What Are Link Exchanges & Can You Still Use Them? A Guide to Safe and Effective Link Building
Link exchanges remain an evergreen strategy for search engine rankings, though they have changed significantly since the advent of the internet. Though a highly debated tactic for developing your online presence, link exchange is a legitimate SEO strategy that can come with many benefits–and potential hazards if done incorrectly. This article will explore the effectiveness of a link exchange, offer suggestions for best practices, and examine the downsides of this strategy so that you’re aware of the risks.
What is a Link Exchange?
A link exchange is simply when two websites agree to link to each other. This is also referred to sometimes as reciprocal linking.
The biggest difference between those two terms is that reciprocal linking refers to an exchange between two websites, whereas a link exchange can involve multiple websites, such as three-way link exchanges. Reciprocal link sharing, when two sites swap links, is the simplest form of this strategy and the most common method, but it’s also possible to have intricate links of web pages all sharing relevant content about one another.
Like many other tactics, link swaps have one main goal – to increase trust and authority to attract more organic users. This is based upon the original statement from Google indicating that links are essentially seen as a “vote of confidence” when editorially placed.
As such, spammy tactics (such as setting up Web 2.0 websites) have been killed off over the years because they are not editorially vouched for, they are simply created by the person promoting the website, much like a press release. Too many links, particularly spammy links, will also damage your ranking in Google’s algorithm, which emphasizes quality and relevance over quantity.
Editorial link placements are those that are added and “vouched” for by the websites adding them, which is what Google wants to see.
We will get more into that shortly, but for now, let’s look at why this is one of the more debated SEO linking strategies.
How Links Lead to Growth?
Link building is one of the most powerful tools for improving your position in search engines. Google sees backlinks as votes of confidence in the relevance and authority of your website.
The goal of every search engine is to provide the most useful results to users, and a web page with a strong backlink profile demonstrates multiple votes of confidence, so search engines will rate it higher.
As a case study, the team behind Stellar SEO showcased that a strong backlink profile can significantly increase a website’s organic reach. Namely, RocketCert, a client in the license/education industry, has seen a 122.6% organic traffic increase after just a year of working with our agency.
Typically, the more incoming links you have to your website, the better your search rankings. However, quantity does not matter as much as quality. A quality backlink on a guest post from a quality site carries far more value, or “link juice,” than ten connections from less authoritative websites.
What do we mean by high-quality versus low-quality? A high-quality link is one that makes sense for your business and comes from a website with high domain authority. For example, linking from spammy Facebook groups is not going to hold as much water with Google as relevant links from a well-respected website in your specific niche.
Avoiding a Link Scheme
Just as low-quality links will not serve your website very well, manipulative tactics, sometimes called link schemes, can be damaging to your SEO power as well.
These SEO strategies involve artificially inflating your search rating through exchanged links that add no value for consumers. For example, the site’s content may be irrelevant to your service, like SAAS businesses placing linking a garden store’s blog, or you may simply stuff backlinks on pages that make no sense.
When seeking potential partners for link exchanges, you should examine their website to see if there are relevant and high-quality backlinks from other websites already present. Do they write quality content for their pages that provides useful information to consumers, or is it all confusing and poorly worded? Approach link exchanges as a way to build relationships with other businesses; you wouldn’t want to have a suspicious company as a vendor, and you shouldn’t want to have suspicious sites link to your company, either.
Now that we have covered why inbound links from other websites are important for your business, let’s talk about exchanging links and reciprocal link building. You might have questions about whether or not reciprocal links are safe, let alone effective.
Below, we will talk through the ins and outs of exchanging backlinks and how this strategy could either help or hurt your SEO efforts. As with most marketing strategies, it all comes down to how well you conduct research and the resources you are willing to devote to this initiative.
“Any links intended to manipulate PageRank or a site’s ranking in Google search results may be considered part of a link scheme and a violation of Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. This includes any behavior that manipulates links to your site or outgoing links from your site.”
Followed by this point specific to link exchanges:
“Excessive link exchanges (“Link to me and I’ll link to you”) or partner pages exclusively for the sake of cross-linking”
Now, if you have been around the SEO space for long, you already know that what Google’s guidelines say and what they do are not always aligned. You also know that sometimes you have to read between the lines to really understand what they are getting at.
To better understand what is and is not a manipulative link exchange, we can consider some examples.
On one hand, we have a link exchange partnership with a reputable blogging website that consistently posts good content relevant to your niche. The webmasters have quality assurance checks and ensure relevance to the content you’ll be linked to. This would be relatively low risk, as Google will see this as valuable information.
On the other hand, you may have low-quality sites that accept any potential partners; they will place a link wherever they have available, regardless of whether it has any relevance to your own service. Their pages may be riddled with white text meant to trick Google’s algorithm without adding value for users, or they may have large lists of keywords at the bottom of all their pages. This would be highly risky and may damage your rankings.
When it comes to link exchanges, just like guest posting or any other type of link building, there are going to be risks. However, you can mitigate this by thoroughly vetting every page that offers a link.
The key to using this tactic is very similar to using guest posting effectively – focus on quality and relevancy. While this will not remove all risk, it will greatly reduce it, just as it will for a guest post.
Taking the time to research potential link swap partners, and looking at the “big picture” will help you make link exchanges safer, even though no link building is 100% safe, outside of posting great content and hoping for the best.
What to Look At When Considering a Link Exchange?
Link building is a major part of SEO, but organic rankings are not the only benefit.
If you get mentioned on popular, well-established sites, they can help you build brand recognition, trust, and referrals.
So, how do you identify a good link exchange partner? You need to dig into the website’s metrics. Examine their Domain Authority (DA), rankings, and monthly traffic.
However, a human touch is also crucial. Spend some time examining their site and reviewing their other content to determine whether they consistently produce good content that both consumers and algorithms will appreciate. Most of their information should also be relevant to your own needs. A site that mostly produces content about digital marketing may be reputable, but if your niche is interior decor, you may not gain much value from the partnership.
Remember, one or two quality backlinks are going to be far more advantageous to your overall strategy than dozens of poor matches. As such, focus closely on those sites that best match your own needs, then craft an outreach message that will emphasize the mutual value of an exchange.
Reciprocal linking is about building relationships with other sites, offering mutual benefits by improving one another’s SEO. If you stand to gain but the other brand doesn’t, you’re less likely to be approved.
When requesting a link exchange, remember that the link partner is also looking to improve their SEO. Explain how reciprocal linking will benefit them by emphasizing your own site’s relevance to their niche and providing details about your domain authority. You can also explain what type of link placement you’re looking for, such as posts on a particular topic or visibility on service pages.
Link Exchanges for Referral Traffic & Brand Building
Looking at the big picture, which is to grow your business, the right link exchange could be golden, even if not for SEO’s sake.
A “nofollow” link from an exchange, sponsored post, or guest post on the right website can generate a great return on your time or investment, as it will get consumers curious about the relevance and more willing to explore your own services. This drives organic traffic over time and can also lead to conversions.
So, start by looking at how a link from the websites you are considering an exchange with can benefit you.
Here is a practical example:
Let’s say that you own a dog grooming business, and you are approached by a veterinarian in your area about swapping links on your resource pages.
You both are in the same location, you both will have a similar audience, so the likelihood of someone finding and contacting you from the link (for both of you) is realistic.
Think of this as the online version of leaving your flyer in the lobby of the vet and displaying their flyer in your lobby in return.
This is a good example of a link exchange with benefits beyond SEO.
But it’s not just local businesses that can benefit. Multinational brands also exchange links with other reputable companies that can improve their reach, creating long-term partnerships that drive traffic to both parties. For example, an international project management firm may include links to their vendors or clients, demonstrating their portfolio of successful products and their relationship with other reputable brands.
Niche businesses can benefit from highlighting companies that use their product or including hyperlinked testimonials from well-known clients in that area, building their reputation while also improving their search engine rankings.
SEO Link Exchange: Geo-Relevance and Niche Relevance
Some websites are just not likely to send referral users, even if they are popular and relevant to your business.
Even major websites like Forbes or Business Insider can contain links that just don’t send many visitors. This could be because the article itself hasn’t gained much traction or it could have to do with how many other resources are linked in the same post.
This can also be the case for local websites as well. Using our above example of the vet and dog groomer, let’s pretend that no referrals were generated in either direction. Does that mean the reciprocal link was a waste?
Nope!
When it comes to link building, especially local SEO link building, that link is a home run. It is Geo-relevant and niche-relevant. Repeat that process and you will be attracting more visitors from local searches in no time.
What if you are not a local website? Well, then it depends.
Here are some examples:
If you are a national site that has city landing pages, like an apartment rental search tool with a pet-friendly filter, then that link is still good because of the geo-relevancy.
If on the other hand, you do not have a localized landing page, the value of that link is going to come down to topical relevance and authority.
Topical relevance is simply the topic of a website and how well that topic relates to your own.
When considering sites for a swap, this should be one of your first questions – is it relevant to what I am doing? If it isn’t, don’t do it. This looks unnatural and it isn’t going to be all that helpful for either one of you.
The second part of the process is looking at authority. By authority, I am not referring to Domain Authority, specifically, although it is a popular metric. You may use metrics from Majestic, Semrush, or Ahrefs instead.
The purpose of this check is to make sure that you are getting a fair or favorable exchange, whether it is for guest post swaps or other types of reciprocal links.
For Example:
If your site has a Domain Rating (Ahrefs metric) of 70 and an organic traffic estimate of 25K (also Ahrefs) you would want to make sure the websites you are exchanging links with have similar or better metrics.
Once you have established that it is relevant and of similar authority, you should look at where they are offering a link on, and the site as a whole.
You should be asking questions like:
How many outbound links does their page have?
Where will your link be located? (main text, footer, sidebar, resource page?)
Are the other outbound links on this same website also to relevant sites?
How is the general appearance and quality of the content?
Do they have large banner advertising link exchanges?
Not all links are created equal, nor are all link placement locations. Sidebar and footer outbound links, for example, are less valuable (and riskier in many cases) than natural links in the main content of a page, offering lower link popularity.
When it comes to the other quality checks, look at how it compares to your site in terms of design and content quality. Avoid sites with poorly written content, and especially sites broadcasting that they offer link exchanges (or sell “dofollow” links), as this is pretty easy for Google to identify.
If you take the proper precautions, you can find some really beneficial link exchange opportunities, be it for referral visitors or SEO value.
Here is one method that works pretty well, if you decide to include link exchanges as part of your overall strategy.
3-Way Link Exchange
There is plenty of debate as to whether or not reciprocal links are harmful or have less value than links obtained through other channels.
As the name implies, a 3-way link exchange is simply when:
Website “A” links to website “B”
Website “B” links to website “C”
Website “C” links back to website “A”
For example, assume you are a local bakery partnered with a food blog to get a backlink. The food blog then connects to a cake decorating supply company, which then connects back to you in a post detailing the best local bakeries in a given area.
None of you are directly competing with one another, ensuring you’re not harming your search engine rankings; instead, all three parties have interconnected niches, and the exchange will appear natural to both readers and Google.
When this is done between relevant websites with similar authority, it can be very beneficial and it is more difficult for Google to identify as anything other than a naturally occurring editorial placement.
This is one of the safest and most effective ways to use a link exchange as part of your link-building strategy.
As with other strategies, you must ensure that the other members of your exchange provide good content and have a strong Domain Authority. Investigate their posts, search rankings, and traffic to ensure that everyone will benefit, and avoid exchanges with any party that seems spammy or low-quality.
So, is a link exchange risky?
As with any link-building tactics, they come with some risk. However, you can reduce this risk by not swapping links in high volume, ensuring a natural fit between you and the partner, and investigating the partner’s authority on search engines. A few excellent backlinks are going to provide much more utility than dozens of poor backlinks.
In all situations, focus on three primary factors: a website’s relevance, authority, and content quality. Closely matched links with high authority and well-written content are unlikely to harm your rankings, while a poorly-fitting, low-ranked, content mill is going to damage your ranking significantly. You should strive for a handful of near-perfect matches, which will require a bit of legwork and research.
If you use the tips above to avoid excessive link exchanges and pick only good opportunities like quality guest posts, you can likely benefit from this approach now and in the foreseeable future.
Tools to Analyze Potential Link Exchanges
In the best of circumstances, a poor backlink will have no effect on your search engine rankings. But there is also a worst-case scenario where a toxic link actually damages your ranking and moves you down the search engine results page. If time or money were spent on acquiring that link, then those resources have gone to waste.
Fortunately, there are many link-building tools that can help you evaluate whether or not a potential link can help or hurt your SEO efforts.
SEMrush Backlink Audit
The Backlink Audit tool is useful for both current backlinks to your website and potential backlinks. If you want to consider an exchange, you can evaluate the backlink profile of the other site to see what their domain’s authority is like. This can help you avoid exchanging links with a risky site that will not boost your position. As you go through all the backlinks, you’ll see whether this potential partner is consistently linking to dangerous sites and if their backlinks have any relevance to your own niche.
Moz Domain Authority Checker
Moz has a free tool where you can get a quick domain score for any website. It will give you insights into page authority, ranking keywords, and more. Using this tool will help you decide if an exchange of links with a particular domain is worth it and will benefit your website.
Ahrefs Site Explorer
While this paid option is generally used for competitive analysis, it can also give you a deep insight into a potential exchange partner. With this option, you’ll be able to review the organic traffic performance, backlink profiles, and keywords.
Another key element of the Ahrefs Site Explorer is that it allows you to review the historical performance of any given webpage so that you can better understand whether they have shown consistent growth over time, or if their rankings have suddenly rocketed in a short period, which can be a warning sign.
This more holistic overview, when combined with the other tools mentioned above, will help you determine the domain rating and whether it is a safe option for your linking strategy.
Stellar SEO Can Guide You Through Link Exchanges
Whether you are looking for inbound links with more link juice, trying to understand Google’s guidelines, or want to learn more about link exchanging, Stellar SEO is here to answer your questions.
Our goal is to offer safe, sustainable growth for website owners by tailoring content to their specific needs. We thoroughly vet all potential partners for relevance and authority, reducing risks for our clients. Additionally, we offer content creation for guest posts, rerouting visitors from multiple avenues through a custom-made backlink strategy.
By leveraging our years of experience, we can adapt best practices to your specific needs. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to great SEO, so we develop a custom strategy based on your goals, which can includereciprocal links, guest post swaps, broken link building, and outreach to private influencer networks.
Our services have enabled clients to experience significant growth in their search engine rankings; just take a look at our case studies to see how we provide results.
If you’re ready to supercharge your linking strategy, contact us today for a free consultation.
Swapping links can be an invaluable part of SEO strategy when done strategically. This includes greater traffic, higher rankings, and better brand authority. However, you must carefully curate which sites link to yours in order to ensure you work only with reputable organizations; a few highly relevant links will better serve you than multiple spammy content mills.
Link exchanges are just one part of your toolkit, working in harmony with your other SEO strategies to create sustainable growth. If you’re ready to start building a comprehensive strategy that will accelerate your gains, contact Stellar SEO today and learn how search engine optimization can supercharge your results.
Link Exchange FAQs
When done correctly, exchanged links can be a source of valuable information that helps both websites. Below, we are going to look at a few common link exchange questions.
Are Excessive Link Exchanges Risky?
When you decide to exchange links with other websites, you should do so in moderation. Your overall link-building strategy should include a diverse set of tactics. This will keep your link profile looking natural and healthy. The various tactics, like submitting a guest post, each offer unique benefits, so don’t limit yourself to a single tactic.
Is it Better to Exchange Links than Ask for Reciprocal Links?
As mentioned above, a 3-way link exchange is different than a reciprocal link, in that the same two websites are not linking to each other. That makes this method appear more natural and avoid creating a footprint – so generally speaking, a 3-way link exchange is the better strategy.
What Should Be Included In Link Exchange Requests?
In a link exchange email, you should let the other websites know why you are interested in making the swap – even if it is just to help each other gain some quality backlinks. You should also highlight how your request is helpful to their readers. Last but not least, you should offer a few ideas of where you could secure backlinks for them as well, to show you understand the value of their site.
What types of Sites Should I Exchange Links With?
When it comes to exchanging links it is important to do so in a way that won’t incur the wrath of Google’s webmaster guidelines. Swapping links, like submitting a guest post can be done in a manner that provides valuable information to both web pages. SEO value aside, improving the value of your website can help you get more free users via improved SEO.
The process of selecting websites to offer a link exchange to should be focused on quality. Look for other business websites that have good SEO power and outbound links to other related sites. Websites ranking for related keywords to what you offer are usually a good target for a link exchange. Even a private influencer network could be a great resource for high-traffic links, so long as you understand the risks that come from using a PBN.
If you are considering a link exchange, use the tips above to do so in a manner that helps both websites involved and you are on the right track for continued growth.
If you are not comfortable with exchanging links, there are plenty of other link-building tactics that work very well, whether you hire a link-building agency or decide to handle it yourself.
