What Is Off-Page SEO?
There is no denying the importance of search engine optimisation in your site’s general visibility and ranking in the SERPs. Undermining SEO activities is an indication that your business is not functioning properly. There are, generally, two branches of SEO: on-page and off-page SEO. While both are necessary, in this article, we’ll talk about off-page SEO (also referred to as ‘off-site’ SEO), why it matters and how to do it (with a focus on link building).
Taking a cue from its name, off-page or off-site SEO refers to SEO activities executed outside of a person’s website to improve the ranking of that website within search engine result pages (SERPs). So, whatever you do outside of your website that impacts its ranking in the SERPs is off-site SEO. It is the opposite of on-page SEO that includes all the activities you do on your site to improve your rankings.
The activities you carry out when optimising for the search engines’ off-site ranking factors should all have one aim: to improve the perception that users and search engines have of your site’s popularity, trustworthiness, authority and relevance. To do this, you have to get other sites, people, or pages on the internet with an excellent reputation to link to your site or promote your website. This way, they will be passing a vote of confidence or vouching for your web content’s quality. The effect will be your site’s improved ranking.
SEO, both off- and on-page, came about with the rise of search engines. Over the years, there have been several tactics and strategies used in search engine optimisation by the SEO community. Some of the advanced strategies and tactics used may be difficult to master in the short term. So, if you intend to take advantage of off-site SEO fully, you can contact an agency that offers a strong link building service or invest the time to learn it yourself.
Is Off-Page SEO Still Important?
The simple answer is yes. The ranking factors and search algorithms used by search engines are always changing. For Google, for example, it began with PageRank. Now there are about 200 ranking factors that the search giant uses. Still, in the face of all these changes, SEO remains relevant, and off-page SEO carries about 50% of the weight of that relevance. It plays a significant role in determining the authority and trustworthiness of a site and its ability to rank high.
The primary importance of all SEO activities, including off-site SEO, is that it is instrumental in getting you organic traffic.
How Is Off-Page SEO Done?
The fundamentals of off-site SEO involves building links from other sites to your site or the page you want to rank higher. The linking site has to be a reputable, higher-authority site that is trustworthy. Getting your content shared by others or your brand mentioned on another website or in a social media post are also effective ways to do off-site SEO. If all of these sound overwhelming to you or looks like too much work, you can get a link building agency to do it for you.
Alternatively, you can get an agency that offers a guest post service to help. Guest posting involves writing a quality post for a high-authority site in exchange for a link posted back to your site. The reason you might want to use an agency is that it can take several months to identify high-authority blogs in your niche that will be willing to have you write for them and contact their owners. Most agencies already have a working relationship with several blog owners across different industries or niches, and it will be easy for them to publish your post on another site or blog, creating a link back to your page.
Off-Site SEO And Link Building
You cannot separate link building from off-site SEO. At its core are backlinks – links on other pages that point back (link) to your site or a page on your website. Search engines consider them in determining the quality of the content that it links to. As a result, backlinks from a high-value site will do more for your off-page SEO campaign than backlinks from a site with equal ranking or value.
When considering links for off-site SEO purposes, there are three main links types. They include:
- Manual links: When you ask influencers or customers to link back website or product, or to share your content, what you are doing is creating manually built links.
- Natural Links: These are links to your content that you played no part in creating. They can come from an editorial or article that another person posts on his or her website. So, if you have a blog post with a comprehensive list of the best auto repair shops in London, for example, and someone else writes a blog about where to go to get the list of auto shops in London, linking to your article, what you have is a natural link.
- Self-created Links: These are backlinks you create in press releases with anchor texts, blog comment signatures, forums, and online directories. There are useful self-created links, and there are those that will hurt your website’s ranking (called black-hat SEO tactics) because search engines will mark you down for them.
Other Activities Related To Off-Page SEO
As stated above, creating backlinks is at the core of off-page SEO. But other activities also amount to the execution of off-site SEO. They include influencer marketing, linked and unlinked brand mentions, guest blogging (already mentioned above), and social media marketing. This is not an exhaustive list. While the number of activities you may need to carry out to get your page to rank high may be much, some agencies provide these services. You can contact a blogger outreach agency to carry out these activities for you while you focus on the core of your business.
In general, any activity that takes place beyond your website and also results in your site having improved rankings in the SERPs is an off-page SEO activity. A good off-page SEO strategy will include several of the activities mentioned above. If you do not have in-depth knowledge of off-site SEO, the strategy that will work for you, there are plenty of online resources you can read through to learn. Better still, you can get an agency that offers a link building service, and they will create and implement a sound strategy for you.
Search engine optimisation is essential for generating organic traffic to your website, product, or service. A significant number of the work you will do for SEO will take place outside of your website. These activities are called off-site or off-page SEO, and it plays an essential role in determining your ranking in the SERPs (search engine result pages).
If you need help with your SEO activity or link building, please get in touch with us today.