{"id":3474,"date":"2020-10-26T08:04:59","date_gmt":"2020-10-26T08:04:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2020\/10\/26\/digital-pr-the-strategic-approach-to-link-building\/"},"modified":"2025-06-17T07:45:02","modified_gmt":"2025-06-17T07:45:02","slug":"digital-pr-the-strategic-approach-to-link-building","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2020\/10\/26\/digital-pr-the-strategic-approach-to-link-building\/","title":{"rendered":"Digital PR \u2013 The Strategic Approach to Link Building"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"lead\">Link building can sometimes be a painstaking and thankless task. It can often devolve into a numbers game, reaching out to enough potential sites in an understanding that only a small percentage will respond to your request. Compounding this issue is the fact that the value of a link is well understood amongst most digital professionals, and as a result, links often come with a price tag attached. This means that when you do get a result, you might then be asked to pay at the end of all your hard work.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>In reality, when you are doing link outreach you are asking another organisation or person to do something that benefits you. Despite it being against Google\u2019s guidelines, that inequality in value keeps the practice of link buying in business.<\/p>\n<p>When we look at link building, we aim for a more strategic approach that cuts out both of these problems. Firstly, by narrowing the list of sites we are going after we can reduce the amount of time we have to commit. Secondly, by finding another way to provide value for those websites we reach out to, we avoid getting caught up in link buying.<\/p>\n<p>When we look for a solution that delivers on those ideas, we end up with something more akin to digital PR than traditional link outreach. In this article, I\u2019ll take you through this approach so that you can apply it to your link building process.<\/p>\n<h2>Identifying the right outreach targets<\/h2>\n<p>As mentioned before, the first step is to refine our list of sites that we\u2019re reaching out to. There are tools we can use to do this, but there\u2019s actually an easier first step.<\/p>\n<p>Start by thinking about your brand and sector, asking these kinds of questions:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>What are the influential publications in your sector?<\/li>\n<li>What kinds of websites do your target audience use?<\/li>\n<li>Have you received any good press or positive mentions on other websites in the past?<\/li>\n<li>Do you have any existing relationships with influencers in your sector?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>These initial questions can help you start to build out a target list based on your knowledge and experience of the digital landscape around your brand.<\/p>\n<p>If you have access to tools like SEMRush or Ahrefs, then you can also take a more data based approach. If you don\u2019t have access to any premium SEO tools, then <a href=\"https:\/\/neilpatel.com\/ubersuggest\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ubersuggest<\/a> is a good free alternative.<\/p>\n<p>Here you want to look for relevant sites with high domain authority. One place to start is to cross reference the sites you came up with based on your previous experience and sector knowledge \u2013 running these through the tool will confirm if they have the search authority you expect them to. To find more opportunities, look at the sites that are linking to your competitors. Are there any heavy hitters among them?<\/p>\n<p>Boil all of this down into a list. We don\u2019t want too many, maybe 10 as a good starting point. Once you have this list of targets, it\u2019s time to move on to the next stage.<\/p>\n<h2>Using digital PR to deliver value<\/h2>\n<p>We\u2019ve eliminated our first problem, the workload of mass outreach based on a predicted low success rate. Now we need to remove our second problem, the fact that the value of what the linking site is offering us is much higher than the value of what we are offering them.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s where content comes in.<\/p>\n<p>Every successful site needs quality content. If you\u2019re reaching out to sites with good domain authority, then you would expect them to know that. <strong>\u00a0<\/strong>So that\u2019s exactly what you\u2019re going to offer them.<\/p>\n<p>The first thing we want to do is rank our list of target sites by priority. Then, based on the kind of content they publish or focus on, group them by topic. What we\u2019re trying to do is build groups of sites where there might be some kind of crossover in the content they\u2019d be interested in.<\/p>\n<p>Once you have these broad topic areas, it\u2019s time to come up with a concept. In this case, a piece of content for each of those topic areas where you can demonstrate expertise and create some real value for the publishing site by expanding the authoritative voices on their platform.<\/p>\n<p>Now, flesh out those concepts into fully-fledged articles. Remember, the key goal here is to get a link on these high impact sites, so make sure you work in a natural link to your website as well. One way to make this look natural is to include other links to authoritative sources within the copy.<\/p>\n<p>With regard to the content you\u2019re producing, it goes without saying that quality is important here \u2013 this is where you need to think more in terms of digital PR than link building. Yes, the link is our goal, but we want to give the site a piece of content they\u2019d be happy to place regardless of whether it was a piece for link outreach or not.<\/p>\n<h2>Pitching out your content<\/h2>\n<p>Now you have the content, it\u2019s time to reach out to those high priority websites. Starting with the highest priority site per topic, reach out and pitch your content into them. Remember, treat this like digital PR \u2013 the topic and the content are the selling points, not the fact that you are looking for a link.<\/p>\n<p>For each topic, if you can\u2019t house the content with the top priority, work your way down the list. We want to place each piece of content with as high an impact site as possible. Once you\u2019ve found a place to publish the content, it\u2019s worth making it clear at this point that you\u2019ve included a link within the content. There may be some push back \u2013 but remember this is the reason you\u2019ve gone to all this effort, so make sure you fight for that link. If you can\u2019t get it, then it\u2019s time to move on to the next site on the list.<\/p>\n<h2>Pick the right method of communication<\/h2>\n<p>There is an art to sharing content with journalists, webmasters or whoever it is that you want to reach out to. Simply creating a template email which you amend for each person often won\u2019t get the job done.<\/p>\n<p>The real trick here is understanding what you can say that will catch their eye. Have they written something in the past which could be mentioned as a precursor to your content? Have they written about you or your brand before? These things can be the perfect way to prove you have done your research and care about the bigger picture, and that you\u2019re not only interested in the link.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, whilst we live in the modern world of technology, it is important to remember the trusty telephone. If you can find a phone number and you know who to ask for, then pick up it up and get them listening to you. Sometimes a chat over the phone can speed the process up and give them a reason to read your email.<\/p>\n<h2>The failure cases<\/h2>\n<p>If you can\u2019t place an article (link included) with any of the sites you\u2019ve found, then you have a few options.<\/p>\n<p>The first is to return to your research tools and find more quality sites to potentially sit the article with.<\/p>\n<p>The second is to use the content yourself. That\u2019s the great thing about quality content, it\u2019s never a wasted effort \u2013 make a few tweaks and publish it on your own site.<\/p>\n<p>And remember, even a \u2018no thanks\u2019 can open the door to a future relationship or opportunity. Although the chosen topic might be slightly off the target this time, there\u2019s no telling what else they may be on the lookout for in the future.<\/p>\n<h2>Embrace the strategic approach<\/h2>\n<p>Using the above process, you can get away from sending bulk outreach emails and seeing relatively small returns. Instead, you can make steps towards impactful and quality links that are based on good content \u2013 a win for both you and the site linking to you.<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019ve seen this strategy deliver great results for clients \u2013 if you\u2019d like to find out more how we\u2019d implement this approach for your website, <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/contact\/\">give us a call<\/a> and let\u2019s talk about how we can make your link building more efficient.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Link building can sometimes be a painstaking and thankless task. It can often devolve into a numbers game, reaching out to enough potential sites in an understanding that only a&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":3475,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"related_service":[45],"related_industry":[],"class_list":["post-3474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"acf":[],"card":"<article class=\"wp-component-card wp-component-card--dark wp-component-card--resource wp-component-card--post wp-component-card--full-width            wp-component-card--link js-card-link\n        \">\n            <div class=\"wp-component-card__image\">\n            <img width=\"868\" height=\"579\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/pete-PR-desktop-868x579.jpeg\" class=\"attachment-card-1-col size-card-1-col\" alt=\"Targeted approach to link building and digital PR\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/pete-PR-desktop-868x579.jpeg 868w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/pete-PR-desktop-276x184.jpeg 276w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/pete-PR-desktop-696x464.jpeg 696w, https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/03\/pete-PR-desktop-450x300.jpeg 450w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 868px) 100vw, 868px\" \/>        <\/div>\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content\">\n        <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-top\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__eyebrow\">\n                    Blog                <\/p>\n                        <a href='https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/2020\/10\/26\/digital-pr-the-strategic-approach-to-link-building\/'>\n        <h2 class='wp-component-card__title'>\n            Digital PR \u2013 The Strategic Approach to Link Building\n        <\/h2>\n    <\/a>        <\/div>\n                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__content-bottom\">\n                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__description\">\n                        Link building can sometimes be a painstaking and thankless task. It can often devolve into a numbers game, reaching out to enough potential sites in an understanding that only a&hellip;                    <\/p>\n                                                                    <div class=\"wp-component-card__meta\">\n                                                    <p class=\"wp-component-card__date\">\n                                26 October 2020                            <\/p>\n                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-card__terms\">\n                                                                                            <div class=\"wp-component-tags__tag\">\n                Content Marketing            <\/div>\n                                                                                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n                                            <\/div>\n            <\/div>\n<\/article>\n","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3474"},{"taxonomy":"related_service","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_service?post=3474"},{"taxonomy":"related_industry","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.elixirrdigital.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/related_industry?post=3474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}