Link Insertion vs Guest Post: Which is Better for SEO?

Whether you will succeed or not depends mostly on your decisions. When looking for ways to improve your SEO efforts, you can regularly come across this question: link insertion vs guest post, which one should you focus on, and which one is a more beneficial SEO strategy? 

A study by Ahrefs found that 56.4% of pages have at least one backlink from a guest post. On the other hand, link insertions have become an essential technique for link builders for getting backlinks and boosting website rankings.

But which one should you concentrate on? This is the question that we will answer together, but until then, let’s talk about what link insertion is.

What Is a Link Insertion? 

Link insertion is the process of naturally placing your backlink into a published article on a relevant website. You reach out to those website owners, suggesting to insert links in the existing content and highlighting the mutual benefits of collaboration. 

The most important thing about link insertion is that it is a highly effective technique and a speedy way to get backlinks from authoritative websites. But we won’t rush anywhere and will do a link placement vs guest posting comparison to understand the advantages of link insertions in this context.

Benefits of Link Insertions For Better Website Performance

As promised, we will explore the pros of link insertion, which make it quite a popular tactic. But before that, let’s speak about the benefits of backlinks and why you should care about getting valuable backlinks, anyway. 

The reasons are simple yet powerful. Not only are backlinks one of Google’s main ranking factors, but a Semrush study discovered that 50% of reputable websites needed at least one backlink to reach the first page of search results.

So, to avoid falling into this category, you have to try getting great backlinks. Link insertions are smart ways to do that, and here is why. Do niche edits work in SEO and should be your technique for getting backlinks? If you’re still wondering, keep reading to find out why you should engage in this practice.

White-hat SEO Strategy

You definitely want to see your website’s rankings skyrocket. To reach that goal, you only need to follow ethical link building practices approved by Google. Organic link insertion in relevant websites is an effective white hat strategy in SEO that can positively impact your website’s online presence. 

However, you should be extra careful when choosing websites for link insertion. Avoid websites that are engaged in spammy techniques and reach out to authoritative and relevant ones to get backlinks. This way, link insertions can drastically increase your website’s credibility and SERP rankings.

Faster Indexing

We all are impatient when it comes to seeing better link building results. The good news is link insertions can make this happen because, with this strategy, you can have backlinks from already indexed articles with potentially high rankings. On the other hand, typically, it takes weeks for search engines to index new content. So, it will take a lot longer for a guest post to positively impact your backlink profile.

However, in the case of link insertion, you can expect almost instant positive results thanks to the authority and traffic of an already-published article.

Easy Outreach

Doing outreach for link insertions can take less time and effort than guest posts. For guest posting outreach, you may need to suggest title ideas, create outlines, and start writing content. 

On the other hand, link insertion outreach is more straightforward: all you need is to find relevant websites open to link insertion, choose the most suitable place, and ask the website owner to place a link in their content.  

The key is to personalize your outreach message as much as possible by showing interest in their content and highlighting mutual benefits. Let’s discuss this example below. SEO specialists have researched and found a relevant article for link insertion․ Then, they presented link exchange collaboration opportunities for a potential partner.

No Content Creation Needed

Let’s admit it. Creating truly valuable and compelling content is time-consuming. To ensure successful guest posting for backlinks, you need to research and find blog content ideas and reach out to website owners. After getting the green light from them, you should start the actual writing process, which obviously takes even more time and effort.  

On the other hand, as you already know, when website owners are open for link insertion and like your suggestions, they can add your link right away, and you will get a new backlink.

Targeting Any Website in Your Industry

It’s a fact that not all websites are open to a guest post. So, it will be more difficult for you to find a website that is ready to publish new content. 

Fortunately, more websites are open for link insertion. This brings more opportunities to get even more valuable backlinks. All you need to do is successfully target link insertion, about which we will talk later.

Ok, you get the picture: link insertion is quite an advantageous link building strategy. But every coin has two sides, doesn’t it?  So, link insertions have some cons as well. We will find out those drawbacks together.

Drawbacks of Link Insertions You Should Consider

First and foremost, the biggest issue about insertions is relevancy. It is way harder to find relevant articles for keywords you are targeting than to write guest post articles around those. On the other hand, when you’re writing a guest post, you can research and choose the right primary keyword, place your backlink in the desired spot, and pick the anchor text, in most cases.

To overcome this drawback, you can suggest that website owners make minor text edits to make your anchor more naturally fit in the article. But here is another drawback of link insertions: you can’t directly control the content where you’re adding your links. It means website owners wouldn’t be ready for those text edits. 

Another not-so-best-case scenario is when your links or the entire articles they’re in may be removed. To avoid this, you should regularly audit your backlink profile to ensure it remains healthy and strong.

But let’s get back to insertions. Do niche edits work in SEO question probably isn’t relevant for you, since you are already convinced that it’s a highly beneficial technique. So, as promised, we will suggest tactics on how you can find link insertion opportunities.

How to Find Link Insertion Opportunities

Now you know both the pros and cons of link insertions and decided to invest in it? Lucky for you we will provide you with some really helpful tips on how to successfully target link insertions.

Find Relevant Websites for Link Exchanges 

We’ll keep saying it: your link insertions should be natural and organic. So your main job is finding the right website that is relevant to your business and an anchor text that you want to target. 

So how can you do that? Deep research on Google can help you find websites that are relevant to your industry. But first you should identify the keywords you want to target. In the next step, you should use specific search queries such as “Keyword” + “resources” to find link insertion opportunities.

Check and analyze those websites to find ones with good SEO metrics.

Another tactic is leveraging SEO analytics tools to find the websites you need. With Ahrefs, you can do competitor backlink analysis and keep an eye on competitors’ strategies. For starters, you can enter a competitor’s domain and analyze backlinks pointing to their websites. This opens up new opportunities for link building. 

To make research even deeper, you can define a link gap, and here is how Ahrefs can help you in that stage.

Now, you have data for all websites that have linked to your competitors and may link to your website. Of course, you have to filter those websites based on important metrics like Domain Rating, organic traffic, and more. Later, we will speak about this in more detail.

Broken Link Building

Broken link building is the process of finding dead links on other websites and asking website editors to replace them with working links to your website. But you may ask, what is a broken link, anyway?

We call a link broken or dead when it leads to a webpage that isn’t working and returns 404 Not Found errors. Are there other SEO terms that you are curious about exploring? If so, our SEO glossary can come in handy. Check it out, but also continue to discover more about broken link building.

It’s one of the popular link building tactics that can open new opportunities for SEO professionals.  So, how can you use broken link building to earn backlinks and improve your SEO efforts? Start by finding your and your competitors’ broken pages with backlinks with Ahrefs.

After collecting this data, analyze them and see what broken link opportunities are worth your attention. Build outreach campaigns suggesting website owners replace their broken links with your relevant content.

Unlinked Brand Mentions

It happens when other websites mention your business (your product or service) in their content but, for some reason, don’t link back to your site. That is something that you need, and you can fix and convert those mentions into backlinks.

But first, let’s understand how Ahrefs can help you find unlinked brand mentions.

Keep in mind not all websites are worth your attention. Check whether those websites have good SEO metrics and seem authoritative. In the next step, check their guidelines to understand requirements and preferred topics to make outreach campaigns for guest posting more effective.

Don’t Forget About LinkedIn

Social media may not be your first choice when it comes to finding new guest posting partnerships, but you will miss a lot of opportunities if you’re not using LinkedIn smartly. It’s not only a professional platform for job seekers or recruiters, but also by leveraging LinkedIn SEO strategies effectively you can find new guest post opportunities as well.

First and foremost, create a post sharing with your connections that you are open to writing new unique guest posts for other websites. Don’t forget about LinkedIn’s search bar as well and search words like “guest post,” “write for us,” and “guest blogger,” to find posts mentioning guest blogging opportunities.

Next, search and find content managers or editors who also work in your industry, send connection requests, and start engaging with them by commenting on their posts. Also, you can send direct personalized messages sharing why guest posting can be a beneficial idea for both of you.

Last but not least don’t forget to share your already published guest post with your connections mentioning that you are ready to write another great guest post as well. 

Do Competitor Backlinks Analysis

Keeping an eye on competitors’ strategies and analyzing competitors’ backlinks opens so many opportunities for improving your own tactics. Competitive analysis will help you find relevant websites open for guest post contributions. Check whether their niche is relevant to yours to ensure your guest post addresses the target audience’s needs and pain points. Additionally, find out whether these blogs have high authority to maintain a strong brand reputation.

How you can use Ahrefs for analyzing the competitive market and meanwhile find new guest posting opportunities. Here is how:

You will see many potential opportunities, so you need to narrow the list down by applying filters like Domain Rating (DR) from 40 to 60:

In the next step, click on the Websites to find relevant sites for guest posting.

Once you find relevant sites to reach out to, prepare a wow guest post pitch that will make those website owners consider guest post collaboration.

Link Insertion vs Guest Post: What are their differences?

Do niche edits work in SEO, or do you need to invest in guest posting?  We did this link insertion vs guest posting comparison throughout the article, and it’s time to finalize that we have learnt so far.

Guest posting and Link Insertion: Factors to Consider

Until now, we did detailed guest posting vs niche edits comparison and talked about both their pros and cons. We also discussed how you should find guest posting and link insertion opportunities. Suppose you have a long list of websites for potential collaboration, but how to filter them and what factors you need to consider.

• Relevance to your industry

You should target websites relevant to your industry if you want to build natural backlinks through guest posting. Not only this, you need to find articles that contextually match your anchor text. Plus, you should decide what kinds of anchor texts you should use to get maximum SEO benefit and keep your backlink profile natural. 

• High organic traffic

In the next step, check whether the website you are considering for guest posting or insertion has enough organic traffic. By getting backlinks from websites with high traffic, you can bring more visitors and improve your SEO rankings.

• Valuable content 

We already agreed that one of your main goals in this process should be building a strong reputation both in the eyes of search engines and website visitors. So getting backlinks from websites with low-quality content isn’t something you should do.

• High domain rating

This last one can seem obvious because getting backlinks from websites with high domain ratings gives a signal to search engines that your website is also trustworthy and reputable. And what happens as a result? Valuable backlinks you get from SEO guest posts or link insertions can truly boost your SERP rankings.

Link Insertion vs Guest Post: Google’s Stance

When comparing guest posting vs niche edits, you may wonder what Google thinks about those strategies. The most important thing you should always keep in mind is that Google considers them as white hat link building tactics and prioritizes the following qualities: relevancy, credibility, expertise, and value you are delivering to readers. For guest posts Google mentions that they should inform and educate the host site’s audience.

So, no matter whether you choose guest posting or link insertion, you can’t worry about getting penalties from Google if you follow ethical practices that Google approves. This means you should stay away from spammy link building techniques, like buying links or using guest posting to get backlinks.

The Final Verdict: Link Insertion vs Guest Post

Ok, as much as we don’t like being in the role of a judge, we should give our final judgment about the link insertion vs guest posting comparison.

While guest posting backlinks is a great way to build authority and get relevant traffic, link insertion is a quick and effective way to get new backlinks.

However, which one you should focus on depends on your link building goals and the budget and resources you have. In the ideal world (we all want to be there, don’t we), both of these strategies should be in your toolkit.

The Final Verdict on Link Insertion vs Guest Post: The Right Strategy for You

Ok, as much as we don’t like being in the role of a judge, we should give our final judgment about the comparison between guest posts vs niche edits.

However, there are several factors you should have in mind when deciding which technique is right for your website.

• Your link building goals

If your goal is to build authority and drive organic traffic, investing in guest posting can be a smarter decision. However, if you are looking for effective ways to get valuable backlinks, link insertion should be the right choice. You may focus on link insertions if your goal is to build a more diverse backlink profile.

• Your budget and resources

Your resources and budget for link building can strongly influence when you compare guest posts vs niche edits and decide which one to choose.

If guest posting is your main choice, you should have a bigger content writing team. On the other hand, link insertion often demands fewer resources.

• Your target audience’ preferences

Knowing the needs of your target audience is a game-changer in so many cases. Monitoring their pain points, desires, and interests can guide choosing link insertion or guest posting as your link building technique. 

Considering all these factors it can be a case that both link insertion and guest posting are right for your website. In the ideal world (we all want to be there, don’t we), these tactics should be in your toolkit.

The Key Points 

Ok,  it’s time to wrap up this link insertion vs guest post discussion:

• Link insertion is a white hat SEO strategy that delivers instant results thanks to faster indexing.
• Thanks to link insertion, you can target any website in your industry with personality outreach without creating new content.
• With link insertions, it is harder to maintain relevancy, and you aren’t in full control of the backlinks.
• To successfully target link insertions first you need to find relevant websites, leverage broken link building, and turn unlinked brand mentions into backlinks.
• Getting guest post backlinks can take a lot of time, and you can’t even expect quick results.
• By doing Google research, leveraging LinkedIn analytics tools, and performing competitive analysis, you can find new guest posting opportunities. 
• Whether you should focus on getting guest post links or do link insertions depends on your goals, but you can do both of them.

That’s all for now.

Hope our tips will help you improve your guest posting and link insertion strategies.

FAQ about link insertion vs guest post comparison