The future of link building is becoming a big of a hot topic recently. Most likely because we’ve seen many different algorithm updates and releases from Google explaining how links are starting to become less and less important.
However, that doesn’t mean they are not important at all. It just means they carried so much weight before, the ranking factors are shifting to be more accurately and fairly spread.
So, what exactly is going to happen with link building in the future? And what are going to be the most effective link building strategies? How we will continue to do link building and how link building affects our content coming into the future.
These are all great questions which have all been answered further down the blog. I’m also going to be discussing the shift from quantity to quality in link building, emphasising the need for backlinks that are more authoritative.
Anyway, let’s get straight into it and find out the future of link building through my predictions and forecasts coming into 2024 and beyond.
Is The Future Of Linking Building Still Strong?
Yes, the future of link building is still strong. As a part of a study released by SEMRush for 2024 ranking factors, we can see that backlinks are still extremely prominent as a ranking factor on Google and search engines. In fact in this report, backlinks are within the top 10 most important factors.
This aligns nicely with another report done by FirstPageSage who showed that in 2024, backlink still carries a 14% ranking weight across SEO. That means backlinks will account for 14% of the entire ranking factor of your website.
Again, if you check the first page for a high search volume keyword using a tool like Ahrefs, you will likely see that all of the pages ranking will have a significant amount of links to their page.
Based on this detailed analysis, I would confidently say that backlinks are not going anywhere right now, and the future of link building still remains very strong and unlikely to disappear or change much.
PR And Journalist Link Building Is Going To Be The Most Effective
Link building has shifted towards quality links more than quantity. This is evident acrossGoogle’s statements and also websites that are successfully ranking highly on Google and search engines.
Before, link builders would want to get as many links as possible, now they have shifted towards getting fewer links but from much higher quality websites. One link strategy or method is through PR and journalism.
Brands and business (& technical link builders) can help journalists by giving insights, statements, answering queries, interviews and so much more providing industry specific information to news corps.
In return for a link to their website, the authority and traffic that these websites carry is massive and has a really positive effect on boosting the brands online visibility.
Also, this is ultra effective for boosting Google’s EEAT requirements for a website as it shows the brand is an expert in the industry and has been recognised by news outlets. It’s probably the most effective link building method for results in 2024, and likely 2025 as well.
Email Outreach Is Super Competitive But Can Still Get Low Hanging Fruit
Email outreach is another effective way of building links for many years and is still a good way as newer websites to get links and build up your domain authority.
However, because this method has been around for so long, it’s been overused by so many and is therefore not as effective as it once was. It’s also riddled with link farms and sponsored links which could lead to a penalty if not done properly.
If you know how to do email outreach correctly for link building, it can be effective but it would require expert knowledge and effective strategy implementation. But in reality, I say that all link building experts should be using this to promote their content.
Why? Because outreach captures the real websites even if they have low domain ratings. If you check the links of a page that is ranking #1, over 50% of all of them are websites with less than 10DR. It’s also very effective for tiered link building (I’ve got a blog with more details here).
This is a much more natural looking link profile vs a link profile with websites only having above 50DR. And it shows just why email outreach is still one of the best link building strategies and will continue to be extremely effective coming into 2024 and beyond.
Creating Linkable Content Is The Most Important Thing
The future of link building relies heavily on the content that is being created, and whether or not it is linkable for humans.
After all, it’s the webmasters who are putting their reputation on the line by ranking your content so now, the future lies in content that is designed to be ‘linkable’.
Here’s some of the different types of content you can create that are highly linkable in general:
Statistical Content For Links
Statistical content is a type of content that is richly laden with data, numbers, and statistics. It’s the kind of content that dives deeply into a subject by providing empirical evidence and quantitative analysis.
Statistical content is a goldmine for links. SpyFu actually ranked in #5 in the best content that gets links here. It works by providing hard data that can back up claims and support research which enhances the credibility and authority of the piece. Journalists or bloggers will link to your content to back up their statements or claims.
For instance, if I’m discussing SEO trends, I won’t just throw in a statistic about search engine usage. I’ll present it alongside an analysis of what that means for content strategies or consumer behaviour.
Sharable Content For Links
Sharable content for links is the type of content that’s crafted with the intent to be so engaging, informative, and valuable that readers are naturally inclined to share it with their own networks.
It should resonate with your audience, addressing their interests or solving their problems. The content should be so compelling that it becomes a resource people want to spread for the benefit of others.
This means people are going to link to it, and of course the more shares it gets across multiple different socials the more no-follow links it will carry which allows the page to gain more crawl budget and higher traffic.
Again, this is going to be the future of content creation as well, especially now with the rise of AI, Google wants to know which content is being valued by users. This is a good way to boost rankings through links.
News & Updates Content For Links
Being the website that is first to release some important news or updates in a specific industry can be a super effective way for link building in 2024. Being the first to report on something that has happened, you’ll find many people will link to your article to reference.
Websites might even republish your articles for speed, including all of your internal links as well and building you multiple links which is great.
This type of content is often sought after for its timeliness and relevance, which in turn attracts links. It’s super effective but also could take time as you’d need to be very fast and extremely up to date in the industry.
Audio Link Building
One new trend coming into 2024 is building links through audio link building. Creating podcasts or being featured on Youtube videos can help build links and again help your EEAT across Google.
You could also share videos and content then convert this audio into text using AI and share this around as guest posts. Some websites wouldn’t mind accepting content like this especially if the video has views.
The key to successful audio link building is to provide value through the content. It’s not just about getting a mention; it’s about contributing meaningful information that listeners will appreciate.
Links Are Human Orientated, So They Need To Provide Value More Than Ever
Links are added by humans, for humans. This means if the webmaster doesn’t see any value in the link, they are not going to add it to their website. Right now, in 2024, value is the most important thing for website masters.
Because of the strict guidelines of Google around black hat link building, most websites will only ever add your link if they see value in it for their users. This means that your links need to be highly relevant, non spammy and helpful.
Your content shouldn’t be commercialised or attract a spammy vibe. I always aim to create content that addresses the specific needs and pain points of the audience. I’ve got a great article on how to write quality content here.
This means diving deep into topics, providing unique insights, and offering solutions that aren’t just generic advice but actionable strategies that webmasters can see the immediate value in.
Valuable content is becoming one of the most important factors in link building and I forecast it will become more important in the future as well.
AI Will Be Able To Automate And Scale Link Building
The rise of AI has already started to reshape the landscape of link building by offering the potential to automate and scale these efforts like never before.
For instance, AI can now assist users in identifying potential link-building opportunities at a much faster rate than manual methods. I can automate strategies for PR and answering journalist queries.
AI is being used by many to create mass amounts of content, and therefore the more content you have the higher chance of building or getting links. Sometimes, link building is a numbers game and having lots of content increases the chance of getting links.
It certainly means the future of link building is going to be heavily focused on scalability and AI generation as well. It’s likely that methods will become 100% automated from the finding of link prospects, to the creation of the content and finally the outreach.
Internal Link Building Will Still Be Extremely Important
Internal links help search engines crawl and understand your site as is a big part of technical SEO. They will point towards your most important pages and actually funnel through link juice across your site to boost rankings.
They are still going to be an extremely important strategy which most overlook, even now in 2024. However, the structure of your site will continue to become more and more important.
Let’s not forget, internal links help user experience by allowing users to navigate your website effortlessly and continuing their research without having to start a new search. This is crucial because user engagement metrics can influence search rankings in a positive way.
Not only that but internal links can help keep your older content alive by connecting it to newer, related content. This can lead to sustained traffic to evergreen content and maintain its relevance over time.
Conclusion
So, there we go. The future of link building. For those stressed out link builders, it’s going to be ok. From what I know, link building isn’t going anywhere.
For website owners, you need to still be considering link building in your SEO strategy if you are still wanting to rank in SEO coming into 2024 and beyond.
Although the weight is beginning to shift from links as a large ranking factor, they are still extremely prominent and the shift is only taking away because they were such a strong factor.
At one point, I remember seeing backlinks as the #1 ranking factor. Which is stupid because that just commercialises SEO and makes everyone sell links through backlink builders regardless of the quality of the content.
I think as I said above, link building is about to become more value based. It’s an exciting future of link builders and SEO experts.
By the way, I’ve got a great article on whether or not SEO is worth it anymore which covers more forecasts and predictions based on what’s happening in the industry right now.
