SEO For The Left: Backlinks

This post was previously hosted on www.mikeeschmee.com in November 2019. The below has been reviewed and updated in October 2023.

The full SEO For The Left Series:

Once you have the content and your site is properly formatted, the next most important thing to do is not even on your site. It’s getting other people to link to your site. Often referred to “backlinking”. It is important because it helps inform search engines that your site is trustworthy and has authority. The more sites that link to your site, and the more trustworthy those sites are, the more authority your site presumably has. This will lead to your content to showing up in search results more frequently and higher.

Since the beginning of search engines and their algorithms, gray and black-hat techniques have been used to falsely increase sites authority with backlinks. Search Engines have increasingly tracked and ignored these inauthentic techniques, so it is important it is done as closely to organically as possible. Buying 10,000 backlinks from a Fivvvvverr will not work (for long at least). In fact it could actually get you penalized! and you could be removed from Google search results completely.

Search can not only make sure more people see our views and think the way we do, but it can literally make or break a site. Below are what site owns should be doing to help increase their backlink portfolio which will increase your authority and search traffic. And also how you can use the power of your own site to help others (and the left in general).

If you don’t have your own site or work in media, there are some things you can do to help at the bottom, so please check those out.

What Site Owners Should Be Doing:

How To Help Your Own Site:

Have content:

-Have well written, well sourced, well formatted content. Content that people wouldn’t be embarrassed to share or use as a source. “Evergreen” content such as how-tos, explainers, top lists, etc. are helpful for getting backlinks. And check out the SEO For The Left: Content post for some content ideas and how to find the best phrases to use in titles and headers.

Internal linking:

-Link to your own content that is relevant. Manually link to related content in other content or just with well phrased keyword/topic index pages mentioned in the SEO For The Left: Onsite post.

Get credit:

-Make sure people who reference you/source you are linking to the relevant content on your site. You can use Google Alerts for your site/name to find sites that are referencing you, and reach out to the writer/editor to ask they add a link to your site.

Use yourself, writers, and friends:

-Actively write on other publications/blogs and make sure you have a bio on that site that is linked to your own site.

-Ask your writers to link back to their work on your site from their personal sites, bios on other sites they write on, and social media.

-Ask your media friends. The Media, and progressive media specifically, is semi-insular. At your monthly happy-hours or in the DMs ask for them to use your work as a linked source and to share on social media.

How To Help Others Using The Power Of Your Site:

All of the above, but opposite:

-Use other lefty sites as sources and properly give credit. Accept work from people outside and make sure your site has bios for authors (this is good for site authority too, mentioned in Onsite post) with links to their other work on progressive sites.

Link to Good Sites:

-Find progressive sources you can link to for each of your “verticals” that you write about. For example if you write an article about Climate Change, link to sites/specific authors that cover it from a more progressive bent than other sites. You could have a list of a few sites and authors for each topic that you start with for linking to related news or sources.

Do Not Link To Bad Sites:

-DO. NOT. LINK. TO. FOXNEWS / BREITBART / SINCLAIROWNEDLOCALNEWS / ETC. EVER. Journalistic integrity or courtesy be damned. Either find other “good” sources or do what the New York Times and New Yorker do and just don’t link at all when referencing the source.

-Use Google to search your site for old bad links and unlink them. Search: site:*your site domain**space**bad site domain* (example: site:www.commondreams.org foxnews.com)

The top 3 were “bad link” free, but the fourth was full of them. It could be argued it’s worth for showing their hate/bigotry/etc. but it should be a rare occurrence. The same can be done with screenshots with no link backs.

What Readers Can Do:

Social media:

-Follow those sites on social media.

-Link to these sites and articles on social media. (Google has claimed it does not use social as part of search rankings, but some have found that it may help, if just for the fact that more people visiting your site from any source leads to more organic shares/followers/backlinks.)

Searching and reading:

-When you are searching for something, go out of your way to find and read the more lefty site, even if it requires you going to page 2 or 3 of the google search results. And once you do go to that article, make sure you are spending time on the piece of content and going to other pages on the same visit. This will help that content rank higher, if people are spending time on the site and are engaged with the content.

-If you’re reading something that has a progressive site sourced but not linked, email the author/editor. I can not speak if the site you are doing that on behalf of would appreciate that, so do at your own risk.

*Turns hat AND chair around. Sits.* Let’s be real, one person or site doing this won’t make a huge difference but much like fighting against the entrenched powers ($$) that make it so 500,000 are sleeping on the street tonight in America, and 40,000 die from lack of healthcare a year, it takes a concerted effort and a big part of that is winning the information war. While SEO certainly isn’t the most important part of this effort, it’s something that shouldn’t be overlooked or mocked.

Here are some additional sources on best backlinking practices: