Most SEO tips focus on adding links and other minor tweaks that help search engines find your content more easily.
While these tips are still helpful, search engines are now very savvy at deducing the relevance and the context of your links, and making small optimizations won't give you the ranking boost you want.
Instead, prioritize contextual link building to your site. You can use them to beat your competition in the SERPs, gain more authority, and trust, sustain your rankings, and more.
But where do you start?
In this article, you’ll learn the following:
- What are contextual and formal links?
- What is an example of a contextual link?
- What are the different types of contextual links?
- Why are contextual links important for your SEO?
- 4 proven ways to get rank-boosting contextual links
At the end of the day, you should be able to leverage this technique and gain an unfair advantage in the SERPS.
If you’re ready, let’s get started.
What are Contextual Links?
Just like the name suggests, the contextual backlink definition is as follows.
A hyperlink within the content of a webpage that is embedded within the text, rather than placed in a separate section.
The link is usually related to the surrounding text or paragraph and may be natural or artificial.
The fact that these links are placed within the link to context meaning the surrounding content, helps search engines like Google and users to find relevant information and establish the connection between different pages.
That comes with an SEO advantage as Google presumes they’re used to provide additional information or resources related to the topic being discussed.
For example, if you blog about content marketing, you can build editorial links to your article from authoritative sites in the niche that will give you a lot of traffic potential and link juice.
At the end of the day? A win in the SERPS. On top of that, you get tons of other benefits, including:
- Increased brand awareness
- Trustworthiness among potential customers unaware of your brand or services.
Let’s take a look at an example of a contextual link
What is an Example of a Contextual Link?
Just like we discussed above, a contextual link is a clickable text (usually the keywords or related phrases with a color other than that of the entire text that appears underlined) found within the written content of your page.
Here are examples of contextual links:
#1. A link contains text that gives a description of the information at that URI
A page contains the sentence "Link building is the backbone of SEO." Where "Link building" is a link.
#2. A link is preceded by a text description of the information at that URI
A page containing the sentence "If you want to find out what our customers say about our services go to HappyCustomerStories.com" where "HappyCustomerStories.com" is a link.
#3. Both an icon and text are included in the same link
A CTA promoting an e-book download could feature an image of the e-book cover alongside the text "Download Your Free E-Book." These are combined to make a single link.
The alt text for the icon is null since the purpose of the link is already described by the text of the link next to the icon.
#4. A list of book titles
A list of books is available in three formats: HTML, PDF, and audio. To avoid hearing the title of each book three times, the first link for each book is the title of the book, the second link says "HTML" and the third says, "audio."
#5. News article summaries
A Web page contains a collection of news articles. The main page lists the first few sentences of each article, followed by a "Read more here" link.
A screen reader command to read the current paragraph provides the context to interpret the purpose of the link.
What are the different types of contextual links? Let’s take a look in the next section.
Types of Contextual Links
Contextual links can be categorized by where they are and how they are gained. These include:
#1. Natural backlinks
These links are gained organically. A good example is if you mention a given brand in your content or blog and decide to link to its website. This can especially be beneficial if they are dofollow backlinks meaning they allow for the passing of link juice.
#2. Link insertions
This is when you ask a site owner to add a link to your website in an already published piece of content. You can do this by hunting down for broken links in articles or content that you’re interested in, and then reaching out to the webmaster to insert a link to your website.
#3. Reciprocal links
Reciprocal links are when you and another site owner or webmaster agree to link to each other’s websites for mutual benefits.
#4. External links
An external link appears in your website's content and links back to another website.
#5. Internal links
These are links in your content or page that point to other pages on your website.
#6. Inbound links
An example of inbound links is when other websites have external links pointing to one of your web pages.
Now that you understand the 6 different types of contextual links and backlinks examples, let’s talk about the benefits they come with—especially to your SEO.
Why Are Contextual Links Important For Your SEO?
The reason why contextual links are so important is that search engine algorithms place greater trust in the idea that the link was genuinely earned—other than added to manipulate rankings.
Here are some of the biggest benefits that contextual link building can bring to your site:
#1. Increased domain and page authority
Backlinks are always seen as votes of confidence from other sites to your site for the authority and trustworthiness of your content.
That’s why earning a single contextual backlink from a highly authoritative site from your niche can give your domain authority a push.
So, if you want to grow your chances of topping the search engine results pages, you should target building a high-quality profile of contextual backlinks.
#2. Better UX
Contextual links often add value to your content and link juice. That’s because it increases the chances of users clicking on the linked webpage.
The whole idea is they feel the link is pointing them to valuable resources and additional information that can help them resolve their pain points.
#3. Increased referral traffic
By linking to your website, webmasters are telling users and search engines that your content is valuable and worth sharing. As a result, they will give you more visitors as referral traffic while Google is using that as a ranking signal.
#4. Greater brand awareness
When webmasters, bloggers, and site owners link to you in their content or pages, they’re basically telling their audience “Hey, look, this person is publishing high-quality and relevant content, and is therefore trustworthy.”
At the end of the day? You strengthen your brand, make new potential customers, and grow your sales by converting them using the content on your site.
#5. Exponential link growth
If your site keeps on getting mentioned in highly authoritative sites, it increases the chances of getting your content appearing before those who matter to your business.
Because of the credibility score that you build (through the links), they are more likely to link back to your content on their own sites (if they happen to blog also).
Although the whole idea of contextual backlinks can sound sweet to your ears, they don’t just come. You have to dig deep and invest in the best practices.
We’ll explain that in the next section.
What Are The Best Practices for Contextual Linking?
If you have settled to target your SEO campaign with contextual linking, you should always do the following:
- Pick high-quality sites
- Link to relevant websites (industry or topic relevance)
- Be wary of paid or artificial links (that do not meet the mark)
Best practices are nothing, if you don’t put them to use. So, what strategies are available for contextual link building?
4 Proven Ways To Get Rank-Boosting Contextual Links
When building backlinks for your site, there is normally no size fits all. However, when it comes to contextual links, you can use the following strategies for maximized results.
#1. Always create high-quality and helpful content
Always strive to create content that demonstrates your expertise, experience, authority, and trust (Google’s EEAT update) in the topic that you’ve pushed live.
That’s because when someone gives you a backlink, they are recommending you to their users. No one is going to link to you if the quality of your content is low and thin.
Here are typical examples of content that people will want to link to:
- Guides
- Research
- Free tools
- White papers
- Thought leadership articles
#2. Write high-quality guest posts
Guest posts normally present a win-win for both parties. The author gets a backlink, and the site owner gets free content for their website.
This strategy can be advantageous because the links tend to appear natural and you have more control over the content of the page that is linking to you (in terms of relevance and context).
#3. Look up for interviews and podcasts opportunities
You can always find opportunities to be interviewed (in what you’re an authority in) by other authoritative brands in your niche who can in turn link to your site when they publish their reports.
This strategy is not only great for gaining contextual backlinks but also branding.
#4. Broken Backlinks
With this strategy, all you need to do is find broken links on websites in your niche, notify the webmaster or site owner of the issue, and then suggest it be replaced with your page or piece of content that covers the same information.
That’s especially beneficial to them (site owner) because broken links can be super disastrous to your rankings when search engines and people bounce after following the link.
Final Thoughts
Let’s wrap it up. What is contextual backlinks? This is a backlink that you get from another webpage where the content is relevant to the information on your page.
..and contextual backlinks are most worth the hype.
They bring in tons of benefits, including:
- More traffic
- More visibility
- More links
- More authority
- More credibility
That’s why you must start earning more contextual links now, so you stay ahead of the curve as search engines continue to refine their algorithms towards rewarding them more.
There are also many different ways you can earn a contextual link with good link metrics. Through:
- Guest posts
- Broken links
- Interviews and podcasts
- Publishing high-quality and helpful content
So, what is contextual links? They’re the future of link-building in SEO. Go for them now.
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