5 Best Link Building Strategies for eCommerce Stores in 2020

Link Building Strategies

TechsPlace | Why should you care about link building strategies?

From the very beginning of the Internet, backlinks have been one of the pillars of organic rankings. Since then, search engines have evolved, but the importance of backlinks in SEO has remained unshaken.

A solid link building strategy is particularly important and challenging for e-commerce sites. As a blogger, you’re often marketing a free, unique, and mostly informational content. When it comes to eCommerce, you compete against other stores that often sell the same products for almost the same price.

While link building is challenging, getting ranked by search engines is more important than ever. Therefore, a properly optimized linking strategy is a must. Solid backlink acquisition plan will allow you to generate valuable long-term organic traffic that you can further analyze and optimize for conversions on your website.

Here are some of the best link building strategies for eCommerce stores in 2020. Let’s dive right in.

1. Develop Online Tools

Let’s face it. Online tools and calculators have the potential to attract hundreds if not thousands of links.

To illustrate, let’s look at the backlink profile for CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer:

headline analyzer backlinks - link building strategies

Source: Ahrefs

That kind of amount of backlinks was not built overnight, but it shows you the potential of online tools when they’re created and marketed in the right way.

That being said, it’s worth noting that the barrier to entry might be slightly higher with this type of content. Creating bespoke tools requires either skills or a decent budget to hire a developer to do that for you. On the other hand, you should treat that as an investment with a handsome return in the form of backlinks and a chance to rank higher for keywords that you care about.

Here are some other examples of great online tools:

Shopify shipping calculator

Source: Shopify

2. Run an Affiliate Program

It’s no coincidence that some of the most successful brands run some of the highest paying affiliate programs.

The concept is simple and similar to commissioned sales. With affiliate marketing, brands and businesses select influencers in a particular niche to promote services or products by using a unique affiliate link.

Thus, creating an affiliate program for your business is a fantastic way to build a rich link profile in no time. While most of the acquired links will be less desirable, no-follow links, the significant boost in traffic and brand recognition will be worth the effort.

Besides SEO benefits, affiliate link building provides businesses a cost-effective opportunity to get additional sales through blog posts and user-generated content. Profits made on affiliate sales are shared with influencers based on the number of links clicked or purchases made.

3. Work with an Industry Blogger

A method worth noting is the link acquisition via outreach to industry bloggers. By reaching an influential publisher with a group of trusted fans, you can significantly increase the exposure of your brand and buzz around your products.

Every year, a considerable amount of capital is invested in various types of marketing. However, year by year, referral by a trusted individual is still the most effective marketing strategy. According to Nielsen, 92% of people trust recommendations made by people they know, and as a result, 77% are more likely to spend money on a given product.

This strategy will require finding industry bloggers and establishing a long-term, formal relationship with them.

Usually, the more relationships, the better; however, it’s always worth looking at the engagement by skimming through the comment section on the particular blog. Highly influential niche bloggers will likely have a much easier time convincing their readers to your product than bloggers with a broader but less engaged audience.

4. Conduct Interviews with Industry Experts

Interviews with outstanding industry specialists have always been and are a great way to get new and valuable links. Many site owners are very aware of that and spend a considerable amount of time and resources interviewing industry experts.

The same applies to brands with video presence on platforms such as YouTube. Even one high-quality backlink from a high authority site can make a significant difference and give your organic traffic a massive boost that your brand deserves.

A great idea might be to interview some specialists who have their own domains and social media accounts. After publishing the interview, it is worth asking them to share the interview content across all their channels, which will help with getting the ball rolling.

5. Build a Blog

Our list of link building strategies wouldn’t be complete if it didn’t mention building a blog. While writing just a few articles here and there won’t get you far, a well-maintained blog can be a powerful backlink generator. High-quality written content is usually perceived as a backlink magnet, and eCommerce blogs are no different.

Additionally, the benefits of building a company blog go way beyond SEO. Leading SaaS startups often use blogs to build communities and transform keen readers into customers, with backlinks being often a very welcomed byproduct.

One such example comes from Webflow.

webflow blog

Source: Webflow

Covered content includes website UX, no-code website design, and website building guides.

It’s very much a niche blog with a highly targeted audience and hyper-relevant content. That easily explains why the blog got thousands of backlinks.

ahrefs backlinks - webflow blog

 

Source: Ahrefs

Link Building Strategies for eCommerce Stores: Key Takeaways

Obtaining backlinks remains the leading strategy for increasing organic traffic to your eCommerce store. However, link building doesn’t end with a backlink to your site. Its power increases with a proper internal linking structure and correct distribution of link juice across related pages. To make every link count, you should also stay up to date with frequent search engine algorithm updates and adjust your strategies accordingly.

Moreover, remember that links are not there forever. As soon as your content is outdated, the link will be pointed to fresher and more relevant content. Therefore the surest way to reach the top is to regularly update your content to maintain a portfolio of high-quality backlinks.