Many SaaS startups try to get high-quality backlinks from relevant websites in order to get a better search engine ranking and more organic traffic to their website. Search engines like Google view backlinks as a sign of trust for relevant websites.

Therefore, a SaaS startup can use backlinks to get more traffic to their landing pages without having to spend a lot of money on paid advertising such as Google AdWords.

What Is SaaS Link Building and Why Does It Matter for Startups?

The definition of SaaS link building is fairly straightforward: SaaS link building involves obtaining links from relevant websites in your industry. This can include a link in a blog post, a news article, a website directory, a link on a partner website, or even a resource page.

SaaS link building is a type of link building that targets relevant websites within an industry. This can be blogs, news sites, directories, partner websites, and many other types of websites. A single high-quality backlink is seen as far more valuable than dozens of low-quality backlinks, because they are more relevant to the content on your website.

Why do backlinks matter for SaaS growth?

Backlinks to a SaaS website help a search engine such as Google rank relevant pages on your website. This means that if other reputable websites within your industry link to your SaaS platform, then Google will consider the relevant content of your SaaS pages to be reliable. As a result, for startups looking to grow early on and compete against bigger brands in their industry, building backlinks to relevant pages on your website is crucial to improving SEO rankings, increasing organic traffic, and conversions.

For startups, this matters even more because:

• It helps you compete with bigger brands
• It increases organic traffic without paid ads
• It improves brand trust and authority
• It brings referral traffic from relevant audiences

Strong SaaS link building is crucial for the growth of your startup in the early stages.

How does link building improve SEO rankings?

Link building increases the authority score of your website. The more high-quality websites that link to your pages, the more the search engines consider your content to be very valuable. This causes the search engines to increase the ranking of your pages in the search results. This leads to more visibility of your SaaS website in the Google search results. This in turn leads to more clicks and, in the end, even more conversions. This results in long-term organic growth of your user base.

Higher rankings mean:

• More visibility in Google search
• More clicks from potential users
• Better conversion opportunities
• Long-term organic growth

Backlinks will help your SaaS website get discovered faster and more often.

What are the 5 Best SaaS Link Building Strategies for Startups?

1. How can you build backlinks using high-quality content?

Creating high-quality content that will generate natural backlinks to your SaaS website is one of the most powerful SaaS link building strategies for startups. As your content is so good that it’s being used as reference material for other people in your industry, this will start to generate backlinks to your SaaS website. This type of backlink is far more powerful than backlinks acquired using other SaaS link building methods.

Some of the best content types include:

• Original research and surveys that provide fresh industry insights
• Step-by-step guides. In-depth tutorials on using your product and how it can be of benefit to potential customers.
• Case studies that show the results that you and your customers have achieved with your SaaS product.
• Statistics pages that collect useful industry data in one place.
• Free templates and checklists that help users save time

However, when we create content, we are aiming to create something that will naturally obtain links from other websites over time. This is because the content we create solves a problem for the reader, and therefore other websites will link to it in order to provide their readers with the solution to their problem.

2. Why is guest posting one of the most effective SaaS link building strategies?

Guest posting for SaaS companies, in essence, is writing an article and then linking back to your own SaaS company’s website. To this day, for companies who have the time to do it properly, this can be one of the most effective link-building methods.

Here’s why it works so well:

• Your content will reach new audiences as well.
• It builds authority as you are published on a trusted and quality website.
• You get contextual backlinks that improve SEO value
• These help reach new users who do not know your brand yet.

Quality content is king when it comes to gaining the approval of other companies to write for their blogs, and gaining the approval of readers to read your content. This does not have to be a plug for your company; it can be a high-quality piece of content that you have written in order to gain backlinks to your SaaS website and to gain the approval of other companies in order to write for their blogs as well.

3. How does digital PR help SaaS startups earn high-authority backlinks?

Digital PR is one of the most powerful SaaS link-building strategies as it allows you to generate backlinks from high-authority news websites, industry-specific blogs, and publications. This type of link building allows you to create a story or provide some insight which journalists will then use in their articles to provide credibility to the story.

By earning backlinks from high-authority sites where your SaaS company has been featured in a story or article, Digital PR can increase your company’s authority and also help build trust for your brand. In Google’s eyes, a mention on a well-known site is viewed in a very positive light and can therefore help to improve your ranking in search engine results pages.

Below are several examples of Digital PR:

Journalist outreach (HARO-style responses)

One of the most simple and successful link building strategies for SaaS companies is journalist outreach. While tools such as HARO allow you to respond to reporters and journalists looking for comments and insights on news, publications, and stories, journalist outreach in general allows you to proactively reach out to reporters, in hopes that you can be quoted in an article.

Publishing data-driven stories

Figures, statistics, and data are the building blocks of a huge portion of online content and, in fact, there are even many websites and publications that exist purely to report figures and statistics. It’s therefore very likely that when you publish your figures and statistics on your SaaS company’s blog,  websites will link back to that page as the source of the figures and statistics.

Industry reports and insights

Publishing reports is also another way that SaaS companies can earn high-quality backlinks in the long run. The best reports to publish are in-depth analyses of trends or topics in your SaaS company’s niche. These types of reports will help to establish your company as an authority in your space and will get cited by other companies in your space.

Newsworthy product updates

Additionally to stories around launches of your SaaS, you can also create stories around other newsworthy updates and releases for your SaaS product. Other stories could be around integrations that you release for your SaaS.

4. Can free tools help SaaS startups attract backlinks naturally?

Free tools are some of the most effective and sustainable link-building for SaaS startups because they instantly deliver value to potential users. As a result, a tool that provides value will naturally get shared with others, get people to recommend it to their friends and family, and get links from other websites.

Unlike blog posts that grow old and have less traffic after a while, free tools keep getting backlinks for years to come and even more.

Here are some examples of high-performing tools:

ROI calculators

ROI calculators are a fantastic tool to create. These tools enable users to quickly get an estimation of returns from a product or service and, of course fro, from other investments that they might want to add to their portfolio.

SEO tools

There are a number of very simple SEO tools which have a high number of very powerful backlinks. This could include a keyword difficulty checker or a backlink analyzer, for example.

AI-based tools

AI-powered tools. This is another highly Shareable type of resource, because they: 1) are cutting-edge and therefore are sure to grab the attention of a blogger or tech writer who comes across them, 2) create value for the end-user instantly. So whether it’s a generator of high-quality content (including articles and other types of written material), a summarizer (such as a preview of a longer document), or even a chat assistant, AI-powered tools are ideal for the type of SaaS company that is interested in building backlinks through linkable resources.

Generators (email, invoice, keyword, etc.)

Simple generators like email subject generators, invoice generators, keyword idea generators, and many more simple generators are extremely effective in order to get backlinks. They are very useful for many people and therefore are often bookmarked, and as a result, they get backlinks very easily.

Interactive resources that get shared

The pages with interactivity – where users can calculate their score, take a test or assessment, and receive results in various formats- are the most linkable as they increase user engagement dramatically and deliver the most personalized results to them.

Free tools can turn your SaaS website into a resource hub for users and thus a great link-building opportunity for your company instead of a mere marketing site. This is a very modern SaaS link building strategy that focuses more on building tools rather than creating content.

5. How does resource page outreach bring consistent backlinks?

Resource page outreach is probably the most under-rated SaaS link building technique there is. Provided you do it right, it will get you lots of high-quality backlinks very consistently.

Here is an example of the type of link that we’re referring to – a “useful tools” page or a “resources” page. These types of pages list resources such as tools, plugins, books, and courses. A marketing website might have a page called “The Best Marketing Tools,” for example, that lists all of the best marketing tools that a marketer could use.

Here’s how this strategy works:

Finding “useful tools/resources” pages

The first step is to look around for those resource pages in your niche. You know the kind that already seem pre-made to point out useful stuff, and that’s kinda why they’re such a solid chance for backlinks. They basically exist to link out, so you can take advantage of that without too much extra work.

Pitching your SaaS as a helpful resource

Pitch your SaaS as a helpful resource to a Webmaster for a Resource Page. Clearly explain how your SaaS product or content can add value to their Web page of useful resources.

Personalized email outreach

It’s also important to remember that a generic message will get you nowhere in terms of link building. A well-thought-out email that not only mentions the page you found but also clearly explains why your SaaS tool or content would be of great value to the people who visit the page in question will be far more effective.

Getting listed on authority pages

A link to your SaaS from an authoritative resource page can be very powerful. For one, a page of resource links is highly relevant to the topic of the page from which the page of links was found. As opposed to a page that contains links to sites found as a result of a search for general information on a topic, a page of resource links is hyper-relevant to the topic of the page from which the page of links was found.

Conclusion

SaaS link building strategies for SaaS SEO are for SaaS startups to earn backlinks and thus improve their search rankings for the products of said SaaS company. SaaS link building requires a lot of consistency and value in order to earn the links. As opposed to most other SEO methods to increase rankings for a SaaS company, SaaS link building tries to earn the most relevant links, which can actually increase the traffic and even brand exposure of a SaaS company in the long run.

FAQs

1. What are SaaS link building strategies?

SaaS link building strategies – SEO methods that earn backlinks for SaaS startups in order to improve their search rankings.

2. Why are backlinks important for SaaS startups?

They help improve Google rankings, increase organic traffic, and build up your brand’s trust.

3. Which SaaS link building strategy works best?

Content marketing, guest posting, and digital PR – these are arguably the most powerful SaaS link building strategies for achieving the best results.

4. How long does SaaS link building take?

It can take a few months to start noticing SEO progress.

5. Can startups do link building without paid tools?

Many link building strategies can be put in place manually using free SaaS tools, for example, guest posting and outreach.