You might be wondering why your website is still not ranking high in search engines despite having great, keyword-filled content. Your pages may already have excellent technical SEO. However, you are still not seeing a rise in your search engine position. This might be because even though you have taken care of the other types of SEO, you still fail to utilize your website’s off-page SEO.
With this article, you can learn more about off-page SEO and learn about the different steps you can take to improve it.
Definition of Off-Page SEO
Off-page SEO, just like its name suggests, is search engine optimization that happens outside of your website. This means digital marketing and external linking. Instead of focusing on what your website currently has, you consider outside factors. When it comes to off-page search engine optimization, the most popular term you might hear of is backlinks. These are links from other related websites that link to your pages.
Importance of Off-Page Search Engine Optimization
Off-page SEO is just as important as on-page SEO and technical SEO. While it takes place outside of your website, it helps increase your website’s trustworthiness. Search engines usually place reliable or high-authority sites first on their result pages. With proper off-page SEO, you can improve your website’s reliability so that you can score higher with search engine algorithms.
15 Tasks for Your Off-Page SEO Checklist
When you want to perform off-page search engine optimization, you should follow these fifteen steps to make sure that you can cover all the bases for your website.
1. Monitor your backlinks.
Backlinks are the life and blood of your website’s off-page SEO. Before you start with anything, make sure that you can evaluate the current backlink situation of your website. You can use search engine optimization tools such as Moz, Google Search Console, and Ahrefs to do this.
When monitoring your current backlink profile, there are things that you should keep in mind. These are the current number of backlinks for your site, the number of websites linking to your site, and the top pages that receive backlinks. Keep all of this information because you will need them when you compare your website’s profile to your competition – and so that you can know which off-page strategy you can use next.
2. Evaluate competitor sites’ backlink profiles.
Now that you already have the evaluation for your website’s backlink profile, you can use various tools – like Ahrefs or SEMrush – to determine how far competitor sites have gone when it comes to off-page SEO. Use automation tools – or ask an SEO expert – to provide you with the current profile of their backlinks.
If you compare to a top-ranking competitor site, use the number of their backlinks as your next goal for your website. Check out the domains that often link to them. If you can, you should also try to have your website linked to high-authority websites that have interacted with your competitor sites.
3. Build quality backlinks.
If your website is far from being on the first page results for your preferred keyword, then you should start creating quality backlinks for your website. By backlinking, it means that another website will reference your site by sending a link towards it. If you have the chance, make sure that you are getting backlinks from high-authority sites and domains related to your niche. Links from these sites count higher in search engine algorithms.
4. Build broken backlinks.
Broken backlinks are different from dead links from your website. Instead, these are outbound links on other websites that refer to pages that either moved or disappeared. Using tools like Xenu or Ahref, you can track which sites have broken outbound links. Consider what content used to be in that link – and try to make great alternative content. Publish it on your site and contact the site owner with the broken backlink. Offer your content so that you can get the backlink for your website.
5. Increase the number of internal links.
While internal linking is not as powerful as external linking, it is still an essential off-page SEO task that you should pay attention to. With internal links, site crawlers from search engines will have an easier time browsing and indexing your page. Try to have at least three internal links for every page. If you want to optimize internal links even further, you can use a tool like Screaming Frog to help you.
6. Fix your website’s broken links.
Broken links from your website are part of your technical SEO – but they can also affect your website’s off-page search engine optimization. As seen in previous steps, you can steal backlinks that are broken. The opposite is possible – other competitor sites might take over your backlinks if you do not fix them. Make sure that all of your website pages are up, especially those that have already received backlinks.
7. Perform on-page SEO techniques.
Off-page SEO strategies usually come hand in hand with on-page SEO techniques, especially for content creation. Since the pages linked to your blog are typically content pages, you should optimize them. Create content with relevant statistics or are research-backed. These types of content usually receive the most backlinks. You can also create long-form content so that other websites will reference at least a part or two.
8. Start guest blogging.
One way to have an organic backlink is by guest posting on another website. You are creating a blog for them by guest posting, and you reference yourself as the author. Not only will it help determine you as an authority for your niche, but it can also provide a backlink. Search for websites that allow guest posting from various niches. Make great content and try to negotiate with the site owner to publish your blog on their page.
9. Monitor your brand searches.
Brand searches may be a lower priority compared to keyword rank positions. However, it still pays to know how much impression your website makes. Using tools like the Google Search Console, you can see how many times your site has been searched, how many clicks it received, and how many impressions it had made over various periods. Take note of your brand searches and consider evaluating your competition’s performance. This way, you can aim to reach an equal – or greater – number.
10. Track your brand mentions.
Like monitoring your brand searches, you can also track your brand mentions. However, you will not be looking at the number of impressions. Instead, you will search which forums, blogs, or posts have mentioned your website. Not only will this help you determine your website’s current reach, but you might also have the chance to offer link exchanges or collaborations with other sites that have mentioned yours.
11. Get shoutouts from high-authority websites.
Increasing your brand’s reach will help you get shoutouts from other related websites that have a more considerable following than yours. This usually comes organically since shoutouts can be received when owners of such sites prefer your products or service. However, you can make the first move by introducing your site, services, or products to them.
12. Set up online reviews and testimonials.
If you have an eCommerce website, you should create sections where previous customers can post their reviews and testimonials. This is beneficial in a lot of aspects. It will not only make your product or service offerings appear more trustworthy to potential clients, but it will also make your website appear more reliable for search engine algorithms.
13. Partner with other sites.
Another organic way to build up your backlinks and brand mentions is by partnering with other brands and websites. While it is best to collaborate with someone from the same niche as you, you can still go through with partnerships from distantly related sites. Since you will both be in collaboration, you will naturally exchange backlinks and give shoutouts to each other’s websites.
14. Use paid advertising to promote your posts.
With paid advertising, you need to prepare a big budget. However, it can give your website many impressions and clicks. If you have enough money for it, you should try using paid advertisements of various forms. You can spend money through promotion from social media sites – or you can get paid advertising from influencers.
15. Utilize social media sites.
While this is technically not a task for off-page SEO, this is still one of the things you should do to help improve it. When you have a website – whether a personal blog or an eCommerce store – you need to prepare social media accounts. This is because social media sites have a broad reach and can help promote your website.
Use an SEO Automation Tool or Hire an SEO Agency Today
If you find it overwhelming to follow every step on the off-page SEO checklist on your own, you can try using an automation tool to help you with the tasks. If you are not familiar with these applications, you can also consider hiring an SEO company to help you improve your website’s search engine optimization. With their help, you can check off all the steps quickly and easily. They might also provide you with other pieces of advice so that your website can further improve search engine rankings.
