The glossary
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Off-page SEO – what it is and how to build authority
Definition
Off-page SEO covers all the SEO work that happens outside your website but still affects how high you rank – primarily building authority through backlinks, brand mentions and other mentions on external websites.
What is off-page SEO?
Off-page SEO covers all the SEO work that happens outside your own website but still affects how high you rank in search engines. At its core, it means building authority and trust in the eyes of search engines by having other websites, brands and platforms refer to you.
Unlike on-page SEO (optimising content and metadata directly on the page) and technical SEO (the website's structure and performance), off-page SEO concerns your website's reputation on the open web.
What counts as off-page SEO?
Off-page SEO covers more signals than just backlinks:
- Backlinks – Inbound links from external websites. The strongest off-page signal for Google
- Brand mentions – Mentions of your brand without a link. Google and AI engines pick up unstructured mentions as an authority signal
- Digital PR – Articles, press releases and media coverage that generate natural links and brand visibility
- Guest posts – Content you publish on external websites with a backlink to your domain
- NAP profiles – Consistent name, address and phone number in local directories (Google Business Profile, Yelp, industry directories). Crucial for local SEO
- Social signals – Shares and engagement on social platforms. Not a direct ranking factor, but they increase exposure and link potential
- Forums and communities – Visibility on Reddit, Quora and industry forums – increasingly important for AEO and AI visibility – read more about social media SEO
Link quality vs link quantity
A backlink from a highly regarded website with relevant content carries more weight than hundreds of links from low-quality sources. Factors that decide a link's value:
- Domain Rating (DR) – Ahrefs' measure of the linking domain's authority (0–100)
- Relevance – A link from a website in your industry passes more ranking power than one from an unrelated context
- Anchor text – Descriptive anchor text strengthens relevance for specific keywords
- Placement – Links in editorial content (not the footer or sidebar) are valued more highly
- Dofollow vs nofollow – Dofollow links pass on link equity; nofollow links contribute to a natural link profile but not directly to rankings
Bought backlinks and link schemes break Google's guidelines, count as "black hat SEO" and risk a manual action or algorithmic devaluation. Repairing the damage from black hat SEO can take a very long time. What the repair takes in practice is covered in the guide to Google penalties and lost rankings.
Off-page SEO and AEO
Because AI engines such as ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews retrieve information from the web, off-page signals play a growing role in AI visibility too. AI models tend to cite and highlight brands that appear on credible external sources – not just on their own website.
Brand mentions and other mentions online – even without a link – make it more likely that your information is included in AI-generated answers. That is why off-page SEO and AEO overlap so much: both involve building a broad, credible presence on the web that AI engines can draw signals from.
How do you measure off-page SEO?
Key metrics for tracking off-page work:
- Domain Rating (DR) – Ahrefs' overall link authority measure (0–100)
- Number of referring domains – Unique domains linking to you; more important than the total number of backlinks
- Link health – The share of broken or toxic backlinks in your profile
- Brand mentions – Tracked with tools such as Ahrefs Alerts or Google Alerts
- Anchor text distribution – The balance between brand anchors, keyword anchors and naked URLs
Tools for off-page analysis: Ahrefs and Semrush for link data, and Google Alerts and Ahrefs Alerts for brand monitoring.
Common questions about off-page SEO
How do you build backlinks for off-page SEO?
The most sustainable methods for building backlinks are: digital PR (coverage in media and trade publications that naturally generates links), guest posting on relevant websites in your niche, creating quality content such as statistics, guides and tools that others link to and reference, and asking partners and suppliers for links. Avoid bought link packages – that is black hat SEO, which goes directly against Google's guidelines and can harm your website over time.
How long does off-page SEO take to deliver results?
Off-page SEO is the slowest branch of SEO. Google usually indexes new backlinks within days or weeks, but the effect on rankings often takes 2–6 months to show. Building a backlink profile strong enough to compete in tough niches takes years of consistent work. That is also why strong backlink profiles are a competitive advantage that is hard to copy quickly.
What does off-page SEO work cost?
The cost varies widely depending on niche and goals. In Sweden, a basic link profile analysis typically costs SEK 5,000–10,000. Ongoing link building through digital PR and guest posting often costs SEK 10,000–30,000 a month, depending on the level of ambition. Large companies with very ambitious goals and fierce competition sometimes need considerably larger budgets. Get in touch for an assessment of what your particular niche requires.
Ready for the next step?
Now that you know more about off-page SEO, you may be wondering what your next step should be.
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