There is a general agreement that having quality backlinks makes all the difference. Which is why it’s advisable that you take time to analyze your backlink profile and those of your competitors. Most SEOs are not bothered by the number of backlinks they receive from particular sites. All they care about is the number of referring domains or unique websites linking to them.
What is a backlink?
Backlinks are incoming links commonly known as inbound links. This is a one way link from a website to another website page. The link points directly to a specific page on the website. Search engines consider backlinks a vote for a particular website page. Therefore, a high number of backlinks on the page translates into a higher organic search engine ranking.
The quality of backlinks is dependent on relevance, link location, site diversity, and domain authority. A backlink profile is a measure of the number of domains and authority score.
What is a referring domain?
This is a linking domain or external websites directing visitors to the website. The websites have on or multiple backlinks to another site. So, if each domain in the backlink profile is linking to your website once, then you will have the same number of acquired referring domains as the backlinks.
However, this scenario rarely happens because when you have a lasting business partnership with another site, you typically get backlinks from their sites on many occasions.
How backlinks and referring domains impact your SEO
Backlinks and referring domains are traffic sources. They constantly send signals to online users and the search engine concerning your web page credibility and quality.
There is a strong relationship between organic traffic a website receives and the number of backlinks it has from referring domains. There are several referral domains linking to a specific website multiple times. Most websites link to other sites 2-5 times.
Google search engine uses many factors to assess the quality of the website backlinks including relevance, source quality, placement page, placement context, and referring domains.
It’s natural to have several backlinks from one website. The SEOs build multiple backlinks from every referring domain to:
Increase the website pages authority
Every website page gets a pageRank which is an authority. The authority translates to other pages on the website via external and internal links. Pagerank flows from one page to the next. So, getting more links from several pages on the websites increases the website authority.
Get more backlinks to more pages
There is a strong correlation between the organic traffic a website receives and the number of referring domains the site has at page level. In short, focus on getting more links to the pages if you want to increase organic traffic. But the focus should be on those pages you want to rank high on google. The problem is that most SEOs don’t always link to those pages.
Increase referral traffic
Choose backlinks from pages receiving high traffic if you want to increase referral traffic to the website. This has a positive impact on the business as it drives up conversion levels and your SEO. In essence, there are more views on the content leading to more links. You can use Google Analytics to know the sites that are giving you the most referral traffic.
Build more links easily
It’s easy to get links from those sites that have linked to yours before. How do you get these websites? You need to check your backlinks report on the site explorer. Look for websites that have linked to your site several times. Publish something that may interest those sites and reach out to share it. They may choose to link to it when they like the content. Alternatively, you can use the contextual link opportunity and pitch the link.
How to get referring domains?
Remember, links from the same domain are different from backlinks from different domains. Generally, not all backlinks are equal. For instance, if you have backlinks from trusted and more popular domains, you receive a higher ranking and traffic. Getting links from separate referring domains is more valuable than multiple links from the same referring domain. In short, quality referring domains is better than quantity if you want to establish brand credibility.
1. Analyze the referral domain report
This gives a complete list of all domains linking back to the website. Evaluate the quantity and quality of those referring domains to know the ones with the strongest backlink profile. It helps you uncover more opportunities to increase traffic and website authority.
The SEO strategy should focus on high-quality content and in creating several blog posts with pages covering relevant topics to boost your efforts to build more links.
2. Create high quality content
Quality content is valuable on any website. Focus on that to get more links from quality referring domains. The SEO strategy should focus on broadening the target audience and your referral links as it boosts conversions, builds trust, and online authority. You can do this by publishing expert roundup posts, creating in-depth posts with infographics, and publishing case studies.
3. Boost audience targeting methods
Start by knowing what your target audience is and understanding the kind of information they need. Also, know their demands and online behavior to help you create the roadmap for your search engine optimization and link building campaigns.
This requires doing a thorough audience analysis and market research to know their interests, expectations, core demographics, and their needs. The research findings inform you on the choice of keywords while focusing on the link building scope.
4. Review competitors
Identify competing domains using the Ahrefs dashboard to know the unique keywords the competitor uses. Use the information to build a strategy for the website. The dashboard helps you know the quality of referring domains and quantity they are using. Analyze the backlink profile to know how they are ranking higher in the search results. Do a backlink analysis to formulate ways of emulating them, getting ahead or improving your link-building strategy.
5. Choose the best destination pages
What websites are more likely to drive potential growth? These are the sites to place your links on. The best strategy lies on choosing reputable websites and top referring domains. They are the ones that establish real and beneficial connections. Topics and quality of content matter besides the online reputation and site structure.
6. Distribute the content
Focus on distributing them to high authority domains. Only distribute share-worthy contents. Write blog posts and infographics to leverage web traffic and build powerful backlinks.
7. Choose the most popular and reputable domains
This is the best way to drive more traffic to your target pages. List down domains then categorize them according to their expertise.
8. Use the right tools
Invest in outreach and prospecting tools to help you find relevant sites for pitching your content.
9. Come up with the best link building strategy
Develop data-driven strategies that will grow your brand. Always follow the search engine best practices and guidelines on how to get referring domains.
Which tools allow you to check backlink and referring domain metrics?
- Ahrefs
- SE Ranking
- Semrush
- Sitechecker
- buzzSumo
- Moz link explorer
- io
- RankActive
How can we help you?
We help you build better backlinks and get unique referring domains. We carefully analyze the websites, curate and qualify them to ensure we maximize the backlink strategy. Our strength is the strong collaboration of the skilled team of SEO experts. The goal is to build the best backlink profile for our clients and get them high traffic and website authority they need to market their brands.
