Owned Link Building Activities
Directories and review sites
Online directories and review sites are low-hanging fruit for link building, requiring relatively low time and effort. These include websites like:
Create a profile for your company on these sites. Then fill in your company’s details, including a link to your site.
You can easily find more review sites by searching the name of a well-known software and “reviews” in Google. For example:
Compared to other link-building strategies, it’s easy to get backlinks from these sites, though they tend to be nofollow. Google is also aware of how directories and review sites have been used for link building, so these links don’t pass as much link equity as other sites. Still, getting listed on them is valuable as a source of referral traffic; it also legitimizes your brand to users.
Forums
Forums are another owned link-building channel that provides limited link equity but can help drive more users to your site.
Potential forums and communities include:
- Quora
- Hacker News
- Indie Hackers
Focus on those that actually connect to your brand and industry, and review each community’s guidelines before posting. And when you do post, do so meaningfully. Engage with other users by writing thoughtful comments and asking questions—don’t include a link to your content in every post. Some observant users, particularly those on Reddit, will call out posts that come off as overly promotional or self-serving.
Consider how this marketer at Ahrefs writes helpful Quora answers. They often link to Ahrefs but in an educational, not salesy, way.
However, we find that you can talk about your brand and share its content without backlash if you’re upfront about it. Eric Bandholz, the founder of the ecommerce shop Beardbrand, does this on Reddit.
