Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
What are the SEO implications of high quality backlinks from US-based websites to UK-based websites?
-
Hi everyone, quick question I hope someone could help me with:
We're representing a client based in the UK. As part of their overall strategy we've been linkbuilding.
At the moment, about 80/90% of the links we've gained come from UK-based sites, with 10/20% coming from US-based websites.
The US based websites are very good (think New York Times and genuine, relevant blogs with good readerships).
An external search analyst/consultant has contacted the client to say that the US links will be harming the site, because the links are from websites in the US and not the UK.
We believe that if 80/90% of the links were from the US this could indeed cause harm as it could indicate to search engines that our client is in the US when it's not (which might compromise their chance of ranking in .co.uk versions of search engines) however because it's only 10/20%, and because the linking sites are very good, we believe that they will getting all of the benefits of the positive metrics without any meaningful negatives.
We just wanted to get a few opinions on this to see if people think that we're mistaken, and would be glad to hear any opinions contrary to our own.
-
I'm not an International SEO expert. This is just my opinion.
I agree with Thomas that links from high-quality destination sites are going to help your rankings regardless. Just to confuse things, I also agree with you that you need to strike a balance when it comes to just how many of your links come from other destinations.
If, for example, you want to rank for SEO in the UK and your website has a majority of incoming links from the UK, I would expect those links reinforce and help boost your UK rankings because Google knows people prefer to shop locally. If, on the other hand, you are trying to rank globally, then you'd want (and benefit from) inbound links from other destinations as well.
So I think your assumptions are good. Reputable inbound links from other destinations are helpful so long as they don't confuse Google about which audience you're targeting. I guess you could use other international SEO techniques like hreflang tags, your URL structure, geo-targeting in GSC, and localized content to reinforce that if you were worried.
I don't know of any case studies on this topic.
-
Thank you very much for your responses. I would be interested in getting a few more responses as well? Does anyone know of any articles that relate to the question? It is such a strange question- never really heard it put out there before, so would not be surprised if there was no literature on it! But if there is then please point my way... or indeed if anyone else has any feedback on it, whether it confirms or opposes our opinion, all opinions are welcome!
-
If they're from relevant pages (topics) from within your clients niche to your client, regardless of where in the world you shouldn't have a problem. The idea that where in the world two different sites are based has an impact on link value to me does not make sense. A post that's on a specific topic would have global value, an example would be architecture, they could be a UK based company who have done some great work, a newspaper in the US covers the opening of the building and links to the architect. The fact that they are in different companies is almost irrelevant. I have seen no case studies to show that anything else would be the case.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Backlink builder (Professional)
If I wanted to hire a professional person to build high quality backlinks for me, where would I look? I'm asking here because I'd rather go on the recommendation of other businesses owners, than a google search. Does anyone have a person that they can recommend? It's for an insurance agency in Texas. Many thanks
Link Building | Oct 30, 2024, 10:47 AM | laurentjb2 -
Backlinks from translated content
Hello, We have quite a few articles "out there" that give us backlinks. We were thinking of also translating the content and submitting it to local content websites, so it can provide us with more backlinks. The main questions here, will this content be recognized as the same content as the English version? Also, being in another language, some of the anchor text might not hit the English keyword. Not sure how Google sees it. Any advise on the matter? thx!!
Link Building | Sep 16, 2017, 7:35 AM | PangeaLangs0 -
$10,000 backlink?
Hello guys, Would you pay $10k for a pr9 backlink? Thanks!
Link Building | Oct 5, 2014, 5:53 AM | The_Kiwi_Man0 -
Backlinks through dofollow commenting
I'm interested in building backlinks to my photography business site by leaving good, engaging comments on other photographers' DoFollow blogs. Is this a good idea? Is it worth the effort? Through a little research, I've managed to locate more than 40 dofollow photographer blogs that have a domain authority of 35+. The idea is to take an hour or so a week to leave 10-20 comments on their blog posts. Would you consider this a good strategy? I rank on the first and second page of most of my keywords that I'm working on, but I want to rank 1st or 2nd on them. I used the keyword finder tool on google adwords to find the keywords that are the most searched for in my area. Surprisingly the competition is not large, so I'm fairly comfident I can get there. I've already optimized my site substantially and I'm looking into link building. Thoughts?
Link Building | Feb 8, 2015, 8:19 PM | studio35design0 -
How relevant are citations to SEO?
'How much do citations help your seo in view of the direction that google seems to be headed where content is king? Should the citations not be relevant to your site?'.
Link Building | Feb 23, 2014, 4:16 PM | arthureray0 -
Local seo + phone number ?
I read that if I want successful local SEO campaign, I should use the same phone number in all my citations. But some citations are local for UK and I do not need to write the phone code +44, others require to use the phone code since they are international. Is it bad for my local SEO using 2 different numbers (with and without phone code) and how to avoid it ?
Link Building | Mar 15, 2013, 7:43 PM | digitalkiddie2 -
Are backlinks to a domain that redirects useless?
I am working on trying to get backlinks. We are currently redirecting a few Domains to our current domain name. One of the Domains that is redirecting is the main Domain, we will be advertising in the near future. Can I send backlinks to the redirected URL or does it only carry link juice if it is to the main Domain?
Link Building | Jun 3, 2011, 6:02 PM | hfranz0 -
SEO Triage - What matters most?
If you only had 8 hours to work on an SEO project... How would you spend your time to get the fastest results? On-page optimization, or link-building? Context: On-Page Optimization: "A" grade (SEOMOZ On-Page Report Card) Keywords: "moderately competitive" (SEOMOZ Keyword Difficulty Tool) Domain Authority: 33 (SEOMOZ Competitive Link Analysis)
Link Building | May 16, 2011, 12:01 PM | JessicaCox0