In this article, we’re going to talk about how to get SEO search traffic without link building.
If you just hate link building or you like link building but want to get better results, this is for you.
First, let’s cover some basics.
What is Link Building?
Link building is the process of acquiring links from other websites to your own.
A link is basically a vote or endorsement for your website, telling search engines that your site is a good resource for whatever keywords it is you’re trying to rank for.
The more links you have, the better chance you have of ranking in Google and other search engines.
Ahrefs ran a study that showed that the more websites link to you the more search engine traffic you’ll get.
Why Would I Want to Get Traffic Without Link Building?
There are a few reasons why someone might want to get traffic without link building.
The first reason is that link building can be time-consuming and difficult, especially if you’re just starting out.
It can be hard to get other websites to link to yours, especially if your website is new.
The second reason is that link building can be expensive.
There are a lot of services out there that will charge you for links, and if you’re not careful, you can end up spending a lot of money on links that may or may not even be effective.
Lastly, link building can be risky. If you get caught using shady tactics to get links, you could get penalized by Google and other search engines, which could hurt your traffic and your business.
Google tells you not to do any link building to your site.
So, if you’re looking to get traffic without link building, what are some things you can do?
Let’s dive in.
How to Get Traffic Without Link Building
Let’s take a look at five tactics to get traffic without building links.
#1 Topical Authority
Topical authority involves taking all of the sub-topics of your niche and covering them.
So, if you’re in the crypto space, you’d want to cover, for example:
- Digital wallet
- Blockchain
- Bitcoin vs. Ethereum
- How to buy crypto
- Are crypto gains taxable
And on and on down the list until you give Google a pretty clear signal that you’re an authority on these matters.
Once Google starts to recognize you as a topical authority, then rankings should rise quickly.
How do you find a topical map?
A good way is to go to AnswerThePublic.com, type in your topic, and it’ll spit out a list of relevant questions to answer.
You can then combine these into articles and help you establish authority on the topic.
You can also look to Google to see what it wants answered in the form of “People Also Ask”
…and autofilled search recommendations.
Also check out related search results at the bottom of each Google page.
And check out your competition to see all of the sub-topics that they cover.
You can also open up their sitemap and search for the related keyword (“crypto” in this case) and look at all of the articles that contain them in the URL.
Tools like Keyword Cupid can also group all of these keywords into specific articles for you.
Then you have to start producing content.
#2 Parasite SEO
Parasite SEO is when you place an article on a site that has a high amount of authority and you piggyback off that authority to get your article to the top of Google.
This involves placing your article on these sites with your backlink embedded in it.
It can be costly, but it involves a direct negotiation with the website you’re targeting.
#3 Keywords that don’t require backlinks to rank for
Some keywords are diamonds in the rough and don’t require links to rank for.
Some keywords are so uncovered by big sites that it can be easy to rank for them.
If you can find websites with low domain authority or domain rank (DA / DR) that are ranking well for certain keywords, that means they’re probably doing really well with their keyword research.
Then plug those domains into tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, Ubersuggest, and/or others and see which keywords they’re ranking for that you can copy and take for yourself.
#4 Aged domains (expired domains)
Aged domains can be available and already have lots of backlinks pointing to them.
You can use these domains and build a new website and get traffic a lot easier than trying to build a site on a new domain without any links.
Look at the links that were coming into this domain and recreate those pages.
The content should also be relevant to the old content. Otherwise, Google is likely to reset the links. They’re getting smarter at this type of trick.
Write content for the easiest keywords first.
You can find aged domains at places like Flippa and Odys.global
#4b Use 301 redirect
You can use an aged domain to inherit a backlink profile and then pass on all those links via 301 redirect to your site.
That basically tells Google that the aged domain doesn’t exist anymore and sends all those links to your new site.
#5 Create link bait articles
Articles with lots of data and statistics can be great for naturally getting links because journalists and people love citing stats and data.
Another way is to write a piece of content that is so helpful that it becomes the reference manual on the subject.
Of course, with this tactic you’re going to need to have a way to get eyeballs on it in the first place.
This is where social media and other platforms come in.
But once you do get links, the article should rise in Google rankings – along with your whole site – and you’ll start picking up links a lot more easily.
After all, this is how Google wants links to be built.
And once you get those links, you want to interlink other articles on your site within them to pass along that link authority.
Conclusion
There are ways to get traffic without link building. It just takes a little more work and creativity.
We covered five main ways in this article:
- #1 Topical Authority
- #2 Parasite SEO
- #3 Keywords that don’t require backlinks to rank for
- #4 Aged domains (expired domains)
- #5 Create link bait articles
If you can find the right keywords, produce great content, get some initial traction, and use the tips covered in this article, you can start ranking in Google without links.
And once you get to that point, link building will become a lot easier.