How Long Does It Take For Backlinks To Show Up?

Link building is very much a "hurry up and wait" process, as there is no surefire way of determining how long your backlinks will take to appear.

Thankfully, our team at Link City has decided to put an article together detailing the factors that can affect how long it will take for your backlinks to appear and activate.

Rest assured that we will consider all these factors if you let us build links for you - allow Link City to help you implement an effective and successful link building strategy.

What Factors Affect How Long It Takes For A Backlink To Show Up?

There are a variety of different factors that will affect how long it will take your backlinks to show up. In this section, we will discuss each element and how it will influence your link building campaign.

Backlink type

Each link that is created has a different value, as some of your backlinks may hold significantly more value than others.

Legitimate backlinks to authoritative websites will always hold more value than links that are attached to a plethora of low-quality guest posts.

If you don't want your link building efforts to be in vain, you should focus on legitimate nofollow and follow links.

Follow links hold a lot more value than nofollow links, as they provide your website with link juice, which has the power to improve your rankings in Google search results.

Nofollow links, however, do not hold any SEO value, as they usually include links from all over the internet, such as social media comments, blog comments, and the comments of many other well-established sites.

While a nofollow link does not hold all that much value by itself, it can help diversify your backlink profile with more links, which appeals to Google's algorithm. Nofollow links can also help get your website noticed, eventually leading to you getting more follow links in the future. Diversifying your website is an undervalued part of the link building process - having multiple relevant links is fundamental in a link building campaign and digital marketing in general.

Therefore, a follow link to an authoritative site will help you show up in the rankings sooner than other links will.

Link velocity

Link velocity regards how quickly you build backlinks to your website. Google's algorithm favors sites that gain many backlinks at once.

One of the best ways to gather numerous backlinks to authoritative sites is by posting viral content. Unfortunately, this is easier said than done, as there is no way of knowing what content will become viral and when.

Thus, trying to create link building strategies while focusing on link velocity will not be a very effective strategy. This is why most SEO agencies recommend building backlinks to your website gradually at first, as spammy links will also be penalized by Google's algorithm.

Domain authority

A website's domain authority boils down to how trustworthy that site is deemed. Google and other search engines generally boost websites that they view to be trustworthy.

Domain authority is determined by the quality of a website's SEO and how many links and backlinks it has with other trustworthy sites.

Having backlinks on an authoritative site can help improve your site's page authority, which also means your ranking will improve.

High authority sites are crawled more often, so any new backlinks posted on them will be indexed by Google faster.

Brand authority and trust

Well-known brands and websites will always have an advantage over smaller, lesser-known ones.

As time passes, websites earn more backlinks, making them more appealing to Google's algorithm. Therefore, it is much easier for these older sites to rank highly in search results with few to no backlinks.

Don't get too disheartened though - all sites have to start somewhere. Any reputable link building agency will work with you so your site achieves the success other pages in your niche enjoy.

You can do this by focusing your guest post or niche edit strategy entirely on highly relevant sites with a high level of authority and also making sure to spend some time on internal link building.

Both tactics can help establish your site's authority in the long run.

Anchor text

Anchor text is clickable text that forms a part of a hyperlink. It previously had a much more profound impact on page rankings, but it became too easy to manipulate, and as a result, it was deprioritized in Google's algorithm.

Anchor text comes in various forms, with exact match anchor text often using target keywords and partial match anchor text using the target keyword and some other text.

There are also naked URLs when the URL of a website is put plainly in the text, branded anchor text that includes the name of your website or brand, and generic phrases that do not include any keywords.

While anchor text does not affect your rankings as much as it once did, research has shown that the top pages often have backlinks that include partial or exact keyword matches.

Competitiveness of keywords

It will always be more challenging to stand out in a crowded room, and the same can be said if you are trying to get your site to rank in a very competitive sector.

Generally, the more often a keyword is searched, the more backlinks and time you will need to spend if you want to stake your claim at the top of the search rankings.

However, this isn't always the case, as commercial keywords are generally more difficult to rank for, with businesses constantly vying for the top spot.

One of the best ways to outrank your competitors is by checking out their domain and page authority, as this will help you find any chinks in their armor that you'll be able to exploit to outrank them.

How relevant your backlinks are

The top link building strategies focus on your links' quality rather than quantity. This is because getting a few backlinks from a few relevant authoritative sites will always outrank getting a ton of low-quality links from various irrelevant pages.

Creating a quality guest post for an authoritative site will improve your ranking and your organic traffic, as more users will be interested to see what else your site has to offer.

Getting backlinks from authoritative sites is essential; however, it is more important that these sites are relevant to your site and the content, products, or services you offer.

If you keep doing this consistently, Google's algorithm will take note and likely improve your ranking over time.

The Bottom Line

It can take from four days to six months for Google to index your backlinks, depending on the above factors.

It is in your best interests to keep these factors in mind when starting your link building campaign. However, if you're wondering how to begin, consider hiring a link building agency to do all the hard work, so you can sit back and reap the benefits.

Why Should You Consider Link City?

If you need help coming up with a great link building strategy, ask about our guest posting and niche edit services, as we can help your website get the ranking it deserves.

If you're hesitant, don't take our word for it - look at what our satisfied customers have had to say about Link City on Trustpilot.

FAQS

How many backlinks does it take to rank a website?

Unfortunately, there is no definitive answer to this question, as the number will vary depending on your sector's competitiveness.

One thing is for sure, though, the quality of your backlinks will always be more important than the number of backlinks you have.

How many backlinks per day is safe?

Getting between 25 and 30 backlinks per day is safe for a newer website, but the number of backlinks you create is not important if they are built organically through exposure.

However, if you are link building, then it is best to stick between the numbers we have listed.

How long does it take to increase domain authority?

The time it will take to increase your domain authority will, once again, depend on several factors, such as the number of high-quality backlinks you can acquire.

If you focus on building high-quality links, you should notice an increase in your domain rating between 6 and 12 months.