External Links: What Is Their Role In SEO?

If you’re a blogger who has recently learned about SEO, then chances are you may have heard about the importance of including links in your blog posts. And while it’s true that quality links can help make your posts more authoritative and boost your Google rankings, there’s actually more to it than using any relevant links particularly, when talking about external links.

Read more as we are going to talk about external or outgoing links and their role in your SEO strategy for your blog.

Definition Of An External Link

An external link is basically is a link that will take you to another website. It is the opposite of an internal link in which the link inserted will take you to another page in your own website or domain.

Some examples of external or outgoing links include linking to a content that has the same niche with your blog, an article that is related to a specific topic, or a review of a product from another source (if your blog is featuring specific consumer products). On the other hand, most SEO experts recommend that you link to authoritative sites (ex. Wikipedia) as much as possible to improve your blog’s authority

The main idea of including outgoing links is to provide more useful information to your readers/subscribers while being authoritative at the same time. If for instance, you wrote a post about a certain event in your area, your reader might find it annoying if they have to use Google to know about the details if you were not able to include links to other sources or the ticket page about this said event.

How Does It Benefit Your Blog?

Inserting external or outgoing links has its share of benefits and these include:

• Links going to authoritative sites can increase your digital footprint or increased website’s visibility.
• Links to sites of the same niche can help build relationships and it the process it also helps to drive more traffic into your blog.
• Placing the right external or outgoing links will give an impression that you care for your readers as you are ready to provide them with all the resources that they need.
• And lastly, it helps your readers to be more engaged in the post they are reading.

Final Word

Just remember the rule of thumb when using external links: insert 2-5 links per blog post so you can also ensure the quality of your post and your rankings won’t be affected as your linking strategy is well within the metrics set by Google and all other online search engines.

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