One of the best ways to increase your website’s authority and improve your rankings is through free backlinks. Backlinks are references to your site in someone else’s content.
In this article, I’m going to teach you exactly how to get free backlinks to your website. More specifically, how to get high-quality free backlinks.
It doesn’t take that much time to do and you don’t need any link-building experience to get started. Keep reading to learn how you can get free backlinks to your website.
How Do You Increase Your Websites Rankings Through Free Backlinks?
Getting free backlinks to your site that are high quality comes down to a link-building strategy called HARO, also known as Help A Reporter.
This is a website where you can sign up for free, and it only takes minutes. This website is where a bunch of journalists ask for opinions and stories from websites like yours.
How Does HARO Work?
HARO is straightforward and simple to use. Journalists will post stories and will ask for advice from experts like you.
An example of this would be a reporter posting for the top 10 finance tips and for business owners to respond. If you’re a finance expert, you would respond, and tell them your experience.
This is not limited to any single industry. You will see hundreds of hiring queries being posted every single week, and these are all link-building opportunities for your website.
How Do I Get Started With HARO?
Using HARO for free backlinks is extremely easy. Simply sign up at Help a Reporter, then you’ll receive daily updates with queries from journalists. From there, you choose the ones you want and respond via cold emailing.
The thing is with HARO, you’re pitching journalists. If you want to get high-quality free backlinks and more press coverage for your site, then you really have to think about what the journalist is really looking for.

How To Make Your Pitch Stand Out
It’s important to make your pitch interesting, concise, and straight to the point. HARO is like a competition.
Everyone’s responding to these journalists, and there are loads of link builders and others looking to build links and a lot of people trying to get press coverage.
You have to be in the top 10 or top one percent to get your query featured. And the better you get at this, the more free backlinks you’re going to get from HARO.
Make It Easy To Read
When you write an email pitch responding to a HARO journalist, make sure that you use a nice format that’s easy to read.
You could write an email that says, “I’m responding to your HARO query because I’m a finance expert. I’ve been in finance for 10 years and helped multiple clients achieve seven figures. Here’s my experience…”
Create A Call To Action
After you’ve filled in your story, then say, “if you do feature me in your article, then please let me know because I’d love to see and share it.”
A lot of journalists won’t reply to you even if you get featured. But, if you leave that call to action, then they have a benefit and incentive to get back to you and cite you as the source.
Also, include a few social media links at the bottom of your response. Then, journalists can easily learn more about you and your expertise.
Be An Authority In Your Niche
To get free backlinks from the HARO technique, you need to make sure that you’re establishing yourself as an authority in your niche.
The more authority and credibility you position yourself with on HARO queries, the more likely the journalist is to feature you versus someone they’ve never heard of.

It’s Okay To Branch Out When Using The HARO Technique For Free Backlinks
You don’t have to worry too much about contextual relevance here. So, don’t worry if the HARO query you’re responding to isn’t that relevant niche or industry.
For example, I run a link-building SEO agency, but I’ve got features on this finance article, which is fine for me. I have the finance knowledge and experience. Therefore, if I get featured, and I get a high-quality backlink, Google is not going to ignore it.
So, you can branch out if you have experience in other fields aside from your industry. Also, write about exactly why you should be featured in that publication.
Make Getting Free Backlinks Easier By Outsourcing Your HARO Link Building
Now, the beauty of HARO as well is that it’s very easy to outsource. You can find a virtual assistant on sites like Upwork, and then you could have them respond to queries every single day.
As long as you give them the right processes, then they should be responding to HARO queries within a half-hour, producing a well thought out detailed response for the journalist.
Another option is hiring a professional link builder like myself. Feel free to book a free link-building consultation with us, so we can take a look at your website and discuss how to get high-quality backlinks and start increasing SEO traffic.