Everyone knows what links are, but are you familiar with backlinks? You may have heard about them in passing, or as a recommendation for building up a successful online presence for your veterinary practice. But what are backlinks exactly, and how do you get them? What makes them so beneficial to your website and business?
Read on for answers to these pressing questions!
What is a Backlink?
A backlink is a link on a website that links out to another website via anchor text. Blog articles commonly use backlinks to connect to other websites and articles, but they can also be found on virtually any other page of a website. If you’ve ever browsed through an article online and come across a section of highlighted text that takes you to another website and page when you click on it, you’ve just used a backlink!
Why Is It Important to have Backlinks on Your Veterinary Practice’s Website?
Backlinks can be a major boon for your website and your practice. Here’s how:
They’re a Vote of Confidence from Other Websites
When other websites link back to a page or specific article on your website, they’re showing that they are willing to endorse it and share it with others. This tells Google that they trust your website and want to openly associate with it, and this can help you score points with Google and boost your search ranking.
They Increase Your Website’s Authority in Google’s Eyes
You know the phrase “birds of a feather flock together.” This applies to backlinks as well. If you are able to get a large enough group of authoritative, quality veterinary websites to link out to your practice website, Google will note this and come to view your website as equally credible, relevant, and high-quality. This can greatly benefit your organic search rankings and increase your visibility to pet owners in your community.
They Can Drive More Traffic to Your Website
Having popular and authoritative websites link out to your website increases your website’s authority. If a website you trust is linking to some other website, you’re probably going to assume that that website has similar integrity and authority. You know that if you click on it, you’ll find quality information supported by experts in the field.
But even better is having multiple renowned, authoritative websites linking to yours—it further increases your trustworthiness in the eyes of Google (and in the eyes of veterinarians and pet owners), and it can get more people to visit your website. The more people visiting your website, the higher your website traffic gets and the likelier you are to get more clicks and conversions, too.
How Can I Get Backlinks to My Website?
There are several ways you can get backlinks to your veterinary practice website:
Work with InTouch Analysts
At InTouch, our talented group of digital marketing analysts has a list of quality, relevant, and authoritative veterinary websites to which we can add our website clients in order to get backlinks. In addition, our analysts can run a competitive analysis to see which quality backlinks your competitors have that you don’t. From that point, we can then explore different ways to help you acquire backlinks from those sites.
Create High-Quality Blog Posts for Your Website
Running a blog on your website is a strategy that can help you acquire backlinks naturally. If you can get your blog posts to rank well in Google Search (this usually requires consistent, high-quality content in your blog and SEO best practices to achieve), other websites will recognize the credibility and authority of the information provided in your blog and link out to it—and there’s your backlink! Regularly updating your blogs can help too—instead of having to put out fresh blogs each month, have evergreen blog content that can be routinely refreshed and optimized for search engines.
Join a Local Business Group
Another way to gain backlinks to your website is to sponsor a local event or join your chamber of commerce or a local business group (or all three). Do keep in mind that it costs money to do this, but it could be worth it in the long run if it increases conversions on your website and grows your clientele. These types of backlinks build a stronger connection between your website/practice and your community, and this can be beneficial to your organic rankings as well!
Get InTouch for More Backlink Insights
Obtaining backlinks for your veterinary practice website can seem intimidating. But if you’ve taken the time to build a great website that is well optimized for search and bursting at the seams with relevant, high-quality content, you’re in a better position to start getting backlinks. If you’re still not confident and want to speak directly with our experts, get InTouch and call (800) 493-9003 to have a conversation! You can also request a free digital analysis to see how your practice website is performing currently.