Encyclopedia

The link building glossary.

Every term that matters in link building and SEO authority, defined in plain English and cross-linked so you can follow the thread. No jargon for the sake of it.

Core

Backlink

A backlink is a link from one website to another, and it acts as a signal that search engines use to judge a page's authority and relevance.

Inbound link

An inbound link is any link pointing to your site from an external page, and it is simply another name for a backlink.

Outbound link

An outbound link is a link on your page that points to a different website.

Internal link

An internal link connects one page of your site to another page on the same domain.

Dofollow link

A dofollow link is a standard link that passes ranking signals (link equity) to the page it points to.

Nofollow link

A nofollow link carries a rel="nofollow" attribute that tells search engines not to pass ranking credit through it.

Anchor text

Anchor text is the visible, clickable words of a link, and it tells both users and search engines what the linked page is about.

Referring domain

A referring domain is a single unique website that links to your site, regardless of how many individual backlinks it sends.

Link equity

Link equity (often called "link juice") is the ranking value passed from one page to another through a link.

Contextual link

A contextual link is a link placed within the main body content of a page, surrounded by relevant text that explains what it points to.

Metrics

Domain Rating (DR)

Domain Rating (DR) is Ahrefs' 0-to-100 logarithmic score estimating the strength of a website's overall backlink profile.

Domain Authority (DA)

Domain Authority (DA) is Moz's 1-to-100 predictive score estimating how likely a website is to rank in search results.

URL Rating (UR)

URL Rating (UR) is Ahrefs' 0-to-100 score measuring the backlink strength of a single page rather than the whole domain.

Page Authority (PA)

Page Authority (PA) is Moz's 1-to-100 score predicting how well a specific page (not the whole site) will rank in search.

Trust Flow

Trust Flow is a Majestic metric (0-100) that scores a URL or domain by how close its backlinks are to a curated set of trusted seed sites.

Citation Flow

Citation Flow is a Majestic metric (0-100) that measures the raw quantity and link power flowing to a URL or domain, regardless of quality.

Spam Score

Spam Score is a Moz metric, shown as a percentage, that estimates how likely a domain is to be penalized or low quality based on patterns seen in penalized sites.

Link velocity

Link velocity is the rate at which a site gains (or loses) backlinks over time, measured per week or month.

Anchors

Exact-match anchor

An exact-match anchor is link text that is exactly the keyword the target page wants to rank for, such as "buy running shoes" pointing to a running shoes page.

Partial-match anchor

A partial-match anchor includes the target keyword inside a longer, natural phrase, such as "these durable running shoes" rather than just "running shoes".

Branded anchor

A branded anchor uses your brand or domain name as the link text, such as "Angle" or "angle.com", rather than a keyword.

Naked URL anchor

A naked URL anchor is a link whose clickable text is the raw web address itself, such as https://example.com, rather than descriptive words.

Generic anchor

A generic anchor uses non-descriptive filler text like click here, read more, this website, or learn more as the link's clickable words.

Tactics

Guest posting

Guest posting is publishing an article you wrote on another website, usually in exchange for one or more contextual link back to your own pages.

Niche edit

A niche edit (also called a curated link or link insertion) is a backlink added into an existing, already-indexed article on someone else's site rather than into a new post.

Link insertion

Link insertion means placing a link into the body of an existing piece of content, the mechanical act behind a niche edit and most curated-link outreach.

Digital PR

Digital PR is earning high-authority editorial backlinks by creating newsworthy stories, data, or commentary that journalists and publishers want to cover and cite.

Broken link building

Broken link building finds dead links on other websites, then suggests your working resource as the replacement, earning a link while fixing the host's problem.

Skyscraper technique

A content-driven link-building tactic where you find a popular, heavily linked piece, build something demonstrably better, then ask the sites linking to the original to link to yours instead.

Resource page link building

Earning links by getting your page added to curated resource or links pages that exist specifically to list helpful references on a topic.

HARO (Help a Reporter Out)

HARO (Help a Reporter Out) was a service connecting journalists with expert sources, widely used to earn editorial links and brand mentions from authoritative publications.

Unlinked mention

A place where another site names your brand, product, or content in text but does not hyperlink it, representing an easy link-reclamation opportunity.

Link reclamation

Recovering links you should have but currently don't, by fixing broken backlinks, restoring lost ones, and converting unlinked brand mentions into live links.

Linkbait

Content created specifically to attract links and shares naturally, such as original research, free tools, strong opinions, or visualizations that other sites want to cite.

Private blog network (PBN)

A private blog network (PBN) is a set of websites, often built on expired domains, that one owner controls solely to link to their money sites and manipulate rankings.

Risk

Link spam

Link spam is any link created primarily to manipulate search rankings rather than to genuinely help users, and it violates Google's spam policies.

Over-optimization

Over-optimization is pushing on-page and link signals so aggressively (especially exact-match anchors) that the profile looks manipulated instead of natural.

Toxic backlink

A toxic backlink is an inbound link from a spammy or manipulative source that risks harming your rankings rather than helping them.

Disavow

Disavowing is telling Google to ignore specific backlinks or domains when assessing your site, via a file uploaded in the disavow tool.

Manual action

A manual action is a penalty applied by a human reviewer at Google, reported in Search Console, that can demote or deindex pages or a whole site.

Link scheme

A link scheme is any arrangement of links intended to manipulate rankings, which Google's policies explicitly prohibit.

Negative SEO

Negative SEO is a malicious attempt to harm a competitor's rankings, often by pointing spammy backlinks at their site.

Google Penguin

Google Penguin is a search algorithm update, first launched in 2012, that targets sites manipulating rankings through spammy or unnatural backlinks.

Technical

Canonical tag

A canonical tag (rel="canonical") is an HTML element that tells search engines which version of a page is the preferred one to index when duplicate or near-duplicate URLs exist.

301 redirect

A 301 redirect is an HTTP status code that permanently sends users and search engines from one URL to another, passing the bulk of its ranking signals to the destination.

rel=sponsored

rel="sponsored" is a link attribute that tells Google a link was paid for or part of an advertisement, sponsorship, or other compensation arrangement.

rel=ugc

rel="ugc" is a link attribute that identifies links created by user-generated content, such as blog comments, forum posts, and community submissions.

Orphan page

An orphan page is a page on your site that no internal links point to, leaving it disconnected from your site's navigation and link structure.

Striking distance

Striking distance refers to keywords for which a page already ranks just outside the top positions, typically positions 11 to 20, where a small push can move it onto page one.

Sitewide link

A sitewide link is a link that appears on every (or nearly every) page of a website, usually because it lives in a shared template area like the header, footer, sidebar, or navigation menu.