Links are often regarded as the lifeblood of the internet. They connect web pages together in a network. Sites in a strong network will be ranked higher by Google. So what you need, as a real estate investor, is a strong network with high-quality links (i.e. organic links).
Unfortunately, not only are there low-quality links, but there are multiple low-quality link building strategies.
Below, we’ll run through 15 link building strategies that actually work, for real estate investors.
15 Ways To Build High Quality Links To Your Real Estate Investing Website
#1 – Broken Link Outreach
What Broken Link Outreach Is
With time, many links become broken. The links may become broken due to site migration or other issues. When this happens, ask for this link to be changed to your site.
What it Looks Like
In order to find dead links on a page, you’re going to need a tool. When doing a page by page search, I use the Chrome plugin Check My Links.
How to Secure These Links
There are multiple ways to find broken link opportunities. We have our VAs use a system to find broken link opportunities by using search engine operators.
- They search for: real estate“resource pages”
- They manually check each page for broken links
- If there are broken links, we pitch the blog notifying them. If there are no broken links, we pitch the blog as a resource page.
Link building is all about creating value and if you have a great piece of content, blogs are usually happy to add it as a replacement to the broken link that was there before.
#2 – Link Reclamation
What Link Reclamation Is
Over time your website will lose links. This is natural and we can ask for the links to be reclaimed.
What it Looks Like
Any website that previously linked to yours, but for some reason removed the link. This could be due to:
- the website changed the URL
- the website is down or no longer functioning
- they removed your link
It’s important to know why your link is no longer live before contacting the website.
How To Find Opportunities
You will need to use a tool to find these opportunities. I use Ahrefs, but Moz and SEMrush work well too.
If using Ahrefs, navigate to your domain, and click the “lost” links section. Review the links and decide which ones are good opportunities to reach out to reclaim the link
How to Secure These Links
You can pitch out to the site owner and ask them why the links are changed or dead. In the majority of cases, the site owner will simply not know that the links are down – it could be for site maintenance, site migration, or various other reasons.
#3 – Sponsored Posts
What Sponsored Posts Are
A sponsored post is sometimes regarded as a grey hat tactic, but still a useful one. You simply pay a site owner to publish your article.
Make it clear up-front that you will not pay for a post labeled sponsored or paid. I could see Google giving less relevance to posts labeled “sponsored” in the near future.
What it Looks Like
Sponsored posts look like guest posts or any other blog. However, they will often have the ‘sponsored’ tag on them.
How To Find Opportunities
Type in “advertise Real Estate blog” to the search operators and see the results. You can also type in real estate “sponsored post” or real estate “advertise on our site”.
How to Secure These Links
Reach out to the site manager and ask if they would be interested in a sponsored post. As always, the content needs to be engaging and relevant.
#4 – Use Infographics
What Infographics Are
Infographics are simply statistics displayed in a graph. People love nothing better than statistics, except statistics displayed in a neat visual format. People will frequently share infographics on social media and link it to their sites. While it may not go ‘viral’ it can easily get a lot of notice as it will be frequently cited and linked to within the real estate industry. We can earn links with infographics in two ways:
- Submitting the infographic to an aggregator
- Pitching our infographic as a guest post
Both methods are quick and very scalable with a virtual assistant.
What it Looks Like
An infographic is just a graph/visual displaying important statistics. 
How To Find Opportunities
If we’re submitting infographics to aggregators, we’re going to use search engine operators to find opportunities. 
If we’re submitting an infographic as a guest post, we’re using search engine operators again, just with a different entry.
Make sure to denote the difference between an infographic aggregator and a blog. Not every blog likes infographics due to so many of them being spammed, so we only want to work with blogs that have posted infographics in the past. If they have posted an infographic in the past, there’s a good chance they will be looking for more.
How to Secure These Links
For submitting your infographic to aggregators, you can manually search for them on Google or you can head over to Fiverr and have someone submit them for you. (I use this guy)
For submitting your infographic as a guest post, you’ll need to write an outreach email to the contact of the website.
Here’s an outreach template to get you started:
Email Title: Are You Still Accepting Guest Authors?
Email Content:
Hey %Blog Contact Name%,
My name is Matt and I’m the founder of Nexus Homebuyers, a real estate investment firm in East Tennessee.
I came across your infographic (Infographic URL) a while back and I really enjoyed it.
We just had one built and haven’t published it anywhere.
I notice you accept content from guest authors and thought you might be interested in running it as a guest post.
If you are, I can send it over for you to check out.
Thanks for your time!
Your Contact Info
#5 – Guest Posting
What Guest Posting Is
Guest posting is the bulk of what most SEOs and agencies are relying on when you hear the term “link building”. A majority of the links that we build at Reibar Marketing are guest posts.
Simply put, guest posts are the best way to build links for your real estate investing website. You gain traffic, authority, brand exposure, and you build relationships with key influencers in the real estate investing industry.
What it Looks Like
Sometimes you’ll see a blog post written by a “guest author”, but most guest posts look just like normal blog posts.
How To Find Opportunities
Use search engines to find opportunities for guest posts.
A virtual assistant can find hundreds of guest post opportunities within a few days of work.
How to Secure These Links
Once you’ve found an opportunity, reach out to the contact person for the blog via social profiles, call, or email. Email is preferred by most blogs.
Each blog will have specific terms and conditions for your guest post. Hand these off to a writer and automate the process.
#6 – Blog Commenting
What Blog Commenting Is
I know what you’re thinking, “Matt, blog commenting is spam and we should never use it to build links.” Not true.
Blog commenting is one of the most common ways to build links and can be a great way to drive relevant traffic to a website and promote a great piece of content.
What it Looks Like
Any real estate blog that allows you to post comments can be beneficial to your website.
However, most blog moderators won’t accept short spammy comments like “great article!” or “look at my site too!”
Your comment needs to be relevant and provide value to the blog. Then you can add a relevant link to your comment.
How To Find Opportunities
Use search engines to find blog commenting opportunities.
How to Secure These Links
Blog commenting is one of the easiest ways to secure links. There are many blogs out there. All you have to do is leave a well-thought-out comment. At least 100 words are recommended.
#7 – Forum Commenting
What Forum Commenting Is
Forum comments offer a few benefits:
- Add link diversity for a brand new site AKA “pillowing”
- To promote a piece of content and drive traffic
There are a few great forums to get involved in with real estate. Here are a few to get you started:
What it Looks Like
A forum is an online platform for discussion. There are various types, but real estate forums tend to be places that connect the various parties (agents, sellers, investors, etc) on deals and opportunities.
How To Find Opportunities
We use search engine operators to find real estate investing forums.
How to Secure These Links
Just sign up to a site and you can post well thought out responses that include links – make sure to read the forums’ policy on links.
*If the forum allows you to fill out your website, make sure to add it. Some forums give you a backlink every comment you make, so make sure to take advantage of it.
#8 – Link Roundups
What Link Roundups Are
There are many sites that do a daily roundup up of links. Some of these sites are powerful, and landing a link is a great way to increase traffic.
Provided you have a good quality piece of content to share, you can reach out to these sites by sending them an email pitch.
What it Looks Like
A link roundup is simply a list of informative links on a particular niche. Here’s an example of a link roundup from www.patrickegan.com.
How To Find Opportunities
Look for titles like ’Best Real Estate Articles 2020’ or ‘Daily Real Estate News 2020’ or ‘Real Estate Latest News’ to see what roundups are available.
How to Secure These Links
Reach out to the site owner and ask if they would consider including your post.
#9 – Resource Page Links
What Resource Pages Are
This is similar to a link roundup but has an important distinction. The resource page is a static page linking to timeless content.
Link roundups usually occur on a frequent basis and link out to recently published content.
Resource pages can be a bit more challenging to land a link on than a link roundup due to trying to land a link on an already published piece of content, as opposed to a post that is upcoming and the author is actively seeking links.
What it Looks Like
The resource page is static and can be found on many sites. It’s a list of helpful resources. Below is an example from Nexus Homebuyers.
How To Find Opportunities
Type in ‘Top Real Estate Blogs’ or similar to Google.
How to Secure These Links
These links can be more difficult to secure than roundups. Site owners typically set up a resource page and may not update it for quite a while. Still, reach out to site owners to try and get your page included.
#10 – Claim Branded Mentions
What Branded Mentions Are
A lot of times, people will link to your site or mention your name in a related post. However, they may not actually link to your site. Monitor these sites using a free tool and reclaim the links.
What it Looks Like
Your brand or site will be mentioned without a link. Find your mentions using a software tool.
How To Find Opportunities
Tools to monitor these branded mentions include Google Alerts or FreshWebExplorer.
How to Secure These Links
Reach out to the site owners and ask to change the links. If you word the email carefully, it should not be a problem.
#11 – Check Competitor’s Backlinks
What Checking Competitors Links Is
The old saying goes “don’t fix what isn’t broken”. If you have competitors who are ranking very well, you can take a look at what they’re doing with their link-building strategy and replicate it. This technique is best suited for investors who understand what a good link is. To put it simply, the more high authority, relevant websites you can earn links from, the more attractive your website becomes to search engines.
What it Looks Like
Finding your competition’s links is now easier than ever with the tools we have at our disposal. You’ll use software like SEMrush, Ahrefs, or Spyfu to find backlinks on competitor’s sites.
How To Find Opportunities
Head on over to SEMrush.com and enter your competition’s domain.
Click on the backlinks and you’ll be able to see all the links currently pointing to the site. From there, you can examine which links make the most sense to go after.
How to Secure These Links
Once you’ve found a site that has a link that you want, contact the website and see about replicating that link. If it’s a guest post, ask them if you can write a guest post. If it’s a blog comment, write your own comment.
#12 – Video Links
What Video Links Are
Video links are links built from video-sharing sites across the web. These links are often referred to as “pillowing” links and are essential to building a solid backlink profile. The majority of these links will be no-follow links, but they are still relevant and can drive a ton of traffic to your site.
What it Looks Like
Below is a screenshot from a video on youtube. In the description of the video, there is a backlink to our site.
How To Find Opportunities
By using the search engine operators, you can find all kinds of video link opportunities. Here’s a list to get you started.
- MetaCafe
- Revver
- BlipTV
- Veoh
- Vimeo
- Flixya
- Break
- Daily Motion
- SevelLoad
- Atom
- PhotoBucket
- Zoopy.com
- Youtube
- Liveleak
How to Secure These Links
You’ll need some form of video content to get the link. Head on over to Fiverr and get a video made for your real estate business. You can get a great video made for under $200. (I use this guy on Fiverr) If you’re on a budget, create some slides on Powerpoint and screen record the slides, and explain them.
#13 – Local Bloggers
Who Local Bloggers Are
If you looked online in your city for local bloggers, you’d find hundreds of bloggers you could get a backlink from. All you have to do is send them a pitch and gain a link.
What it Looks Like
The majority of local bloggers cover fashion, travel, food, and some general niche topics. We have to find bloggers whose sites can relate to real estate.
How To Find Opportunities
Use search engines to find bloggers in your area.
Don’t forget to check social media too. Twitter is a great source to find local bloggers in your area. #(yourcity)bloggers
How to Secure These Links
There are two main ways to secure a link on a local blog.
- Send them a piece of content to post on their blog.
- Pay them to write a post and include a link to your site.
Most bloggers are not making a lot of money, so offering them a bit of cash to write an article they were going to write anyway is a big win for them and a great way to land a link for you.
#14 – Directory Listings
What Directory Listings Are
A directory is essentially like an online phonebook of URLs for businesses. Some have very high domain authorities and because there are so many of them, you can build a lot of links in a short period of time.
The best directory listings tend to be the paid ones. Still, they are not very expensive and are definitely worth the money.
What it Looks Like
A directory listing is simply a listing of online URLs. Here are some of the best directories for real estate investors:
- www.yellowpages.com
- www.zillow.com
- www.trulia.com
- www.yelp.com
- www.angieslist.com
- www.homes.com
- www.linkedin.com
- houzz.com
- www.thumbtack.com
- appraiserusa.com
- www.bbb.org
- www.facebook.com
- www.bizjournals.com
- www.xsitesnetwork.com
- www.homeadvisor.com
- www.mapquest.com
- www.manta.com
How To Find Opportunities
Google ‘real estate investment’ and ‘directory’. You can also add the name of your state for more precision.
How to Secure These Links
All you have to do is submit the details of your real estate business to the directory.
#15 – The Skyscraper Technique
What The SkyScraper Technique Is
This strategy is simple yet powerful First, you research a trend/article that is already popular. Next, you create content that delivers the same message in a unique way. When you have created it, you reach out to people who already linked to the existing content in the first place. Simple but extremely effective.
What it Looks Like
The Skyscraper technique can look like any high-ranking page that is continually improved.
How To Find Opportunities
Look for the top articles involving real estate trends in your area. Ahrefs wrote a great article going in-depth on how to find these opportunities.
In this instance, I used Ahrefs content explorer tool. I typed in “sell a house fast” and looked through the articles.
The article “Top 9 Steps To Sell A House Fast” came up as having over 10,200 organic views per month. This would be a great article to review and improve upon.
How to Secure These Links
To do this, you need to create a killer page or post that people want to link to. In the example above, you’d need to write a longer and more in-depth article than the one currently ranking. After this, you need only watch the links fill in. The Skyscraper technique is one of the biggest trends in SEO right now.
Summary
There is little doubt that a good backlinking strategy is the key to any SEO strategy. You can’t rank well in competitive niches, such as real estate investing, without links, and without rank, your page won’t get any traffic. The main issue is that link building takes a pile of work. If it seems like too much hassle, consider using a reliable digital marketing agency, one that specializes specifically in real estate investors. SEO for real estate investors is a tricky field, and working with an agency that specializes in only working with real estate investors might be a good fit. To learn more about how we can build backlinks for you, visit our link-building service for real estate investors or contact us.
