Frank Hamilton, Blogger

Off-page search engine optimization is perhaps just as important as on-page SEO. However, when the two are used together, their impact can be significantly bigger and can lead you to outstanding results.

Just like anything else in digital marketing, off-page SEO is evolving while some trends stay the same. When you know these trends, it’s much easier to create a strong off-page SEO strategy. Hence, here are the best off-page search engine optimization tips for 2021.

#1 Be Selective with Backlinking

First and foremost, you should be more selective with your backlinking. Backlinking is already a very powerful technique for boosting your link profile, but it’s still crucial for you to choose the right backlinks for your website. It’s much better to have several high-quality backlinks instead of having hundreds of low-quality ones.

In fact, low-quality backlinks could potentially harm your site rankings. Try to seek out questionable websites linking to your site and then remove links from them as best as you can. When guest blogging to get more backlinks, don’t post on websites that you don’t feel are authoritative and legitimate.

#2 Focus on Influencer Marketing

Influencer marketing is by far one of the most popular digital marketing techniques nowadays. With so many influencers out there, you are bound to find someone in your niche who could promote your brand and your products or services. And if you focus on influencer marketing more, you could potentially improve your off-page SEO too.

As Tracy Parks from the writing services reviews site Writing Judge puts it, “Influencers get you the links that you could get through guest blogging. Moreover, they also help you get tags to your social media pages which means you could be using influencer marketing to boost both your website and your social media profiles. Besides, it’s a great way to get more exposure and establish yourself as a reliable brand.”

#3 Utilize User-Generated Content

UGC or user-generated content is content created by your current and potential customers. Anything from customer reviews to social media posts asking product questions can be considered UGC. The great thing about it is that using it allows you to create less of your own content and still get a lot of traffic, engagement, and so on.

To use UGC in your strategy, you will need to seek it out online (on social media, review sites, and elsewhere) and then curate it by sharing it on your own channels. Alternatively, you can simply reply to UGC when you come across it or interact with it in some way. In other words, bring attention to it and encourage people to post more of it. It’s a great way to get more links to your website and more tags on social media.

#4 Seek Out Broken Competitor Links

An interesting linking tactic that not everyone knows about is seeking out broken competitor links and then substituting them with your own. Your competitors are likely trying to build their own link profiles, but not all links they get will work (just like the links you may get that turn out to be broken). That’s when you can claim their links and use them for your own site.

As Tobias Walton from the custom writing reviews site Best Writers Online explains, “It’s really not that complicated. Find broken links of your competitors. Then, contact website owners or managers letting them know that the link is broken and that you have relevant content to link to. If they agree, you get a new backlink! If they don’t, you can move on to other broken backlinks you found.”

#5 Encourage People to Mention You

Last but not least, you should never forget about the importance of your audience and, more specifically, your online following. These people are your current or potential customers who could be promoting your brand just by talking about it online and spreading the word about it.

If you see that someone mentioned your brand but didn’t link to it, you can reach out to them and ask them to actually link to you. Alternatively, you can let it stay just a mention or you can comment under the content to make it easier for people to find you (e.g. comment under a social media post).

Final Thoughts

To summarize, off-page SEO definitely needs to be utilized as much as on-page SEO. It’s a way for you to boost your website rankings with the help of a combination of multiple techniques. Use the tips in this article to help you create your own off-page SEO strategy and use it in combination with your on-page SEO efforts.

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About the Author: Frank Hamilton is a blogger and translator from Manchester. He is a professional writing expert in such topics as blogging, digital marketing and self-education. He also loves traveling and speaks Spanish, French, German and English.