Table of Contents
OffPage SEO Definition
Off-page SEO, as the name suggests is the efforts made outside the website to improve the rankings and the authority of a domain.
Why does off-page SEO matter?
Google considers several ranking factors while ranking a website, and off-page SEO are one of these factors.
Off-page SEO helps to improve the website’s recognition and domain authority which ultimately plays a role in improving website ranking on SERP.
Offpage SEO also has the following benefits:
- Bring people to your website.
- Improve your position in the search engines
- Increase your authority (E-A-T) to aid in reputation building.
- Boost your social media signals
- Help you gain Natural links organically
This means you will have to invest efforts in off-page SEO techniques for better search engine rankings
So what are these techniques?
Before we discuss that let’s answer one more question you might have.
OnPage vs OffPage SEO vs Technical SEO – Where to Focus your energy?
There are 3 broad classifications of SEO: On-page, Off-page, and technical SEO.
While we know that On-page SEO refers to activities performed on the website (keywords and content optimization) and Off-page SEO techniques refer to activities outside a website ( which we will come to shortly), what is Technical SEO?
Technical SEO refers to activities done to optimize the website’s technical side and server, which will help the website crawlers to crawl and index your site faster.
These activities include website speed optimization, making the website mobile-friendly, etc.
So where should you focus your energy?
The short answer- All of them.
Google has hundreds of ranking factors and On-page, off-page and technical are all part of it.
Common OffPage SEO Techniques That Work
1. OffPage SEO Strategy – Link Building
Link building is an off-page SEO technique that involves acquiring links to your website from other websites. This is also called backlinking.
The idea is to get as many relevant and authoritative backlinks to your website – naturally and organically
But what does relevant and authoritative mean?
a. Authority of Links
According to Google, one factor that plays part in ranking is “ if other prominent websites link or refer to the content.”
Every Website’s domain has authority and every time any link from that website comes to your website, it passes down that authority to your domain (referred to as Link Juice)
So if you get a link from high authority websites, you will benefit more as compared to low authority websites.
You can check the domain authority/domain trust of a website by using the competitor research tool of SE Rankings. ( 14 Dys Free trial)
b. Topical Relevance of links
We have established that you need backlinks naturally from authoritative websites but another factor to take care of is whether the website linking to you is relevant to your content.
Topical relevance refers to websites that have similar content and talk about a similar topic as you.
Backlinks from relevant websites have a greater impact on a website’s rank in search results than backlinks from unrelated websites.
According to Google, topically relevant external links provide users with additional information that may be useful. There’s a good chance that unrelated links were bought or inserted to boost a site’s ranking in search results.
So if you have a website that focuses on fitness-related content, you should focus on getting Backlinks to websites that talk about or around the same topic.
Organic types of links that are gained naturally will help you gain the relevant authority.
2. Off Page SEO Strategy – Building Backlinks
a. Create Linkable assets
Linkable assets are purposefully crafted content pieces that attract a backlink.
These are valuable content and include case studies, research/whitepapers, Infographics, or informational content.
Such valuable piece of content is usually linked
Thus, consider creating such valuable content and offer your website, visitors, this information
You may have to invest in your knowledge and research before you create such linkable assets.
For an SEO blog, consider creating an SEO Checklist that one may use to improve the SEO of the website.
For a Food Blog, consider creating some content that talks about the calories content of the food. This may help visitors to know the calorie content before they eat or cook a particular food.
Such Linkable Assets will help you improve the Organic Traffic of your website
b. Be active on social media
Creating content and distributing your links organically using social media is essential to backlinking.
We will cover this in detail later, but when you create content on your website promote it heavily on your social media profiles with links.
c. Strategic Guest Posting
Guest posting is the website’s version of a collaboration and is the oldest tactic in the book. But before you go on and start randomly submitting guest posts to any website, consider the domain authority and the relevancy of the website.
Focus on actual collaborations with the website’s owners and don’t participate if people charge you to guest post on their websites.
d. Study Competitors and Pitch for Backlinks
To find websites to collaborate with you can leverage your competitor’s backlinks.
Use a Free Backlink Checker from SE Ranking to find the Backlinks to your competitor’s website.
Then you can contact these website owners to pitch to them for guest posting to backlinks.
e. Manually submit backlinks
Similar to promoting content on social media, this technique requires you to submit your website links to forums, classifieds, social bookmarking sites, blog directories sites, comment on other blog posts and link them to your websites.
3. OffPage SEO Stratgey – Brand Building
The ranking of Google relies on expertise, authority, and trustworthiness (E-A-T).
While Google has 200+ ranking factors, it all boils down to these three.
Google has always given brands priority.
Greater click-through rates in organic SERPs correlate with higher conversion rates, and barding can help businesses to get higher click-through rates by making a brand more memorable.
a. Brand Mentions
Brand mentions are references to a business, brand, or service on an online platform.
These references are frequently found in product or service reviews, blog posts, educational materials, and news pieces. It can have a direct impact on a company’s or product’s online reputation.
To increase your brand mentions
- Encourage customers to leave reviews
- Increase your social media presence
- Work on Blogging and Influencer marketing
- Interact at forums
You can keep track of your brand mentions by use of a Social listening tool like Google Alerts
b. Social Signals
Monitor your Brand’s Social Signals
See how people are talking about your brand online.
Search engines interpret social signals as a webpage’s collective shares, likes, and general social media prominence.
These activities, like backlinks, add to a page’s organic search ranking and are considered another type of citation.
Such Signals from social networks positively improve the Referral Traffic
4. OffPage SEO Stratgey – Content Marketing
Content marketing is the creation and sharing of online content (such as videos, blogs, and social media posts) that does not directly promote a brand but is meant to stimulate interest in its products or services.
The idea is to create and share content that can help the audience in some way by educating them, entertaining them, or motivating them.
Types of content you can create include:
- Blogs and articles
- Newsletters
- Videos (Youtube)
- Social media posts
- Infographics
- Case studies
- E-books
- Checklists
- Social media posts
We have Described how to perform Content Marketing using Semrush here
a. Broken Content Building
Broken link building is a technique in which you identify a broken (i.e., dead) link, recreate the content, and then redirect everybody who links to the dead resource to the new link.
Rebuilding broken links is important because broken links/content can hurt the User experience of the audience.
Consider using a tool like Ahrefs Broken link checker to check for broken links
Now – Let’s talk about Social media marketing.
b. Social Media Marketing
Social media marketing uses social media websites and platforms to market a product or service. The most popular social media websites are Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Linkedin.
Marketers who want to improve the SEO of their website with content marketing create content on these platforms to engage their audience, drive traffic to websites and build a brand.
However, creating content on these platforms regularly and effectively is challenging. So here are a few points that might help you.
- Develop a social media marketing plan
- Prepare a content calendar to stay consistent because consistency is key
- Create engaging and shareable content
- Engage and Interact with your audience regularly
- Be informed of the new updates and utilize them to grow ( Reels on Instagram)
And lastly, promote your website links while creating compelling content to generate more awareness about your brand.
5. OffPage SEO Strategy – Local SEO
Local SEO is a type of search engine optimization (SEO) that makes your company more prominent in Google’s local search results.
One fact that most people are unaware of is – SREP results for the same keywords for two people can be different based on the preferences of the user. Google search results are tailored to the user’s preferences depending on their search history, device, and current location.
So if you are a location-specific business or location is a big part of what your business is, you can benefit from Local SEO.
To dive into local SEO you can use the following to your advantage.
a. Google My Business for Local SEO
Google my Business is the official business listing website of Google.
According to research by databox, the most important channel was a local business’s website. The second most important is – Google My Business listing.
When you create a google my business account Google located you on the Google map and makes it aeries for people to find you.
Below is GMB account for Digital Marketing Lane
It gives you a competitive advantage in terms of managing your web presence and attracting clients using Google search and maps to find your business.
You can also submit photographs of your products or services and respond to reviews with a Google My Business account.
This will improve your exposure and engagement.
b. Customer Reviews for Local SEO
Your company’s reputation plays a big role in local organic search rankings.
For example, if your firm is featured in every major local business directory, is frequently cited in local news sources, and has numerous positive customer reviews, you’ll likely rank higher.
As we mentioned, with Google my Business you can respond to reviews left by your customer.
Google my business account allows you to get reviewed by your customers and you can keep track of these reviews with your Business account on Google.
These reviews also show up on the Google map when a potential customer finds you.
c. Citations for Local SEO
Citations are a type of web reference that includes a company’s name, address, and phone number (NAP). They’re a collection of different websites’ business listings.
Citations are one of the key factors in local SEO.
We have already mentioned Google my Business. Other citation sites you can target are:
- Bing
- Yelp
- Foursquare
Starting with the online business directories that are most relevant to your sector is a solid rule of thumb when determining which citations to include your firm in.
Consider Checking out these 8 Top Local SEO Tools that can help you get more Google by Business reviews and Citations
6. OffPage SEO Strategy – Forums
We mentioned forum submissions while talking about manual backlinks generation but how to utilize them the right way?
To start with :
A forum is an online community or group where your potential audience has discussions.
These include websites like Quora, Reddit, Facebook groups, Linkedin groups, StackOverflow, etc.
The primary purpose of these forums is to interact, share ideas and solve queries.
Website owners can utilize these forums to their advantage, by being part of and contributing to them.
A few guidelines to consider :
- Join Only relevant forums or groups
When on the lookout for forums to contribute to, go for the ones within your niche and the one which has your target audience.
If you are into the fitness industry, join a group related to fitness. If you are joining a platform like quora, then interact with content or question within the niche.
- Genuinely Interact with members
When you are part of a forum, don’t spam with your links. Instead, contribute to the conversation and solve the queries that people have.
- Link to resources present on your website
While interacting or solving doubts you can organically post links to resources you have on your website to direct these members to your websites.
7. OffPage SEO Strategy – Influencer Marketing
We mentioned E-A-T while talking about Brand Building. Let’s talk about Trustworthiness.
According to Google, a site is trustable if other people link to it or talk about it.
We have talked about building links and getting links from high-domain authority sites. But, this can also be done through Influencer marketing.
Working with influencers is a fantastic way to improve your website’s position by generating more natural backlinks.
This can happen in a variety of ways. If you work with influential bloggers or influencers who have their websites, you can bet they have one or have access to several high-authority sites.
When these influencers write content and connect to your site, your site receives a high-quality backlink.
Furthermore, having an influencer post your link improves the likelihood of other people sharing it. Because of its growing popularity, higher-authority domains are more likely to notice it and incorporate it into their sites.
Influencer marketing helps you develop a high-quality link profile in any case.
How often should you check on your website’s off-page SEO progress?’
“You cannot improve what you don’t measure.”
To improve your website SEO you will need to keep track of the progress, analyze data and then change your strategy accordingly.
To do this you can use a free SEO tool like Google Analytics and Google Search console
If your website is relatively new, you should monitor your site every 2 months at least.
Since it’s a new website with low traffic there would not be enough data to analyze. Also, it takes some time for Google to rank a website.
However, if your website is 6–7 months old and has been ranked by Google, you can check your progress every other week to evaluate how you’re doing and what you need to do to improve your ranking.
Consider Reading this SEO Analysis Guide with free SEO Tools
OffPage SEO Conclusion
Off-page SEO has evolved over the years.
Today it’s not just about link building but also about the overall brand presence on the internet. It’s all about improving your Brand’s Online Visibility.
Today branding plays an essential role fo the reputation of a business and the authority of the business’s website.
Working on the Off-page SEO strategies mentioned above will help you to rank your website in SERP. However, don’t ignore the On-page and technical SEO Optimization. All three lay an important role in SEO.
Consider Reading: How to improve your Brand’s Online Visibility in 2022
FAQs – OffPage SEO
What is a good link?
A good link is a backlink that you get naturally, from a high domain authority website which ultimately increases the authority of your domain.
How to get high-quality links for your website?
To get high-quality links for your websites participate in collaborations and genuine guest posting. Create shareable content that people will want to link to and be active on social media.
How Can We Avoid Penalties for Unnatural Links?
Unnatural backlinks to a website can lead to Google flagging the website. To avoid these penalties refrain from paid guest blogging, linking to unrelated and penalized websites, and generating backlinks from random domains.
What are some off-page SEO elements?
Some of the most popular Off-page SEO techniques include-
- Link Building.
- Brand Building.
- Content Marketing.
- Local SEO
- Social Media marketing
- Forums.
- Influencer Marketing