Do you feel like your content marketing strategy is missing something? Could it use an extra boost in reach and engagement? It’s possible that building authority from everything you’ve already published could be the answer to growing your blog. Authority has big impacts on SEO, someone finding you online, and user experience–all factors critical for success as a content creator. Here’s how I used existing content to dramatically scale my reach, increase readership, and build my audience over time—let me show you the steps!
Utilizing Google Search Console
Building authority from existing content is a valuable way to increase traffic to your website through organic searches. One effective method to achieve this seamlessly is by harnessing the power of Google Search Console. This powerful tool helps you understand and optimize your website’s performance, including link analysis and targeting pages with high authority potential.
Visit the links section in Google Search Console to view internal and external links, top linking sites, and top linking text. These provide critical insights into what Google crawls and analyzes on your website.
Analyzing External Links
Focus on the external links and sort them by linking sites rather than the default option, which is incoming links. Doing so reveals the articles with the most link authority or credibility for your website. These top articles often have the most traffic and are likely shared on various platforms or picked up by other news sources.
Leveraging Homepage Links
Having numerous links pointing to your homepage is indicative of a healthy brand presence. Relevant, contextual links from external sites to your homepage can provide immense value as they boost traffic and improve your ranking on search engines.
Internal Linking Strategy
Create a robust and purposeful internal linking strategy on your website to build authority from existing content. Here are some essential benefits and steps to execute it effectively:
1. Increase the number of sessions: With well-placed internal links to relevant content, you’ll keep visitors on your site for longer periods. Increasing the number of sessions on your site can improve ad revenues and conversions from your monetized pages.
2. Reduce bounce rate: Internal links to related content reduce bounce rates by providing additional valuable information to your visitors. A lower bounce rate is a positive indication for Google, signaling that your content satisfies user queries.
3. Pass-through authority: Assimilate aptly targeted internal links to related content to establish website authority. Link juice is passed on as users navigate through the related content, signalling to Google that your website is an authoritative source for the given topic.
Effective Implementation
To implement these strategies, consider your top pages with the most external links. Identify or create two to three new articles on related topics and strategically place internal links to these articles within the top pages. Ensure you have at least one internal link targeting other site content for every 150 words in your article.
See Related: How to Format Answers on Quora to Optimize Views
Reciprocal Links
Additionally, incorporate reciprocal links between the new articles and the authoritative pages. This creates a favorable cycle of increased sessions, reduced bounce rates, and gradual authority propagation through well-structured internal linking.
Final Thoughts
To build authority from existing content, leverage the comprehensive features of Google Search Console, pay close attention to external links, and implement a result-driven internal linking strategy. Following these guidelines will improve your website’s performance and elevate your overall SEO efforts. For more information on building website authority, visit Moz’s guide on link building.
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