Resource Link Building

Introduction

Resource pages are web pages that connect to industrial, educational, or local resources (for example, articles, video content, audio or podcasts, infographics, and comics) to improve the user experience of site visitors.

Some resource sites merely list the links, while others list and explain each resource mentioned.

In general, links from resource pages are earned by being the best resource on your topic. Most authoritative resource pages go to great lengths to find the absolute best materials; you want to be their go-to resource.

Getting backlinks from resource pages is simple because such pages exist solely to connect to the best sites! You are free to suggest your material as a good choice to link to.

In addition, you can look at what is currently on a resource page and create a resource that is far better, specifically targeted at resource link building on that page.

Resource link building opportunities are well worth taking advantage of, as this approach is exceptionally reliable once you manage to find relevant resource pages. But how do you get started with resource page link building?

Let’s take a look at the basics of this type of search engine optimization.

What Is Resource Page Link Building?

Resource page link building occurs when you get backlinks from websites that curate and link to a variety of useful industry resources. Resource link building is one of the most prevalent link building strategies out there.

It is also one of the simplest link building tactics to implement. It does not require any trickery, and for certain prospects, you will not even need to undertake outreach because their website may well include a page submission form.

It is simple in comparison to other ways of link building, and, provided you select your prospects carefully, the links you obtain will be from authoritative, high-quality websites.

It is not only beneficial to your search engine optimization, but it is also helpful to people seeking reputable information on something specific within your niche.

The Benefits of Building Links with Resource Pages

So, what is the big deal about getting links from resource pages?

For starters, having more links going to your website is good. This is always a beneficial thing unless the links are sketchy – and links from a resource page are very rarely sketchy!

Beyond this, resource pages are generally regarded as credible. People are more likely to see and click on your link if you have credibility. What makes them credible? There are two main explanations for this.

First and foremost, resource websites exist to help people, not to sell products. People are more likely to trust the website and the links on it because there is no buy now button (although, in some cases, certain resource pages may have affiliate links on their web pages).

Second, resource websites are frequently developed by trustworthy or renowned sources. Academic resources, medical resources, and valuable collections of helpful links like that are often curated lists put together by major, trustworthy organizations in the field.

If links pointing to your site are visible on relevant resource pages from a trustworthy organization like the NHS, people are going to trust them and follow those helpful links much more than if they just find a backlink in a blog post.

Getting Started With a Resource Page Link Building Strategy

Resource link building is a common link building strategy used by SEOs and marketers to obtain high-quality, niche-relevant backlinks that provide numerous link building benefits for your page.

This technique is very effective if you devote a significant amount of time and resources to content marketing. Specifically, you should be spending a lot of time on blogging, guides, and reports.

This needs to be good quality material: the person responsible for a web page of resources will not want to include poor quality content from external websites on their page.

The better and more material you have on your website, the more probable it is that other websites will be pleased to feature you as a reference on their page for your desired topic.

When your website has at least 100 articles and ranks for thousands of keywords, you can look into resource link building. But why should you be focusing on this?

Freshness

The first and most important reason you should begin resource page link building is that websites are looking for new resources to update their resource pages.

It is no secret that Google loves more recent and up-to-date content. So, in order to remain fresh and up-to-date, you must periodically update your old content and add new information.

This also applies to resource pages, which must be updated on a regular basis to comply with the requirements of the Google Freshness algorithm.

So, by approaching them and requesting that they update their resource page and include you as one of the resources, you are actually doing them a favor and making their job much easier.

If they are concerned about their resource page, they will want to ensure that you are trustworthy and genuinely super helpful, and they will not want to direct their users to a shady website.

Because of this, they will examine your website, website traffic, and some of your content to guarantee you are delivering value.

So, before you start resource page link building, it is important to make sure you are a genuine resource with high-quality content.

It is not enough to provide fresh content: you also need to ensure that you are offering genuinely great resources and awesome content for their users.

Outreach for Resource Link Building Opportunities is Easy

The second reason you should begin with resource link building is that the outreach process is simplified. This is because many websites will provide a way to contact them in order to be featured as one of the resources.

Be friendly and polite when you submit resources, and ensure that you make your niche clear in the subject line of your email to the site owner, and you will have a good chance of getting some valuable link juice out of a tiny bit of email outreach.

This makes it a very appealing link building method because the world of link building outreach is usually such a frustrating one. Finding the right person to share your links typically takes a long time and is not the easiest thing to do.

You still have to find resource pages to reach out to and put a large amount of effort into actually creating your useful resources, but if you are already writing informative content like a step-by-step guide or a complete guide, resource link building is much easier than guest posts or other classic approaches that you might use to build links.

How to Start Building Backlinks with Resource Page Link Building: Step By Step

Starting with resource link building is actually pretty straightforward, especially if you use link building tools to make your life easier and have a lot of valuable resources on your website.

If you have already got the content in place, this is one of the easiest ways to build high-quality backlinks.

The ease or challenge of this method is primarily determined by the quantity and quality of your website’s resources. Thus, if you have a fantastic website with an abundance of information and high-quality material, getting included on the resource page you have chosen will be a breeze.

You do not have to be winning blog awards, but you do need to be providing useful resources with genuine value.

Let’s take a look at the process for getting backlinks from the best resource pages. We are going step by step here, and at the end of this, you should have a to-do list that you can use to build high-quality links.

Step 1: Prospecting for Leads

Prospecting is the initial stage in creating resource links.

Fortunately, this is simple because most resource pages have common traces that you can follow to locate plenty of resource link building chances for your area.

Google Search Strings is a great place to start. Simply edit any of these strings to your desired keyword and enter them into Google search:

• Keyword “best resources”
• Keyword “best blogs”
• Keyword inurl:resources
• Keyword” useful resources”
• Keyword intitle:links
• Keyword “helpful links”
• Keyword intitle:resources inurl:links.html
• Keyword inurl:.com/resources
• Keyword inurl:resources intitle:resources
• Keyword intitle:links inurl: resources.html
• Keyword inurl:.com/resources

In some cases, you may find that your chosen keyword is actually too specific, and you are not getting very many search results at all.

This can happen if your page is in a very obscure niche that is too small to actually have a dedicated resources page on any website. This is not a disaster: it just means you will need to search a bit harder.

If you find yourself in this frustrating situation, simply use the “~” search operator to find resource pages that focus on keywords related to your primary page keyword.

Your outreach may need to be a bit more determined to get these other sites to host your links, but the results should improve your backlink profile just the same.

Using search strings like this is the best way to find resource pages, and the search results should leave you with an enormous list of resource pages relevant to your niche.

Whether you are a local business or an SEO site, using search phrase strings and related searches like this is the best way to find pages that might be relevant leads.

Step 2: Narrowing Down the List

Once you have compiled a list of resource pages, it is time to choose those that will help you move the ranking needle and are not spam.

The first detail you want to check is that the website provides a DoFollow link, as this is the value-passing type of link that will help you with organic rankings on the search result pages.

Simply navigate to one of your possible resource pages, right-click on the link, and select “Inspect.” This will open a window containing the website code and highlight the link’s source code.

You should now look at the rel=”” portion. If you see the phrases “nofollow,” “sponsored,” or “UGC,” this link is Nofollow and does not pass any link juice.

You should also consider the organic traffic of the pages you are looking at.

There is no point reaching out to get featured on a resource page that does not get any visitors, as even with a great conversion rate, that will not help your site very much. The higher the organic traffic, the more Google trusts the website.

If you are just getting started, we would generally recommend starting with domains that have at least 500 organic visitors per month, according to your SEO tool of choice.

Site Types To Avoid

Avoid spam pages and Link Exchange webpages. You may come across resource pages that ask you to exchange backlinks in order to be included.

This is in violation of Google’s quality guidelines, and you do not want to be linked with these websites.

Avoid pages that require payment from you in order to be featured: If the website is managed by a blogger, this could happen to you. While this is a popular practice, we would advise steering clear of these.

Not only is this likely to lead to your site falling victim to expensive scams, but also because buying or selling links that pass PageRank is against Google Quality Guidelines.

If you find a resource page with a lot of broken links that do not lead to external resources, it is best to take it off your list.

Broken links suggest that the resource page in question is not well maintained and probably not a very useful prospect for your resource page link building efforts. Any kind of dead links is a sign that the website owner is not worth your time.

Step 3: Outreach

Once you have a list of validated prospects, you can begin your outreach effort.

This is usually very simple because the resource page generally includes an avenue to contact the person in charge and offer a resource link.

If the resource page does not have a clear contact path, you will need to do some research to discover the site owner of the blog. Start with the Author of the page or identify someone in control of the blog.

You have to understand that most prospects will not reply to you, and this is not a reflection on the quality of your content; they are most likely busy, and your emails to their resource page are probably not a very high priority. It may be worth sending a follow-up after a week or two.

While most resource page prospects are unlikely to result in links, the hit rate for this type of page tends to be higher than from cold contacting other types of pages in the hopes of getting a backlink to your site.

Conclusion

It is important to build links if you want to rise up in the search results rankings, and resource page link building is one of the best ways to build high-quality backlinks for your site.

If you can get a resource page to host a link to your page, then the amount of organic traffic you will get from search results can be enormous.

You will have to put the time in to create good content, of course, but if you are not making good content, then you will probably be struggling to get a good conversion rate even if you have got a large number of search hits for your page.

As long as your page has valuable content, you can search for a resource page that might want to link to it and reap the benefits.