How B2B Businesses Can Develop Content for Link Building

Improving your organic search presence isn’t for the faint of heart. Ranking in top search results is getting harder, and 77% of marketers say it could take up to 6 months to see results.

What does this mean for you? B2B marketers need to be savvier in developing a link building and content developing strategy.

Search engines cater to users, not your website. With evolving algorithms and new ranking guidelines, search engines work to serve quality content that matches the queries of their users. As far as they are concerned, earning a high volume of valuable links from external websites suggests your content is credible and relevant for the user.

If you’re focusing on search engine optimization (SEO), earning links through content marketing is the best way to create a solid link profile for your domain.

However, content marketing can mean a myriad of things for B2B companies. Guest blogging? User-driven data? Where are you supposed to start? Fortunately, there are so many ways you can approach content for link building to drive qualified traffic to your website.

Let’s look at how you can pair content marketing and link building to create more optimized and strategic marketing campaigns for your B2B.

Quick Takeaways:

• Link building sends trust signals from your website to the search engine so you’re able to rank higher in result pages.

• By developing relevant and high-quality content, you’re more likely to earn links through other websites that view you as credible.
• It’s recommended to create different content formats—case studies, whitepapers, surveys, etc.—to better understand what your industry prefers to consume.

What is Link Building?

Link building is the process of earning authoritative hyperlinks from other websites to your content. Each link you acquire endorses your website and signals search engines that your website is trustworthy. Once a search engine crawls your website and indexes the link, they will determine if your webpage offers enough valuable information to rank for particular keywords.

Generally, the more quality websites that link to your website, the more likely you will rank higher in search engine result pages (SERP). In fact, Google lists links in the top criteria within its page-ranking algorithm.

Increasing the number of links to your website can significantly increase your chances of ranking well and driving valuable conversions for your business. Beyond high rankings, link building also benefits your business by:

• Helping you build relationships with other influencers and professionals in your industry
• Sending more referral traffic to your website to capture more leads
• Building your brand awareness and further establishing you as an industry leader

Developing High-Quality Content

Before jumping into content formats, it’s essential to understand how to develop high-quality content to acquire links. Content marketing refers to the development and sharing of content, such as blogs or infographics, to drive traffic to your website and move leads through your marketing funnel.

To develop quality content that offers value to other industry professionals, it must be:

• Well-researched with accurate information
• Directed to your target audience and speak to their needs
• Characterized by advanced story-telling – a compelling copy
• A content that uses images, videos, graphics, and more where applicable

Once you’re able to create desirable content, other websites are more likely to link to your own.

When developing your content, consider using the skyscraper technique. Find worthy content, develop something more valuable, and reach out to the right organizations to link to your new, improved content. With these basic principles, you’re able to choose the right topic that speaks to your industry, develop your research, and quote other industry experts.

5 Types of Content for Link Building

Content marketing and link building go hand in hand. With 41% of experts believing that link building is the most important part of search optimization, it’s more important than ever to drive acquisition through a content marketing strategy.

To inspire you to develop engaging materials, let’s look at five ways you can build links through content marketing.

1. Case Studies

Do you have a library of customer or product success stories that are gathering dust? It’s time to tell the world all about them. Your peers will be intrigued to understand the success of your work, and putting together a well-thought-out case study often provides valuable resources for the industry as a whole.

By developing data-driven and detailed case studies, you’ll likely earn link building success from industry publications. If you have a great story to share that includes in-depth knowledge and statistics, many editors are more apt to share the insight with their readers as well.

Source: App Annie

2. Interviews

While interviews are time-consuming to develop and review, they help you build relationships with complementary industry experts who are likely to link the content back to their website. Why? You’re featuring their knowledge and value alongside your own.

However, when running the interview, focus your questions on themes that your target audience would also be interested in. If your guest can speak on relevant insight, guidance, or tips, reach out to industry publishers who would be interested in these as well.

Remember, the end goal of any content is to provide value to the users, so the interview needs to be relevant. Building links is a bonus.

3. Infographics

People love infographics. In fact, using data visualizations like charts, diagrams, and timelines within infographics tend to be more engaging on social media platforms than any other content. For your infographic to prove worthy of a link, it needs to include considerable takeaways that look aesthetically pleasing and digestible for users.

Here are a few tips for creating link-building infographics:

• Develop an eye-catching headline
• Use accurate statistics and research
• Earn visibility through your distribution channels
• Embed social media links so they’re easily shareable
• Optimize the graphic with SEO-friendly copy

Source: World Resources Institute

4. Whitepapers

If you’re able to conduct your own research, developing whitepapers is an excellent way to highlight your authority and earn industry-specific links. Whitepapers allow you to speak in-depth on a new topic and provide extended insight to your audience.

Not only can you earn links. Doing your own research also allows you to prove your service or product’s value for the industry with data-backed evidence, which could lead to more conversions. Using a wider target audience, distribute a survey to build unique data that backs your claims and tells an authentic story. Alternatively, consider teaming up with a local university to test focus groups on your brand.

With statistical content, you’re able to position your content as highly attractive and engaging for industry publications to leverage throughout their website.

5. Public Relations

Even if you’re a small or mid-sized B2B business, focusing on local public relations (PR) can lead to big returns for link building. Local publications and online platforms focus on sharing success stories and are easy to work with when you provide well-written content. Their resources are also typically stretched thin, so developing high-quality content increases your odds of being published.

While it’s easy to overlook the local arena when you’re trying to reach a wider target audience, local links are easy to win over and still hold a strong level of authority on search engines.

Develop Content for Link Building to Grow Your Authority

The more you can improve your rankings on search engines and acquire organic links, the better chance you have at capturing more leads and growing your bottom line. By implementing a robust content marketing and link building strategy, you can improve your chances of ranking well and provide significant value to search engines and users alike.

When developing your content strategy, consider driving the most impact with the following formats:

• Case studies
• Interviews
• Infographics
• Whitepapers
• Public relations

Ready to start developing content for link building? Schedule a free consultation to learn about our Weekly Blog Writing  Services that make quality content seamless.

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