Backlinks have been the subject of quite a bit of back-and-forth in the SEO community—enough that you may wonder whether they still matter, whether they’re worth the effort, or whether they might actually do more harm than good to your website.

In the early, “Wild West” days of search engine optimization, getting links back to your website was one of the most effective ways to juice your search engine rankings; as such, paid link directories and article databases emerged as just two of the duplicitous, “black hat” SEO practices uses to artificially inflate search engine success.

Google’s algorithms caught up with these practices in time and implemented strict penalties against illicit backlink practices. Because of this, there are some who say that backlinking is dead, or that it can be dangerous.

Here is the truth, though: For all the chatter and all the controversy, backlinks—when they are gained legitimately, not through tricks or gimmicks—can still be a big deal for your website’s rankings. In fact, many experts believe that backlinks are among the most influential factors in determining a website’s rank.

Getting Backlinks—The Right Way

All of this begs the question: If backlinks matter, but there are only certain approved ways of obtaining them, what’s the best way for a marketer or a webmaster to achieve the links they need? Strategies can vary, and ideally will encompass a variety of different tactics. For our clients at enCOMPASS, we go down different avenues to gather links, just depending on the nature and objectives of the client website.

Some of the best ways to generate backlinks are as follows:

Ask for them. The safest way to generate a backlink is simply to identify an industry influencer—a blogger in your niche whose site carries a lot of clout—and ask for a link. Though this helps you steer clear of Google penalties, it obviously hinges on you forming a good relationship with the influencer in question. A work-around is to mention or quote the influencer in your blog or in your tweet, then ask the influencer to share the piece—a good way to answer the “what’s in it for me?” question head-on.

Become a guest blogger. You can also win backlinks by penning a guest blog for an influential publication; many sites allow guest bloggers, and will allow you to have one or two backlinks placed in your article. This is time-intensive, but can be effective, too.

Create an infographic. Similarly, creating an infographic, and embedding it with a link to your website—or simply requesting that those who share the infographic offer proper attribution—can help you generate links while building thought leadership.

Do some content marketing. Finally, simply engaging in the best content marketing practices—creating and sharing content that is helpful and meaningful—can help you to earn backlinks. When all else fails, make your content so good that people will want to link back to it.

Backlinking isn’t something you do in a vacuum, of course; it’s part of a fuller, broader marketing strategy. That’s where we come in. We’d love to explain further what the merits of backlinking are, and how we can help you develop a website people will want to link to. Learn more by contacting us at enCOMPASS today.