The Ultimate Guide to Link Building:
Essential Knowledge to Improve Your Search Engine Optimization

What is netlinking? What is its purpose?

Netlinking is an SEO practice (Search Engine Optimization) that improves a site’s linking structure. Also known as external linking and link building, netlinking contributes to enhancing the ranking of a web platform in search engine results. Web specialists perceive it as a simple and effective means in their activities. They use it as a strategy to quickly increase the number of backlinks to a website’s pages.

As you may have noticed, the primary function of netlinking is to participate in the optimization of a website. It helps improve its SEO, popularity, and consequently its audience. If you’re struggling to make progress with your website or e-commerce store on Google, for example, you should keep this information in mind. Netlinking can be an excellent option as it enhances your reputation.

It is true that it is not the only factor to consider when it comes to better positioning web pages or entire sites on the internet. However, it is one of the most absolute elements that directly and naturally impact a website’s visibility.

At first glance, the definition of netlinking is simple to understand and apply. However, to achieve concrete and impactful results, certain criteria must be considered. It is necessary to know the variations of this practice and to master their different implications.

What are the different types of netlinking?

When mentioning the term netlinking, many people generally refer to external links. In other words, they mention links (backlinks) that point to the site to be made visible. It should be noted that the concept of netlinking goes far beyond this element. It also takes into account internal linking.

This type of netlinking allows Google robots to navigate smoothly through the various contents offered by a platform. Internal linking also enables Google bots to understand the logical links positioned on a site’s pages more easily and to decipher the semantics more effectively.

For netlinking to be effective, it is essential that outbound or inbound links are of high quality. Thus, the links pointing to the site to be made visible must be relevant. Overall, netlinking strategy may involve link exchanges between webmasters. It may also involve placing links pointing to:

• sites vitrines ;
• blogs ;
• boutiques en ligne ;
• annuaires ;
• discussions de forums.

In the past, simply positioning all types of links possible on a site was sufficient to succeed in netlinking. With updates and filtering systems integrated into search engines, this is no longer valid today. Indeed, search engines not only calculate the number of links present on a site to better rank it, but also take into account their relevance to visitors.

Speaking of the quality of a link, it should be noted that this refers to the match between the chosen external link and the general theme of the host site. For example, Google algorithms are set to detect the number of links present on a web platform and to determine their usefulness. For this, you can do netlinking in Nofollow or Dofollow.

What is the difference between NoFollow and DoFollow?

NoFollow and DoFollow are types of links that can be used to instruct search engine robots (Google, Bing, or Yahoo) on what to consider or not. When these bots crawl a website to detect links, this allows them to understand what to do for indexing.

Nofollow netlinking instructs Google to ignore this link despite its existence on the site. It urges the robots not to give importance to this link in terms of natural referencing unlike dofollow netlinking. For the latter option (Dofollow), netlinking instructs the bots to follow this link and consider it for indexing.

It is therefore possible to place any link that is not necessarily relevant on a given site and to prevent Google from using it to slow down positioning.

Backlinks and netlinking: what is the connection?

The concepts of backlinks and netlinking are often treated as synonyms in the majority of exchanges and practices related to SEO. This is noticeable because backlinking is one of the main variants of netlinking strategy. Both concepts have a common goal: to contribute to better positioning a website through the insertion of various links.

However, it should be noted that netlinking presents a wider range. It encompasses all techniques of creating hypertext links. These are used to facilitate navigation and impact on referencing. Speaking of netlinking therefore calls for:

• Outgoing links;
• Incoming links;
• External incoming links also called backlinks.

Backlinking is a netlinking strategy based on the multiplication of hypertext links pointing to a page to be highlighted on search engines. It relies on seeking various external links that can best position a site in SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).

Why develop a netlinking strategy for your SEO?

It should be recalled that the objective of a netlinking strategy is to make the site on which it is implemented visible. This notably involves obtaining backlinks from various popular web platforms that address the same topics or topics closely related to those defining the site in question. The result of such a strategy will be visible in terms of the traffic generated by the website.

A good strategy will therefore help identify mostly high-quality external links. These will serve to increase the number of visitors interested in the site on a daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly basis. SEO is a process that actually takes into account many other elements such as keyword relevance and content quality. It also considers the site’s loading speed and its layout.

However, compared to all these elements, link building also contributes to the effectiveness of SEO. More explicitly, for natural optimization to be effective, it is essential to know how to combine all these different elements. It is especially important to constantly improve each of them so that the work does not regress over time.

For a good external linking structure, there is the possibility to buy links, exchange them, or choose links that naturally suit one’s needs. If the link must be placed in dofollow, it is just important to ensure that it is genuinely useful. This is important because netlinking is a metric calculated based on the proximity of backlinks and their relevance to the site.

When the netlinking strategy is well thought out, it not only helps improve the visibility of the platform’s pages, but also becomes one of the trust indicators. Moreover, the better established it is, the more it benefits a number of stakeholders such as:

• The company or individual who owns the website;
• Search engines;
• Internet users.

What is a Netlinking audit and how to conduct it?

Before creating a website, it’s possible to identify links that can help create an excellent netlinking strategy. If this hasn’t been done beforehand, an SEO audit can be used to analyze both internal and external linking. However, it’s important to note that this type of audit can also be implemented to monitor the evolution of the netlinking strategy over time and evaluate its effectiveness.

Indeed, a Netlinking audit allows for the analysis of a site’s popularity. It’s a way to quantify the inbound links to a site and understand their relevance in general. This audit is part of the various aspects considered when conducting an SEO audit, alongside technical and semantic audits, which contribute to determining if a site is naturally well-referenced.

It’s therefore one of the key points that ensures the performance of an SEO strategy and identifies any adjustments that may be needed. To assess a site’s status, a netlinking audit must necessarily include the following information:

• The total number of backlinks;
• The different destination pages;
• Referring domains;
• The types of links;
• The anchor texts of the links;
• The source of the links.

To conduct a netlinking audit, calculate the total number of backlinks to compare the result with that of competitor sites. This allows you to identify potential gaps and adopt a plan to address them. After this step, review the pages to which the links from the audited website point.

Often, these links point to homepages. To adjust this and ensure a good distribution of the site’s popularity, links should instead point to various strategic pages of the site. It’s important to note that the audit should also evaluate the response codes of the destination pages that appear. If a 404 error is reported, this will later allow for the implementation of permanent (301) or temporary (302) redirection codes.

Once the destination pages are determined, it’s necessary to consider the number of referring domains. The ratio of links to referring domains should ideally be close to 1. By determining the various referring domains of the site, it’s possible to analyze their quality and ensure that backlinks point to trustworthy sites with strong authority.

During the execution of the netlinking audit, check the anchor texts and assess their diversity. There should be unoptimized, optimized, and semi-optimized anchors on the site. Regarding the types of links, it’s advisable to analyze during the audit the number of links:

• text;
• images with “Alt” tags;
• And other categories of links present.

Good to know: If the audit shows less than 70% text links, less than 20% image links with “Alt” text, and less than 10% other types of links, then each level should be addressed. Finally, it’s important to track the source of each link during the audit. In reality, the search engine Google demotes sites with links from network platforms.

Should You Refer to a Netlinking Agency for Your Campaign?

For successful SEO netlinking, it’s important to launch a campaign and use appropriate tools. The question that frequently arises is who should be entrusted with this mission. If you specialize in a web domain or have prerequisites in this sector, you can conduct your campaign. However, if you have no knowledge in this area, it’s best to turn to a Netlinking agency.

Generally, all SEO web agencies are experienced in managing netlinking campaigns. In reality, for this type of campaign, several specific details need to be taken into account. Therefore, it’s recommended to collaborate with a specialized agency as it offers various advantages.

For your netlinking campaign, an SEO web agency can help you obtain a good domain name and ensure perfect link sharing. Frequently, agencies working to make their partners’ sites visible have specialists of various levels. With their skills and above all their experience, these experts help clients benefit from close assistance.

With mastery of both main and modern tools, they can implement methods to achieve results. They also master the various netlinking techniques and know which ones to apply for a particular type of site. Whether you have an e-commerce site, a blog, a showcase site, a portfolio, or an institutional site, you have nothing to fear.

Choosing to entrust the mission to an agency is an option that undoubtedly benefits you. In addition to assisting you with the netlinking campaign, the chosen agency will help you better promote your site in general. The goal of web agencies is to offer concrete solutions to improve the performance of the sites entrusted to them.

To improve your netlinking strategy, don’t hesitate to contact a web agency, as it could offer you comprehensive services or personalized services. It could also help you find reliable links, sort through them, and position those that are truly worthwhile.

How much does a Netlinking campaign cost?

The Netlinking campaign is one of the SEO levers. It helps to strengthen the audience of the pages of a platform hosted online. To conduct it properly, web agencies offer various pricing or package options. Prices vary from one agency to another and depend on various elements that you will have the opportunity to discover. To provide you with a netlinking quote, your web agency must consider the number of pages on your site. It should also have information regarding the results you wish to achieve at the end of the collaboration.

For this, it needs to know if the campaign will be conducted through internal or external linking only or if it will involve both at the same time. In addition to all this, the web agency must know:

• If you already have quality content on your blog or website;
• If you want to create new content to enrich it or for its redesign;
• How often you usually publish;
• If a netlinking audit needs to be conducted on your site;
• If you have previously attempted a netlinking campaign, etc.

All this information will be taken into account to allow the agency to offer you a netlinking package adapted to your needs. Once this step is completed, you will then have an approximate estimate. Generally, several hundred euros are needed to expect to benefit from a good Netlinking strategy.

However, it should be noted that this estimate is average and can vary widely depending on your case. To get an idea, you can make estimates on dedicated websites by providing information specific to your platform. This way, you’ll have a more personalized forecast and know how to prepare in advance.

The 13 Netlinking Tools You Absolutely Must Have

As mentioned above, for the success of a netlinking strategy, it’s essential to master the use of certain tools. The 3 most important ones you can rely on are as follows:

Majestic SEO

This tool is one of the most used by web agencies for netlinking, but also for general SEO tracking. It allows you to analyze both your own site and competitors’ sites by entering a simple URL. Its operation is based on Citation Flow, which represents the number of times a website is cited by another external site. Majestic also operates based on Trust Flow, which allows it to know the number of external links pointing to a site.

You absolutely must have this tool because it offers users access to an interesting feature called “Search Explorer“. This will help you better rank your web pages by tracking their level of influence. Majestic SEO is available online in several versions. You can have the free version or the paid one according to your budget. However, for full access to the various features of the tool, the paid version remains the best option.

Google Search Console

It’s a powerful tool for successful SEO strategy implementation. It provides timely indicators that can help obtain information about the flow and origin of the backlinks to the site to be made visible. Google Search Console also provides access to information about the traffic generated by the platform.

If you want to know where to place your backlinks, you can use this tool. In addition to being essential thanks to its features, Google Search Console is free and accessible to everyone.

SEMrush

Powerful and combining a variety of original functions, SEMrush is a tool you must try without further delay if you want to improve the netlinking of your site. It is highly praised by SEO professionals and also allows to define the volume of backlinks and the size of the audience of a site.

It allows, among other things, to analyze most of the netlinking techniques implemented by the competing companies of a site. By using this tool, you can have vital information that you can use to boost your strategy.

Other Netlinking Tools Not to Neglect for Your Netlinking

In addition to Majestic, Google Search Console, and SEMrush, there are other tools that can make your job easier. In terms of improving internal and external linking, you can choose from at least the 10 tools listed below:

• Ranxplorer;
• SEObserver;
• Moz;
• Monitor backlinks;
• Monitorank;
• Ahrefs;
• Whitespark;
• SEMjuice;
• Smartkeyword;
• Semscoop.

Some Simple Tips for Successful Internal Netlinking

To succeed in internal netlinking, it’s important to understand this concept and master some dedicated tools. As a reminder, the goal of this type of linking is to use hyperlinks within a site’s content that point to different pages of the same site. Unlike external linking where links point to other sites, internal netlinking helps facilitate navigation on a platform.

It allows highlighting links to content already published by the site and related to specific content. To succeed in this type of netlinking, it’s therefore necessary to first respect this criterion. Furthermore, it’s essential to ensure that the positioned links are relevant and confirm or refute a statement.

Secondly, it’s important to ensure that these links are inserted logically and naturally, in order to prevent visitors from getting bored. Apart from that, it’s important to ensure that the anchor texts are diversified and point to different pages. You must absolutely avoid overusing optimized links. On your site, there should be non-optimized anchors, semi-optimized anchors, and fully optimized anchors. This helps to streamline navigation.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning that the structure of a website helps improve internal linking. Therefore, you should build it so that yours is simple and well-defined. This way, you can limit the number of “deep pages” and maintain the pagerank of your home page. Also, don’t hesitate to use themes that automatically install breadcrumb navigation or plugins that could help you access this feature on your site. This will help users find their way better after clicking on an internal link that points to a page other than the one they were focused on.

Netlinking Campaigns: Pitfalls to Avoid

For Netlinking campaigns, it’s extremely important to pay attention to certain details to avoid wasting time and missing out. You must absolutely avoid creating links on sites already penalized by search engines. Specialists often refer to the notion of “toxic links” to describe all links placed on sites that have suffered from Google algorithm penalties.

They can quickly become harmful to your site. To prevent this from happening to you, you must therefore research in advance all the sites where you want to place your backlinks. You can rely on the “metrics” of a backlink source site to ensure that the links are of quality.

Besides that, you should also optimize your website. The search engine Google takes into account the bounce rate of a site to better rank it, not to mention its user experience. The longer your site’s pages take to load, the higher the bounce rate will be, and this will have a negative impact on user experience. As a result, your site will be downgraded by Google.

To avoid this and ensure that your netlinking campaigns succeed, you must make sure not to load very heavy photos and videos. The loading speed should help open pages quickly and facilitate smooth navigation between them.

Another pitfall to avoid during your campaigns concerns the quality of your content. For example, the articles to which your site’s links should point should not be duplicated or lacking in keywords. In case of plagiarism, your site may be deindexed by Google.

So, make sure to load rich and interesting content for visitors. Make sure that the articles are truly written with simple-to-understand sentences and without spelling mistakes.

How to Avoid Inbound Link Spamming?

The term “spam” is used to refer to all forms of mass communication sent via messaging that have not been solicited. You have certainly noticed them in your email inbox. Spam can also be sent via SMS or through social networks.

These communications are often promotional and harmless. When inbound links are of poor quality and point to irrelevant content, there is a huge risk of them falling into spamming. To avoid this, you can use dedicated netlinking tools to assess the relevance of all inbound links.

The Best Netlinking Platforms in France: Our Comparison

To do netlinking in France, it’s possible to use various specialized platforms. They will help you with link purchasing as part of your netlinking policy. Among the best, you can turn to:

Ereferer

Ereferer has been a great success in the web field. The platform has nearly 50,000 blogs and over 300 directories available for the needs of SEO web agencies, media, and others. It exists in three languages, namely:

• French;
• Spanish;
• English.

You can sell and buy articles written to meet your netlinking requirements.

Access Link

Since 2021, this site has been one of the most visited online for questions related to web page linking. You can buy links for as little as €10 to improve your site’s position on Google. By using the services of Access Link, you will quickly have reliable links at very affordable prices.

WeWantLink

This platform brings together owner-operated sites that have been networked since 2020. You’ll find a multitude of thematic sites and access to paid writing services. With a sum of €15, you can find sites to improve your external netlinking.

Submit

This French platform was launched in 2016. With Submit, you’ll find many backlinks sold at interesting prices. Many users attest to the quality of the links highlighted by this site. You can use them to strengthen your overall SEO strategy.

Synapsis.link

To obtain relevant links, you can also exploit this innovative system. It will allow you to get backlinks through link rental. Each month, you can opt for this alternative, as it will prevent you from ending up with cumbersome links that will only overload your site.

Other Platforms to Strengthen Your Netlinking Strategy in France

If you want to try out more possible platforms to form your own opinion, here are some other sites you can rely on:

• Backlinks.fr;
• Booster Link;
• Easy Links;
• Develink;
• GetFluence;
• MyBackLink;
• DealerDeTemps;
• Linksgarden;
• Rank1.link;
• Semjuice;
• RocketLinks;
• Netlinking.fr;
• SeedingUp;
• Vipseo;
• Netlinka;
• Paper.club;
• NextLevel.
• Acheteuntexte.com

Can I Do Netlinking on Anglophone Sites from France?

To do netlinking in France today, you have many options. You can choose French-speaking sites to buy links and improve the netlinking of your blog or your company’s showcase site. Additionally, if you find Anglophone sites that interest you, you can also use them from France without any constraints.

To do this easily, you need to understand English and have the ability to follow various instructions. There are tools you can use to translate web pages into different languages. If you’re not comfortable with English, you can use one of them to simplify your life.

If you also want to order texts or other content in English to improve the visibility of a site, you can directly turn to English-language platforms, even if you reside in France. The web removes all barriers and it’s possible to place orders from anywhere. Certainly, you’ll have to pay according to the currency of the Anglophone country hosting the site of your choice, but you’ll get the desired result.

Apart from this aspect, you can also partner with different Anglophone websites to expand the scope of your site’s referencing. Thus, you can exchange links with these sites or buy links from them.

Furthermore, you’ll need to be careful to choose quality sites that are well-referenced and that can help you achieve your goal more easily. Make sure that the links they offer you are reliable. Above all, don’t hesitate to have your links placed in interesting articles.

To find these types of sites online, you can refer to platforms that specialize in netlinking and bring together websites from various backgrounds.

Good to Know

Discover here answers to a number of recurring questions when it comes to Netlinking.

What is a good Trust Flow?

Trust Flow, abbreviated TF, is an element used to qualify netlinking. It represents a numerical value and, above all, an indicator that helps evaluate the quality of all links pointing to a website. In other words, webmasters and SEO specialists use it to measure the quality of all the content found on a website, considering of course the quality of backlinks.

The TF value ranges from 0 to 100. Although it’s not the only element taken into account to evaluate the effectiveness of the netlinking strategy, it plays a decisive role. Combined with other indicators like Citation Flow, Domain Authority, and Pagerank, it’s easier to achieve a more convincing result.

Anyway, the higher the TF, the better the quality of the various links pointing to the website being made visible. By deduction, the greater the TF value, the more your site will be considered partly reliable and relevant by search engines.

To find out the Trust Flow of a platform, you can use one of the online netlinking tools mentioned above. If you decide to use Majestic SEO, simply copy the URL of your site and paste it into the tool’s website to get the result.

The index calculation is done considering the largest link index database globally. This database is updated daily and helps to have the state of backlinks in general. Trust Flow is often lower than Citation Flow. Furthermore, for it to be good, its score must be greater than 40 at least.

Is Free Netlinking Possible?

It is indeed possible to do free netlinking using accessible freemium tools. To develop and execute a netlinking strategy, you need to allocate a predefined budget. But based on some clever methodologies, costs can be cheaper. However, it should be noted that this will require more time and energy, which you must have before starting the process.

To get backlinks for free or at a relatively low cost, you can rely on the services of the Bloggermax platform. It specializes 100% in SEO article exchange. Developed by the founder of Boosterlink, this platform represents a good alternative to enjoy the benefits of free netlinking.

In addition to this, you can also work on your own to create engaging content on your site. If the articles are rich in information, easy to understand, for example, and the links are well chosen, then you will succeed in your netlinking campaign.

Apart from these different tips, you can also find responsible and reliable partners to carry out link exchanges. This solution will allow you to partner with sites that have the same need as you and want to improve their visibility. You’ll be able to exchange links without having to pay a penny.

Are There Penalties Related to Netlinking?

When netlinking is relevant, it can help you gain visibility and better sell the products or services highlighted by a site. Although it is an element that strengthens the strategy of natural referencing, it can also be the cause of numerous penalties.

Although rare, it must be said that netlinking can be the cause of a manual penalty from Google on a web platform. This can lead to its downgrading and regression in the positioning of websites during user searches. Before the sanction is actually lifted, a general cleaning of the external linking of the penalized site must be carried out.

How to Avoid Netlinking Penalties?

You can avoid penalties related to netlinking by respecting the basic rules of this strategy and understanding how algorithms work. The slightest mistake can lead to a penalty. So be vigilant regarding the quality of the links used to build your netlinking.

Always specify if the links in your content or those pointing to your site are nofollow or dofollow. Don’t hesitate to vary your anchors and use appropriate keywords for your content. Don’t collaborate with penalized sites and don’t forget to insert your links into interesting content for users.

Netlinking helps to showcase your website and attract as many visitors as possible. So, take these tips into account to avoid it becoming the subject of a penalty.