Link Building and Shopify, Updated 11th August 2020 – In this article I explain what links are and why they are important for SEO. I also give some actionable strategies to discover and get more links for your Shopify store.

If you are interested in learning the basics of SEO for Shopify, you might want to check my other articles:

• Optimise Shopify Page Title and Description
• How to Add Shopify Alt Tags to Theme Images
• How to add Alt Tags to Shopify Product Images
• How to Add Google Analytics to Shopify
• How to Add SEO Headings in Shopify
• How to Optimise Your Shopify Site Structure
• How to Edit Shopify Robots.txt File
• How to Find and Submit Your Shopify Sitemap
• How to Verify Your Shopify Store with Google
• How to Create a URL Redirect in Shopify
• Duplicate Content and Shopify
• How to Compress Images on Shopify
• How to Improve Shopify Page Load Speed
• Optimise Your Shopify Blog Posts
• How to Backup Your Shopify Store
• Enable AMP in Shopify

If you need some help with link building for your website, feel free to check our Shopify SEO agency services.

What is Link Building?

Link building is the practice of getting other websites to link back to yours via hyperlinks for the purpose of increasing your authority and visibility on search engine.

What is a Hyperlink?

A hyperlink, also known as backlink or simply ‘link’, is a link from a web page to another web page on a different website.

Why is Link Building Important for SEO?

The number of links is still one of the most important factors for ranking on Google.

Simply put, a link is like a recommendation, referral or vouch of confidence from one website to another.

While in the past the Google focus was primarily on the number of backlinks to determine the authority of a website, nowadays the quality of backlinks is even more or as important.

Having said that, according to a study by Ahrefs there seems to be a correlation in the sense of the more backlinks a page has the more organic traffic it gets.

How to Get More Links for Your Shopify Store?

There are a number of strategies to get started with your link building strategy for your Shopify store:

• Links from suppliers – If you get your products from other companies, they might be open to add a backlink to your website on one of their pages. Send them a personalised email and ask for that
• Influencers – Reach out to influencers or experts in your niche and offer them to interview them in exchange for a link on their website or just simply to add a piece of content to your blog. This is likely to generate a link to your website or at least a mention
• Mentions – Your brand might have already been mentioned without you knowing about it. Use a free tool like Google Alerts to search for mentions of your brand. If the mention doesn’t include a hyperlink, send a personalised email asking for it
• Broken links – A broken link is a link to a web page or resource that has been moved elsewhere. As a results it triggeres a 404 page not found error. By using free tools like Ahrefs free broken link checker you can identify link opportunities on pages within your industry. Once you find a broken link, if it makes sense, send a personalised email to the web master asking to replace it with a link to your Shopify store
• Check your competitors – By checking your competitors’ websites you can get some additional ideas for building backlinks. I have used this strategy successfully and discovered a number of link building opportunities. To get started, use a tool like Ahrefs free backlink checker. Look for pages with a high domain authority (DR). Once you find an link opportunity, see what the best way to get the backlink is. Sometimes it’s just a question to add your website to a directory within your industry.

Sources

https://searchengineland.com/now-know-googles-top-three-search-ranking-factors-245882
https://ahrefs.com/blog/search-traffic-study/
https://optinmonster.com/shopify-seo-guide/
https://stories.freepik.com/illustration/connecting-teams/rafiki