Backlinks, also known as Inbound Links, are the links that are directed to your website. It plays a very important role in Search Engine Optimization. A number of backlinks a website has is a good indicator of its popularity or its importance with search engines. Search engines like Google gives more importance to the websites that have quality backlinks and considers those websites more relevant in a search query.
It is not important just to have inbound links, the links have to be quality links. When inbound links come from other sites, and those site have content related to your website then the search engines consider those links more relevant to your website. If your site is about computer accessories than linking to a site about Pet food is not relevant and therefore it is not a quality link.
Larry Page, one of Google’s founders, invented PageRank, through which Google used to monitor the quality of the page based on the number of links pointing to it. This invention was then used as a part of overall ranking algorithm and became a strong signal as it is an amazing way to understand the quality of the pages. There was a time when even low-quality backlinks helped to rank a site. But ever since Google has launched its Penguin Algorithm, the system of backlinks have changed.
Now let’s take a look at why backlinks play a significant role in SEO:
- Improves organic ranking: "Backlinks are important for getting better search engine rankings. If any content of your website is getting organic links from the other sites, then that content would naturally rank higher with search engines."
- Faster Indexing:" With the help of backlinks, search engine bots discover links to your website and crawls your site effectively. Backlinks are very useful for a new website as they help in faster discovery and indexing of your website."
- Referral Traffic: "The most important benefit of backlink is to get referral traffic. Referral traffic is more targeted and a has low bounce rate."
There are numerous tools available to keep track of the backlinks to your website. As you know that it is not important to have inbound links, but it is extremely important to have quality inbound links. This tools help to find the websites related to you that would add you as a link to their site.
Anchor text is also important to generate quality backlinks to your website. When a link incorporates a keyword into the text of the hyperlink, it becomes an Anchor text. Instead of putting “Click Here”, input the words that are related to your website. If an anchor text is not utilized properly on the website that is linking you, you should request that website to change the anchor text to something that uses relevant keywords. This will help boost your quality backlinks score.
Backlinks should be given priority in SEO as they are very important. Just keep in mind to do it ethically, or it would do more harm than good to your site.