Traffic is revenue in the digital world. There are many ways in which one can bring traffic to a website.
- Brand Awareness and Brand Visibility – followed by companies like Tesla, Uber.
- Providing Sponsorships – Nike, Pirelli, etc.
- Ad campaigns – Housing.com, FMCG companies, etc.
- Organic Traffic – By providing the necessary solution or content to people.
Out of all these ways, driving organic search traffic is perhaps the easiest way in which there is a level playing field for companies of all sizes. In order to build a huge brand awareness or to provide hefty sponsorships to events, companies need to pump in millions of dollars into research or into sponsorships. In order to run a consistent ad campaign, organizations should have deep pockets and a large marketing budget. In the case of driving organic traffic, SEO gives the best result and this is where all companies have the level playing field.
Backlinks Play an Important Role in Ranking Your Websites
When it comes to SEO, all organizations can create a good page with a killer content and proper page structure. However, what makes the difference between a good website and a great website is the number of backlinks that website has. It shows how reliable and trustworthy a website is. Generally when a website links to a webpage, it gives the signal that the content on the web page is trustworthy. However, there are different types of backlinks and not all backlinks have the same weightage when search engines rank the webpages for a particular query. It is easier to create a backlink for your website and the Backlinks cost is not huge when compared to the sponsorships or ad campaigns.
Creating a Good Backlink is Not an Easy Task
First things first. Even when you have good content on your website, not all websites would want to link to you. By default your competitors won’t be interested in giving a link to your website. Also industry leaders wouldn’t want to link to an upcoming and small website. So, only websites that are comparable to your website will be interested in linking to your website. However, for ranking of your websites, you need to get backlinks from high quality sites that have better content. This translates to a high Backlinks cost.
You need to choose the right websites that have topical relevance to your domain. Once you select a few websites, you should make the first contact with these site admins and ask if they would be interested in linking to your website. Once you receive the responses from these admins, you need to finalize the potential websites that would give you the most boost in your rankings. All these efforts take time and money and hence their backlinks cost a little higher than you think.
Google Doesn’t Take All Backlinks into Account
Even if you have successfully created a backlink to your website from a leading website, Google need not consider it while ranking your website. This happens when the high quality website links to many websites such as yours. So, you need to be patient and keep creating quality backlinks from prominent websites in your industry. This way, there is a higher chance that your website gets the authority in your topic and be considered for the top rankings.
Also not all links are considered with the same weightage. When the anchor text or the keyword to which your website is linked does not convey the industry or keyword that you are trying to rank, then it will give mixed signals to the search engines. So, creating a successful backlink is not a simple task but one that could last weeks if not months.
Indexing Happens at a Slow Pace
Another important factor that you need to consider before fixing the budget for building backlinks is that Google need not index the sites that you build links from. In case of directory websites and other websites where you can post ads, Google will simply stop indexing their websites as these are filled with paid content. So, the right approach is to find active blogging sites or industry standard websites that are open to link to your site. This is why most SEOs quote the cost of backlinks as higher than others. When you need a high quality backlink that could boost your website traffic, you need to pay a premium and then wait for a few weeks to complete the process.
You Need to Factor in the Loss of Links While Building New Backlinks
The Internet and the maze of websites is a dynamic world where the changes happen faster than you can even imagine. While new websites sprout every single minute, there are also many websites that go without a trace in the digital realm. So, when you have acquired a new backlink in the past, it is important to search for the same backlink and ensure that these links stay connected. Otherwise your website will keep getting new links but the old links will soon go missing giving you an overall lower score in the internal ranking system of these search engines.
As there is a continuous change in the number of reliable backlinks, there is a need to consider link building as a continuous and ongoing process. Just as we need to nourish and exercise our body regularly, we need to build new links and fix broken links on a continual basis.
As a search engine optimization expert, SEO professionals will prescribe this to you. If you are someone who thinks that you can build multiple links once and then forget about SEO, then it will not give you the results that you seek. The cost of backlinks is significantly higher than running ad campaigns. However, over the period of time, the returns that you receive by building quality backlinks is much higher.
So, stop worrying about the initial costs that are associated with SEO campaigns. Invest in your website and drive traffic seamless to your money-making pages.