Organic Link Building Best Practices: What to Check Before Starting

Before starting an organic link building campaign, I would check which page I’m going to promote, whether the websites I’m approaching are a good fit, and what I can say that gives them a reason to consider the link.

We will go through those checks here, using a cash flow template as an example. The aim is to help you work out what another website could use from your page before you start sending emails.

By organic links, I mean links someone chooses to include because your content helps their readers, without payment or an agreed link exchange. You can still reach out to introduce your content. The decision to reference it stays with the author or editor. If that distinction is new to you, start with what organic links are.

Choose the right page to promote

First things first, we need to choose the right page. If it’s a service page, someone needs to understand what’s included and whether it’s suitable for them. If it’s a blog post, the answer should be easy to find without reading through a long introduction.

But being easy to read doesn’t give someone a reason to link to it on its own. Here are a few types of pages I would recommend:

• Templates people can use. Something that helps them complete a task, with enough explanation to get started.
• Original research they can reference. Useful findings with the data source, method and limitations explained, so someone can check what the numbers mean.
• Detailed guides that show how to do something. Clear steps and examples that add more than a general overview.

Each can give another website something useful to reference. A template with a completed example, for instance, can help an author explain a process without having to build the resource themselves.

It’s also a good idea to open the page on your phone and check that its links and downloads work while signed out. If a reader hits an access request instead of the template, they can’t use the resource you’ve recommended.

If research is the better fit for your business, our expert discussion on creating research worth linking to goes into what makes a finding useful to publishers.

The page you want to rank might not earn the link

Let’s say you run an accounting business and you want your service page to rank for “accountant Sydney”. That page helps people decide whether to hire you, but it can be harder to earn organic links to because there’s less for another website to reference.

So you could create a cash flow template that helps business owners prepare a forecast. That gives someone writing about cash flow a useful resource to link to, although the backlink would point to your template rather than your service page.

From there, you can include a relevant internal link to your accounting service page, so anyone using the template who needs more help can find your service. That creates a useful path for the reader; it doesn’t guarantee that your service page will rank for the keyword.

Check whether the website and article are relevant

Once the page is ready, the next question is which websites to approach. For most businesses, I would put relevance first, even if the metrics are a bit lower.

If there aren’t many websites focused on your industry, broader publications can be worth considering too. But even with a good Domain Rating, the article itself still needs to be relevant to your page.

Back to our cash flow template example, a general business website could be a good fit if it publishes content about managing finances. An unrelated article on that same website wouldn’t become a good fit just because the domain has a strong score.

If an article explains how to prepare a forecast but doesn’t include an example, your template could help readers follow the steps. If there’s already a good template there, sending another one might not add much, so it’s worth checking before doing any outreach.

Read a few other articles too. Are the explanations useful? Do the links lead to sources that support what’s being said? Does the website appear to be maintained? Those checks give you more context than a list of domains and scores.

Keep the outreach specific and easy to follow

From there, I would contact the author of that article, or the editor who manages it. You’re asking them to consider a resource for their existing article, rather than asking them to publish a new guest post.

For the email, it’s probably a good idea to keep things simple. Explain what you’re sharing and where it could help, without making them read a long introduction first.

Using our example, the message could be:

Hi [name], I was reading your guide on preparing a cash flow forecast. We’ve put together a template with a completed example that might help readers follow the section on customer payment dates. Here’s the link if you want to take a look: [template URL].

That’s a sample message, so the section you mention needs to exist, and your template needs to deliver what you’ve described. Referring to a specific part of the article helps the recipient understand why you contacted them.

They still choose whether to include the link. A useful resource and a relevant email give them something to consider, but there’s no guarantee they’ll say yes. For more on the process, see how to get organic backlinks.

A quick note if a publication asks for payment

Some publications will ask for payment to include your link. That would be a paid placement, so it’s separate from the organic links we’re discussing.

I can’t tell you whether a price is reasonable without looking at the publication, but there are a few things worth checking before agreeing:

• How long will the link stay live? If they say permanent, ask what happens if the link or article gets removed, and whether they offer a replacement or refund. “Permanent” is a promise to clarify, not something you can verify in advance.
• What other outbound links will be in the article? Ask how many there will be and where they lead. Useful references can help readers; unrelated commercial links are a reason to look more closely. The count alone doesn’t tell you whether the article is good.
• What does the fee include? Confirm whether it covers writing, placement or outreach work, and whether the agreed article and destination can be changed later.

The same relevance checks still apply. A fee or a high domain score doesn’t tell you whether the publication reaches the people you want to reach, and payment doesn’t guarantee traffic or rankings.

Check the live link and keep measurement simple

Once it’s published, it’s a good idea to click the link and make sure it goes to the right page. If the article mentions your cash flow template, the reader should land where they can find it. Then save the article URL and date so you can check it again later.

For results, I would save the target page’s Search Console clicks and impressions before the campaign and compare them with a similar period afterwards. Keep any content changes in the record too, because an increase after rewriting the page doesn’t tell you the backlinks caused it.

Visits and enquiries from people clicking through the publisher’s article are worth checking separately from Google search traffic. They can tell you whether the reference brought interested people to the business, even if your rankings haven’t changed. I explain that distinction further in does link building increase organic traffic?

Start with one page and a clear reason to share it

Before building a long outreach list, pick one page and work out where it could help someone else’s readers. That gives you a clearer idea of who to contact and what to say.

You don’t need to turn every service page into a research project. A useful template or a guide with a clear example can be a sensible place to start, as long as it adds something the article you’re approaching doesn’t already provide.

For the wider approach, read the organic link building guide. If you’re choosing what to create next, compare the options in natural link building techniques.