A guide to Resource Page Link Building: What It is and How It Works

Despite being a popular strategy in the field of SEO, link building still gets a bad rep. Even if you’ve been in the digital marketing industry for years, you know that building links from authoritative sites just feels too hard sometimes.

You’re not alone. Link building takes a lot of effort—there’s no way to sugarcoat it. 

But the thing is, for as long as links play a huge role in rankings, you have little to no choice but to engage in link building. Making sure that it complies with Google’s Webmaster Guidelines is a part of the pie, too. 

Unfortunately, this has also created something alarming: a black market of links from suspicious sites. You’d also come across websites that willingly offer various link packages in exchange for a price. If you’re desperate to rank high on SERPs and gain traffic, you’re likely going to fall into the trap.

Little do you know that there’s a trick that outperforms every method, may it be legal or sketchy—resource page link building. This tactic is proven to positively impact a website’s SEO, especially if you do it right.

Let’s get right into it!

What is Resource Page Link Building?

A resource page is a page on a website that lists links and resources for certain topics, whether it’s related to industries or educational materials. This includes podcasts, comics, infographics, videos and articles to improve the user experience. Other websites will also provide a brief description of every resource material they link to. 

So, in essence, resource page link building is the process of getting your site mentioned on another website’s page as one of its resources. Remember, it’s your responsibility to let webmasters know that your platform exists, so you have to get your resources out there!

What makes it different from other link-building tactics is that it’s relatively easy. You can start by pitching your content and see what’s on a resource page. From then on, you may start improving the quality of your content and earn more links!

Most importantly, it gives you the chance to get more control over your link-building strategy.

The Advantages of Resource Page Link Building

What’s so great about building links to resource pages? Let’s take a look at its benefits below:

Trustworthy Backlink Source

An evident benefit of resource page link building is they lead to more backlinks. When your webpage is helpful to users, websites will be encouraged to link to it. Consequently, more visitors are going to visit your platform, further improving your search engine ranking.

For example, Microsoft—a corporation producing consumer electronics—typically posts research articles concerning technology. If you have written anything related to it such as artificial intelligence or cybersecurity, the company might link to your study. 

This will help you earn a backlink from an authority in the industry, thereby making you a reliable source of information.

Scalability

If you want to enhance the overall customer experience, this link-building tactic is right up your street. Having a resource page on your website tells search engine algorithms that you’re optimising elements that speak to customer needs. This, in turn, also means that your platform is scalable.

A resource page may act as the central hub of your website. It centralises all the tools and materials your readers might be interested in, from video tutorials and audio files to product reviews. 

Easy to Do and Monitor

Unlike other methods, resource page link building is much easier to execute and gives you better predictability. You won’t even have to spend your hard-earned money because it’s pretty simple to set up. Depending on your niche, there are lots of resource page templates available online that fit your needs. 

Let’s say you manage a tech website. To further drive traffic to your website and earn a bigger audience, you can curate educational blogs about cloud computing, computer science, biometrics and many more. 

Another thing you can do is create a page for online courses, recommended applications or training videos, among others.

How to Find Resource Page Opportunities

Use Google Advanced Search Modifier

The first step when finding resource page opportunities is to take advantage of advanced searches called Google footprints. It helps you find more targeted results and resource pages that suit your industry. 

Here’s the format you can follow: [Your niche] + “resources”.

Once you press enter, the search results will display the top websites and their respective resource pages. As an example, we’d go for a travel blog. Take a look at the screenshot below:

Another search phrase you can input is inurl:[your niche] + resources. If you type the word ‘travel’ again, the results would look like this:

You now have specific results that will help you narrow your search. If you’d like to export the results, using a Scraper tool will make the process much easier.

Use SEO Tools

Ahrefs 

Being an Ahrefs user gives you the chance to easily collect resource pages with the SEO Toolbar. It helps you extract the entire Google search results with SEO metrics, as well as download every SERP to a CSV file.

And if you’re planning to reverse-engineer your competitor’s resource page links, you can use the backlink checker.

Once you’re done, make sure that you vet and analyse the pages using a Batch Analysis report. Keep in mind that you have to go for websites with high DR ratings since they mostly gain organic traffic. 

When it comes to manually reviewing the web pages, you also have to look at their quality and maintenance. 

SEMrush

Semrush is also a recommended tool for reverse engineering your competitor’s resource page links. First, enter a competitor’s website on the search bar and press enter to display their backlinks. 

Search for terms that most resource pages use such as resources and other related keywords. Semrush will automatically show you the links that use the term, helping you save time and simplify the search process.

How to Analyse a Resource Page

Take Note of the Relevance

Although there are lots of SEO tools that can help you assess a resource page, the manual review still has to be part of your process. 

First, look at the web page’s relevance. Is this page relevant to your industry? If the site owner approves your proposal, will your link add value to the platform? In resource page link building, context matters the most. 

For example, if you’re in the food industry, you should only connect to similar websites in your niche such as restaurants, established chefs and food blogs.  

Take Note of the Backlink Type

Before reaching out to the site owner, pay attention to the links on the page. Are they dofollow or nofollow? Is the resource page filled with spam links?

Be careful if the page only lists links with a nofollow attribute. Since it doesn’t boost PageRank, it sends a signal to Google that you don’t have anything worthy to say.

How to do Resource Page Link Building

Now that you know the basics of resource page link building, let’s discuss how you can start your campaign and earn backlinks. Check out these steps below:

List Down Potential Resource Pages

Once you’re done doing an advanced Google search, list down the resource pages that interest you the most. However, make sure that you stay away from link farms. We know it’s tempting to go for every relevant resource page you can find, but it pays to tread extra carefully.

Link farms are websites that exist solely for the purpose of link building and nothing else. If Google finds out that these sites have backlinks pointing to your web page, your efforts would go to waste.

Here are the signs that a website is a link farm:

• It allows you to pay to get a dofollow link
• It has a pretty high spam score
• The page is filled with links to low-quality resource materials
• The website owner demands a link exchange before they feature your resource

Also, avoid website owners who only link to their own content. If you send them a pitch, there’s a huge chance that you’d be rejected.

Prepare Your Best Content or Offer

Just like any other link-building method, quality matters more than quantity in resource page link building. This is why you need to make sure that your content is worthy of being featured.

How do you prepare the best content you can propose to website owners? Of course, it will always depend on the target audience. But to help you jumpstart your content creation, here’s a checklist of what makes content great:

• You use statistics and accurate data to support your arguments
• To tell stories, you use case studies
• You create a resource that has all the information your visitors need so they won’t jump from one page to another. You give them answers. 
• There are guides and walkthroughs.
• You include infographics, GIFs and even memes to make the content visually compelling

Another option is to conduct keyword research and explore forums like Reddit. In this way, you know what’s currently trending and see what content your competitors are creating.

Reach Out to the Site Owner

The next important step you have to take is conducting email outreach. Once you have a complete list of potential resource pages in hand, email the people who run these websites. 

Remember that this can either make or break your resource page campaign. Take some time to search the website to find the contact information, which is usually found on the footer of the page.

If they have a ‘Contact Us’ section, then the work has been cut out for you.

If there are no contact details available on the website, find their social media accounts or use a blogger outreach tool. This allows you to get the email address of any website instantly.

After you’ve found the contact information you need, it’s time to craft a pitch. Make sure that you establish rapport and personalise your message. Refrain from using scripted messages and mention their name in the greetings!

Take the time to acknowledge their work. The site owner might instantly like you more when you’re appreciative of how hard they work on their platform’s resource page.

Here’s a sample you can follow:

Hello [Name of the site owner],

I’m Harold from [website of company name]. I cover [mention your niche] and have already been featured on popular sites like [places you’ve been mentioned or quoted].

When I was looking for potential resource pages, I was lucky enough to come across your resource list on [page URL]. It’s truly a great collection of websites. I’ve browsed a few links, and [pick a link] caught my attention and interest.

The good news is that I have recently written an article on [topic of resource page] and thought that it would be a great addition to your resource hub.

Here’s the link to the resource: [insert your URL].

Let me know if you find the material useful to your list. Everything’s up to you.

Regards,

Harold

Make a Sheet to Monitor it Regularly

Congratulations on launching your resource page link building campaign! However, your job isn’t over yet. You have to keep your eye on your targeted resource pages, so make a sheet to track their progress.

You can use SEO tools like Monitor Backlinks so you’re updated on your resource page backlinks as they happen. You’ll receive email alerts, see what links you’ve won over and check if there are any links you need to follow up on.

Final Thoughts 

If you’re looking for a start to launch a link building campaign, taking advantage of resource pages is a great starting point. It’s simple to set up, and you’d find that lots of site owners are willing to link to your content.

For as long as you know how to make compelling articles and other materials, finding opportunities will be as smooth as butter.

Also, having a useful resource page attracts powerful links. When you have quality content and quality backlinks, you can drive organic traffic to your platform and expand your target audience.

Looking for a reliable team to help you get started with resource page link building? Get in touch with our team of SEO services to reach your goals!

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