How to get your first backlinks for a new product
George · 5 min read
You can build a good product and a clean website and still be invisible in search. One reason is simple: nothing links to you. A link from another site is how search engines find a new page, and one of the ways they decide it is worth showing.
Getting from zero links to a handful is the slow part. After that it gets easier, because people who find you start linking on their own. These are the places I would start.
First, what kind of link counts
Links can bring readers and help search engines discover a page. Search engines decide which links to use as ranking signals; a normal link does not guarantee ranking credit. Attributes such as nofollow, sponsored, and ugc describe the relationship behind a link. Google's link guidance explains when to use them.
You do not need to obsess over this. A healthy site has a mix of both. Just know the difference, so you can tell what a site is actually offering you.
Launch sites and directories
This is the easiest first step, because these sites exist to list new products. Each one gives you a page about your product with a link to your website. Some follow the link, some do not, and some follow it if you put their badge on your site.
On ShipDesk.dev every launch page links to your website with a followed link, on free launches too. I wrote more about choosing between sites in Product Hunt alternatives for solo founders.
Your own profiles
Put your website on every profile you already have: X, GitHub, LinkedIn, your personal site, the footer of your other projects. Most of these are nofollow, but they are how people who meet you somewhere else find the product, and they cost nothing.
Write one thing worth linking to
People do not link to a pricing page. They link to something that helped them: a guide, a comparison, a free tool, the numbers from your own launch. One useful page will earn more links over a year than any amount of asking.
It does not have to be long. It has to answer a question someone actually types into a search box, better than what is already there.
Be useful where your users already are
Answer questions in the communities your users spend time in. Not with a link in every reply, which gets you ignored or banned, but by helping, with your product in your profile. When your product really is the answer, say so and link it.
What not to do
- Do not buy links in bulk. Packages of hundreds of links are the kind search engines are built to ignore, and they can count against you.
- Do not trade links with unrelated sites. A link only helps when it makes sense to a reader.
- Do not wait for it to happen by itself. The first ten links are almost always ones you went and got.
A realistic first month
- Launch on three or four launch sites that fit your product.
- Add your website to every profile you own.
- Publish one page that answers a real question in your field.
- Spend ten minutes a day being useful in one community.
None of it is clever. It is just the work of telling the internet you exist, one link at a time.