Link building in 2026

Link building in 2026
Latvia SEO Meetup 22.1.2026

Transcript

1. Link building in 2026 Latvia SEO Meetup 22.1.2026 Katarina Dahlin Senior Growth Hacker at WHITEPRESS®
2. • Senior Growth Hacker @ WhitePress® • From Finland, living in Estonia • Link building strategies • Research about link building and SEO • SEO & growth marketing since 2019, on the Nordic markets and internationally. Katarina Dahlin
3. 3 When we start with link building, this is our goal… Organic traffic growth increase while we build links
4. 4 But sometimes, this is what we get…
5. 5 One worked. One didn’t. Why? Both of these sites built backlinks, in the same niche.
6. 6 What actually happened • Only dofollow links • Only exact-match anchors • Linked only to the main money page • No branded links → Rankings dropped after a few months.
7. 7 What actually happened More holistic link-building approach: • different link types • different anchors • different target pages & home page links • branded links • consistent link building → Sustainable & growing rankings
8. I analysed clients who are actively investing in link building, to see what they do change image here No theory Real examples
9. WhitePress® change image here 30,000 clients 34,000 publisher websites 34 languages
10. 10 • What are they doing & why? • What is actually working? • What types of links are they building? • What strategies do they use? • What doesn’t work & what to avoid? Clients actively investing in link building
11. 11 Let’s dig into it…
12. 12 Plan your link building from your starting point
13. Plan what keyword & page you want to rank better Avoid linking with the same keyword to different pages on your site → makes Google confused of which page to rank. Use exact-match anchors and partial match anchors on these, but also branded and other types.
14. Plan budget: Spread link building over time Spread the budget across several months. It looks unnatural to get 10–20 links in one month and no links for the rest of the year.
15. Competitor analysis • How many referring domains do top-ranking pages have? • What kind of sites are linking? • Where are they linking? Understand what’s required to compete → adapt it to your site. Ahrefs
16. 16 Examples
17. Case: Getting ready to rank in high season A Swedish B2C company wanted to rank when search demand peaked. Very seasonal niche. What was done? Dofollow links from 30 unique domains over 5 months leading up to the start of the high season. Result +150.6% YoY organic traffic growth after link building Link building period: 30 new links Baseline Nov 2023 Baseline Nov 2024 Baseline Nov 2025 YoY Growth: +150.6% YoY Growth: +7.5%
18. Case: New sites need backlinks early +41% top 3 positions links for 56 unique domains were built during this 2 year period My advice: Set apart 10-20% of the marketing budget on link building. Links from 56 different domains were built consistently over 2 years, with start 5 months after launch. Result During a 2 year period, keywords in top 3 grew 41%
19. 19 Publisher domain & page relevancy
20. Exclude domains linking to your site already We care more about amount of unique referring domains, than same domain linking many times. Use the filter in the WhitePress® platform
21. 21 Relevancy matters
22. Relevancy matters The domain must be topically relevant. The article we get a link from and the surrounding context must be topically relevant. A gardening eCommerce can have links from flower or gardening blogs.
23. Find publishers ranking on relevant keywords If a publisher site ranks for your keywords, Google already see it as topically relevant. Use the filter in the WhitePress® platform
24. 24 → casino, CBD, adult content… Be careful with sites that heavily link to sensitive niches, if you build for white hat niches Latvia: 249 publishers that do not accept casino content Lithuania: 715 publishers that do not accept casino content Estonia: 167 publishers that do not accept casino content
25. 25 → Check with site search in Google News sites are usually fine, they are super strong and have many topics.
26. 26 Domain authority (DR)
27. 27 The stronger the referring domain is, the more powerful is the link you get (Domain Rating)
28. Sort by domain rating or organic traffic Check also if the publisher offers dofollow links
29. Check referring domains in Ahrefs yourself Don’t blindly trust DA metrics Spam links, no link juice
30. Ordered publications per DR in the Baltics in 2024
31. 31 Traffic & indexation
32. 32 The linking site has to have traffic If it is already ranking, Google likes the site! Aim for consistent traffic, avoid sudden drops
33. 33 The linking page has to be indexed → You can choose portals where most of the articles get indexed. Use the filter in the WhitePress® platform
34. Internal links to the article → helps with indexation → makes it crawlable and findable
35. 35 Homepage links vs links to money pages
36. Homepage links are one of the safest ways of building links.
37. They look natural and lower risk compared to direct money-page links
38. → No anchor text risk → No over-optimization → No confusion about which page should rank Homepage links have:
39. They strengthen domain-level authority, and distribute link equity across the site
40. Of course also use inks to money page. Very effective. Just don’t overdo it with only building links here with exact match anchors.
41. 41 Links & Anchors
42. 42 Branded vs exact match anchor texts
43. Branded and partly branded anchors are safest The stronger your domain is overall, the more you can use exact match anchors. If a new domain, start with branded anchors. WhitePress® whitepress.com WhitePress® link building platform
44. Do not only build exact match anchors to money pages Specially if the keyword have high search volume Only exact match anchors were built in the beginning. The site increases in organic traffic. But it’s not sustainable. The site tanked when no branded anchors were built. Has to look natural
45. Example of a diverse anchor text profile in a competitive niche Branded 11% Partial branded 6% URL 13% Exact match 20% Partial match & phrases 35% Generic 17%
46. 46 If you buy 3 backlinks to the same page, use a natural mix for sustainable results 1. Branded & partly branded keywords 2. Exact match and partly exact match keywords 3. Phrases, URLs, CTAs
47. 47 How many links in one article?
48. Start with one sponsored article per page One topic, one article, 1-3 backlinks. Not an absolute rule. Add 1–2 external links to other authoritative, non-competing sources (to keep it natural), or internal links to other articles on the publisher site.
49. 49 Dofollow, nofollow & sponsored links
50. Not all links are equal, but all can be useful Dofollow links pass link equity (PageRank) directly. Nofollow links don’t pass PageRank, but can act as authority signals. If relevant, they can support rankings (e.g. Wikipedia links). Sponsored links are generally treated similarly to nofollow links. A healthy link profile always includes nofollow links. Keep it natural. Number of nofollow links low → unnatural Number of nofollow links higher → more natural
51. Filter out dofollow links in the WhitePress® portal
52. https://www.growth-memo.com/p/how-ai-really-weighs-your-links-analysis Nofollow links are important for AI-search
53. Nofollow links matter for LLMs It doesn’t matter whether links are nofollow or dofollow. → Both are important for visibility and ranking in AI-driven search. https://www.growth-memo.com/p/how-ai-r eally-weighs-your-links-analysis
54. Image links perform better than text links for LLMs https://www.growth-memo.com/p/how-ai-r eally-weighs-your-links-analysis
55. High Authority Score helps visibility in AI search Your site must first reach a certain level of authority before it can appear in AI-driven search results. Getting links from multiple different domains is very important, not just the number of links from a single site. Quality links matter. https://www.growth-memo.com/p/how-a i-really-weighs-your-links-analysis Semrush authority score: Link Power (quality and quantity of backlinks) Organic Traffic: estimated monthly average of traffic Spam Factors (Natural Profile)
56. 56 Brand signals are important in 2026
57. Important brand metrics: → Brand mentions → Brand searches → Traffic from other channels
58. Brand mentions in Google Brand mentions without a link, in topically right contexts, is an authority signal to Google (E-E-A-T). → Google dare to rank your site on related terms
59. Brand mentions are important for AI-searches → The brands with the most brand mentions appeared most often in AI Overviews → Branded anchor texts, brand search volume, and DR are also important https://ahrefs.com/blog/ai-overview-bra nd-correlation/
60. The more often a brand is mentioned online in contextually relevant discussions, the higher the chance it becomes part of AI-generated answers.
61. Brand searches An increase in branded searches signals to Google that your brand is in demand in the market. → Google ranks what people search for. → If people search for your brand, Google will show your brand.
62. Brand searches Lot of searches on brand + product → Google will also rank your product on non-branded searches for that product
63. Traffic from other channels Traffic from other channels than only Google signals to Google (via Analytics) that this site is real, it is a real brand, it has real traffic and doesn’t only exist to rank in Google organic. When a page get traffic from other channels, specially viral traffic, it tends to give a ranking boost in organic traffic too.
64. 64 To end this talk..
65. 65 • Plan your link building carefully • Build topically relevant links • From sites that has organic traffic • And from high-authority domains (DR) • Referring domains > amount of backlinks • Keep the link profile natural and diverse Quick link building checklist
67. 67 Thank You! whitepress.com Katarina Dahlin Senior Growth Hacker, WhitePress® katarina.dahlin@whitepress.com linkedin.com/in/katarina-dahlin