This is our third and final installment in our backlinks blog series! Previously we’ve provided a bit of background on what backlinks are and some common misconceptions about them. In this post we’ll cover some very basic “Dos and Don’ts” of backlinking to help your dealership better approach its backlink strategy or otherwise referred to as “link building.”

So without further ado, here are our top tips and simple-to-follow rules for link building.

Dos

• Deliver Valuable Content: A great place to start providing valuable content is on your own website! Make sure your website contains robust and detailed information whether it’s on your FAQ page, or even some maintenance tips on a resources page. If another source shares content directly from your pages, this helps build your website’s credibility. Another way is by contributing valuable content to other websites. This could be in the form of guest blogs, written articles for industry publications or listings on relevant and credible directories. Contributing content that’s necessary for the other website’s audience will build your credibility and chances of others sharing the content further. Therefore, creating more backlinks for your website.

• Ask for Backlinks: Outside of the realm covered above, it’s also a good idea to directly ask relevant businesses to include a link to your website on theirs where applicable. The best place we suggest starting is with your customer base. Do they have a website? Ask if they’d consider listing your dealership as a preferred partner. You can even offer to list their testimonial of your business on your own website and link to their website to create a backlink to them. Making it a mutually beneficial situation increases your chances of success!

• Look Into Competitor Backlinks: Don’t be shy about digging into some of your competitors backlinks to get an idea of what strategy they may be using and places you should also have a presence in. You can use online resources like MonitorBacklinks.com, SmallSEOTools.com, or this list of other useful backlink checker tools.

Don’ts

• Purchase Backlinks: This is a big no no and will be a huge red flag for Google. It goes against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines and therefore Google will take manual action against your website. In other words, Google will rank your website lower in their search results if they catch you. Despite some companies saying their link purchasing services are undetectable, it’s pretty clear when you’ve bought them because there will be a sudden uptick in websites that have links directing to yours. Google will catch on due to the sudden uptick in website traffic.

• Target Irrelevant Backlink Sources: Make sure that the websites you’re targeting for backlinks are relevant to your industry. One of the worst things you can do is secure backlinks on irrelevant websites, like a doctors directory, or other websites that have no relation to your dealership. This could potentially be flagged as “spammy” backlinks, which won’t reflect positively for your website. Additionally, the more relevant backlink sources you have, the more quality visitors you’re more likely to convert.

• Focus Solely on Text Backlinks: Hyperlinked words as backlinks aren’t your only option, even though they’re the most commonly used. Other assets, like images and video can also be appropriately used to create a backlink. For example, an image can link to your website, so make sure if other websites are using your images, that you ask them to link it to your website for credit. The image can also be tagged with the appropriate alt tags so that it adds some extra SEO boost as well.

If you’re questioning your link building strategy or have questions about how backlinking works in general, don’t hesitate to reach out! You can connect with our Search Team Supervisor, Diana Richardson, at diana.richardson@traderinteractive.com.