How to Build Links to Your SaaS Site?

SEO plays a crucial role in determining the success of your business. It doesn’t matter if it’s a SaaS tool or an eCommerce business. SEO increasingly depends on link building. In this article, I will talk about effective strategies you can use to boost a site’s search presence as well as improve organic traffic.

That’s not to say that link building alone can propel your site to great heights. Link building combined with a massive content push helps you score big.

Understanding the Importance of Link Building for SaaS Sites

Before going deep into link building it’s essential to figure out the importance of link building for SaaS. Backlinks are the tipping point that help you build confidence for your site. It indicates to search engines why your SaaS site should rank higher than others. Also the right links can get more people inside your digital sales funnel and improve customer experience.

This helps your SaaS site rank higher in search results, leading to increased visibility and organic traffic. For example, if you’re a customer service software, your target should be to get links from similar SaaS customer-centric sites. A simple way get a lot of links at one time is by finding the best PBN networks available and securing links that way.

Conducting a Link Audit

The first step in building links to your SaaS site is to conduct a link audit. Analyze your existing backlinks to identify the quality and relevance of each link. Look for any toxic links that could potentially harm your site's reputation and rankings. And if there are in fact toxic links present, run a disavow for those links using the Google disavowal tool. You can ask a specialist from a freelance platform for help in conducting this audit.

Creating High-Quality and Relevant Content

Quality content forms the cornerstone of any great link-building strategy. Never skip on creating informative blog content, whitepapers, and case studies that both address pain points of your target audience and help them learn more. Invest in creating custom graphics, infographics and other materials that will drive more visitors. To ensure that content quality is first-rate, utilize a content testing tool, which will ensure you’re conveying your messages clearly, setting the right tone of voice and speaking to the target visitors. It's also important to learn more about the function of web portals as this website type can be a source of valuable information your audience wants to check out constantly which means bringing more traffic and links. Doing keyword research is the key to creating good content.

For example, the data visualizations in Jobber’s Electrician Salary Guide provide valuable content that other websites may link to as a reference to enhance their own articles.

Leveraging Social Media for Link Building

Social media is another awesome tool to enhance link building.

Share your valuable content on various social platforms, engaging with your audience and encouraging them to share it further. Collaborate with influencers and industry leaders to amplify your reach and attract more backlinks.

Building Relationships and Networking

Networking with SaaS companies and other pros of the industry help you score new link-building opportunities. Consider guest posting on reputable industry blogs and other platforms. This helps you earn backlinks and establishes you as a true authority in your niche.

Guest posting

Talking about building relationships- guest posting is a critical part of your SEO arsenal. Guest posting is part of classic link-building efforts and, as such, is a predictable, even easy way to get links regularly and shoot your rankings up.

I, for instance did 40 guest posts last month in an effort to boost rankings for my site BrushDial, a SaaS design tool. Before that, I did link-building campaigns for another site that eventually resulted in 160 RDs in a period of 5 months. The results? Traffic grew 700% and is still growing.

So, on the back of my sound experience- guest posting works. It helps you get everything you want.

How does it work?

Guest posting works on the back of heavy relationship building. You build relationships with high authority sites and ask them if they would like high-quality content on their blog. The catch? You need a link in return for all the work you’re doing.

You build relationships with a high authority site (or preferably websites) in your niche and ask them if they would like free high-quality content on their blog. To contact the right person behind the website, you can use an email finder tool like Signalhire to find the right contact information and get into the inbox with ease. Once the proposal is accepted, you can write this content and naturally try to include a link back to the page to which you want to drive rankings.

This sounds like a lot of effort. But this pays for itself with the rise in domain authority and helps increase organic traffic to your site. Perhaps target newer long-tail keywords when creating content as a guest author.

It’s worth getting a long-term relationship with site owners who value quality and is willing to help you get links.

However, it’s worth noting that link prospecting this way involves back and forth, it involves delays in getting your content published, and sometimes after all this effort, you may still get your links deleted.

Many SaaS businesses use SEO tools and services - that provide guest blogging services using existing connections they can leverage.

However, it should also be noted that link prospecting can be time-consuming

The process however is fairly straightforward. Identify sites that are relevant to your industry and target audience. Craft personalized outreach emails with a cold email generator and talk about the benefits of collaboration with each other. Build great and meaningful relationships for link placements. For a streamlined approach and faster results, explore professional link-building services. They offer established networks that ease outreach challenges and enhance online presence efficiently. Whether through direct outreach or professional services, the goal is the same: enhancing connections and boosting digital authority.

Create trend reports

Venngage’s post that continues to get many links is its post on 8 Biggest Design Trends for 2020.

How did they get so many links to this post? Did this come from relationships and high-quality guest posts? I don’t think that’s what happened here. Analyzing the link profile, it seems to me that writing about trends helped them rank higher for this term and get links to it naturally.

They researched this topic heavily, and this post has over 13000 words. Doing competitor research this way enables many things.

Next, they multiplied their SaaS strategy by creating custom infographics for people who want to use the product.

Creating quality YouTube videos that got more than 50,000 views that talked about these graphic design trends was another big part of the picture.

They update the URL every year, matching it with the current year for that year’s design trends. Doing this, they increased the number of domains linking to it and increased search rankings.

What trend report can your SaaS brand be known for year over year?

Run podcasts

Search engines don’t really discover your site from a podcast. But podcasts are a great way to create awareness for your brand.

To create a podcast that resonates with your audience, rely on web scraping solutions that give you access to valuable data collected from various sources that help to get a better understanding of your target audience and, therefore, produce podcasts they have an interest in.

On the other hand, it’s quite surprising to hear that podcasts not only create awareness but are a heavy-weight SaaS link-building tactic.

Here’s how.

It works in a similar way to guest blogging. When you speak on a podcast, they publish it on their site and afterward include links back to websites that you mentioned.

Here’s how HubSpot built a link back to their podcast show after their VP of marketing was interviewed.

The big advantage is that you don’t need as much effort as you need for guest posting.

Product embeds

Product embed links are when users embed parts of your product on your site. At Typeform, where people embed contact forms, they build a link back to Typeform’s contact form maker.

Source: Typeform

This is widget link building.

When selling SaaS products and thinking about product embeds, you can turn to vetted developers as they help to realize your thoughts into actual products.

Conduct Roundups

SaaS businesses use great techniques like roundups and resource page link building to post collections of tools or resources on specific topics.

Here’s an example:

Source: Brand24

The example above is from brand24 a site in the SaaS social media space.

Avoiding Black Hat SEO Techniques

While link building is essential, it's crucial to steer clear of black hat SEO practices, such as buying links or participating in link schemes. Search engines penalize websites engaged in such activities, severely damaging your SaaS site's reputation and rankings.

Badges

Badges are similar to widget link building. Badge link building was done successfully by G2 which includes rankings of software companies.

If you want to include an accolade to your link profile look no further than G2 as top sites add the G2 badge to their site and boost social proof.

Source: G2

Furthermore, Customer Success Managers at G2 are encouraged to ask others to add the G2 badge to their sites and include links to G2.

Another great example of badge link building is with Mixpanel which give you extra usage on their plans if you add their badge on your site’s footer and include the link. This is a wonderful strategy.

Not only that, to check if a website has removed the badge, they periodically run a scan and based on the results downgrade that particular account’s usage plan.

Conclusion

Link building remains a vital aspect of SEO for SaaS sites in 2023. By implementing effective link building strategies, such as producing high-quality user-intent focused content, leveraging social media, and networking with industry peers, you can enhance your site's online visibility and drive organic traffic. Remember to stay compliant with search engine guidelines and always focus on providing value to your audience.

FAQs

1. Is link building still relevant for SaaS sites in 2023?

Yes, link building continues to be crucial for SaaS sites in 2023. Quality backlinks help improve search engine rankings and increase organic traffic while also bringing you new leads.

2. How long does it take to see results from link building efforts?

The timeline for seeing results from link-building efforts can vary depending on various factors, such as the competitiveness of your niche and the effectiveness of your strategies. Generally, it takes several weeks to a few months to see noticeable improvements.

3. Can I build links without creating content?

While it's possible to acquire some links without creating content, focusing on producing valuable and shareable content significantly increases your chances of attracting quality backlinks.

4. Should I focus on quantity or quality when building links?

Quality should always be prioritized over quantity when building links. One high-quality, relevant backlink can be more valuable than numerous low-quality links.

5. What are some common link building mistakes to avoid?

Some common link building mistakes to avoid include using black hat SEO techniques, targeting irrelevant websites, and neglecting the importance of building relationships with other site owners.