Search engines use web crawlers to reach all parts of the web, and one of the many things these crawlers look for is backlinks. What are backlinks, you might wonder? Any informed Seo hero knows it is simply what the name implies – a link listed on another website that directs viewers to your website.

While backlinks are certainly not the ‘be all end all’ of search engine optimization, a good Seo hero knows that these links are analyzed to determine popularity, trust, and authority of a website. A common rule of thumb: if a trustworthy site links to another site, that site is also most likely trustworthy. Therefore, it is important to know where on the web these links to your website are found.

Things to remember:

– Popular sites link to other popular sites

– Backlinks to your site are much more useful if they are on a site that covers similar content

– Links from highly trusted domains are more trustworthy than links from spam sites

– Be careful with the sites you link to on your own site – linking to a spam site doesn’t help your trustworthiness

– Social media sharing counts (but not as much)!

An Seo hero can check these backlinks for you, and run a series of tests to find out how many backlinks exist for a given website URL. These tests should be completed at least once a year, so you can keep track of the effectiveness of existing links as well as areas where you can possibly earn new backlinks to your site.