Moz.

It reads:

  • The Missing Link Building Tip For Local SEO

Now let’s write some attention-grabbing headlines while staying focused on the theme above:

  • 15 Missing Link Building Tips For Local SEO
  • The Link Building Guide You’ve Missed
  • Local SEO Link Building Tips You Should Trust

Step Three

Use the 3Es.

Make your article more exciting, more entertaining and educate your readers with interactive modules such as puzzles, games, survey, Q&As, and more.

Step Four

Reach out.

Send the published link to all the people who shared or liked the initial viral post.

You can find people who tweeted it using Topsy. You can also use Ahrefs Site Explorer to find people who linked to the post.

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Brian Dean used this technique to promote his popular article, “Google’s ranking factors.” He generated 17 links just by emailing site owners and offering value on his post, which was better than what’s out there.

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Give Away a Valuable Swipe File

People love to link to resources that will save their reader’s time.

A simple technique you can apply is to create a resource or swipe file and share it for free with your readers.

A swipe file is like a ready-made document containing your best tools, strategies, secrets, and data.

Ryan Deiss gave away a swipe file, he got lots of authority links and even generated over 45,000 visitors to his landing page from pay per click advertising.

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For example, you could compile a list of long-tail keywords that are easier to rank for and give it away as a single file. When people get it, they’ll gladly share it with others to save their time.

You’ll get high-quality links that way because you’re offering something great they can’t resist.

They’ll share it with others in their blog posts, guest posts and social media sharing which will result with links to your website.

Conclusion

With the right links, you’ll naturally improve your search rankings and get a slice of the rewards online.

According to comScore, “on average, we conduct 12 billion searches per month in the United States.” And not just in the U.S., but all over the world.

These searches are for content in different formats (articles, infographics, videos, podcasts, ebooks, and more).

In today’s SEO world, you have to understand the importance of user experience.

It’s more important than getting thousands of links to a site that doesn’t care about the user.

If you can take these 5 strategies and implement them, you would be on your way to your first 100 quality links in no time.

Stay consistent.

You may not see an overnight improvement on your search rankings and traffic, but no matter how long it takes – you’ll dominate the top 10 results pages for your target long-tail key phrases, in the near future.

Do you have any link building strategy that works better than the ones mentioned here?

Davor Bomeštar

Hey you, I’m Davor - the founder & CEO of Fortis Agency - an SEO & content marketing agency for B2B SaaS. I am a SaaS marketer with 16 years of experience in SEO. I am also a 3 times agency owner, and I’ve helped 50+ companies with their SEO & content strategies. So, if you're a B2B SaaS business struggling with an underperforming blog and you want to turn it into a top revenue channel, don't hesitate to reach out!

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