Earning valuable fashion backlinks has never been more critical.
If you have a website in the fashion niche, you need to be doing everything you can to get that website to the top of the search results pages.
Consumers are depending on search engines more and more to buy fashion products, both online and offline.
The e-commerce fashion industry is only going to keep growing, from $481 billion in 2017 to an expected $1 trillion in 2024.
The trend is clear:
People are relying more on search engines, which makes appearing in search engines more important than ever for fashion businesses to compete online.
And the best way to do that is with backlinks.
Relevant, fashion backlinks.
In this article, I’ll show you 13 actionable ways to get your website some Google-friendly fashion backlinks that'll keep your business on-trend and in front of your best customers.
1. Get Listed in Fashion Directories
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A directory lists all the relevant websites (and their links) in a niche. Directories are intended to be helpful resources, hence they're trusted by search engines and your potential customers.
This trust from humans and search engines is why you must earn backlinks from relevant fashion directories. Let me show you how.
A. Find Relevant Directories
Not all fashion directories are equal. Your goal is to get listed in only the best.
The most effective way to find these directories is with a simple Google search. You can use this search string:
[fashion niche] + “directories” + [location]
For instance:
- fashion + “directories” + Germany
- shoes + "directories" + Europe
Here's an example for the target niche of jewelry. You can see how many results there are just on the first page:
Find even more relevant directories by getting more specific with your fashion niche.
You can add other search terms to your queries like:
- Fashion designers
- Apparel suppliers
- Handbag makers
- Footwear designers
- Clothing accessories
And so on.
B. Filter for the Best Directories
You should only target the best directories in your niche and no more. Prioritize directories that have high Domain Strength.
A backlink on a spammy fashion directory is worse than no backlink at all.
An easy way to weed out the spammy directories is to plug the URL into SEOptimer's Backlink Research tool.
Here you can view the Domain and Page Strength for each directory.
A good rule of thumb is to avoid listing your business on any fashion directory with a DS and PS score under 30.
C. Filter for Regions
Google and other search engines recently updated their algorithms to favor local businesses over those further away from the searcher's location.
So in the directory business, local is better.
Fortunately, the search query allows you to find local directories by changing the location. So far I've only used broad locations, but in this example, I’ll use a more restricted location search.
This is the result for fashion designers + "directories" + new york:
Now instead of targeting the entirety of the USA, you can narrow down your audience to New York alone. This is especially useful if you serve customers in just one location.
D. Get Your Fashion Business Listed
Once you’ve built a healthy list of these fashion directories, it’s time to get your business featured in them.
In most cases, you won’t have to pitch the directory to be listed. The majority of modern directories allow you to register your business without contacting them. Your listing may or may not need to be approved.
A good example is Fashion Mingle, a directory for fashion entrepreneurs. All you need to do to list your business is scroll to the bottom of the page and follow their instructions:
If a particular directory doesn’t support this feature, find their contact information and send them a pitch. In most cases, they’ll oblige you.
2. Feature in Crowdsourced Fashion Posts
Crowdsourced content for your fashion business does two things:
- Builds your value in the eyes of your customers, and
- Helps you create lasting connections with other brands in your space.
For small businesses, this is a powerful backlink building strategy. There are two ways to go about it:
Create Your Own Crowdsourced Posts
This is a more straightforward technique for new businesses in the fashion niche.
Since you're aiming to signal value to potential customers, the best way is to get the experts in your niche featured on your website.
To use this effective technique:
1. Identify the experts in your niche and build a relationship with them.
You can find them on social media, especially visual platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram.
Reach out to them and compliment them. Tell them what you genuinely like about their work. Keep this up for a while to build rapport.
2. Brainstorm on a pressing industry topic with lots of traffic.
Use BuzzSumo to find topics that are generating the most engagement online. Choose one topic to start with.
3. Reach out to the experts in your niche.
Let them know you want their opinion on a pressing topic. If you already have a good relationship with them, they'll be much happier to contribute.
4. Create a blog post around their answers and publish it on your blog.
Notify them when the post is live and thank them for their involvement.
Politely request that they share your post on their site or social media profiles.
Get Featured in Someone Else's Post
This method requires you to have an already-established reputation in your niche. The better your reputation is, the better your chances of success.
The process involves scouting for crowdsourced posts in your niche and offering to contribute for free. Here’s how to go about it:
1. Search for fashion tips by experts on Google.
Look through the results and find sites that publish posts with experts' opinions. Make a shortlist of sites.
2. Reach out to the site owner or editor.
Find their email address on the site or contact them on social media and politely request to be featured.
Make sure to include all your qualifications as an expert on the topic.
3. Prepare your answer to the topic and send it to the site owner.
You should also create a powerful bio and headshot to send with it, including a link to your site.
Follow up until the article is published or updated.
3. Get on "Best of" Lists
Lists are similar to crowdsourced posts, except that this time they reflect the opinion of one person.
The currency of the fashion industry is attention, hence the need to get on these lists.
Consumers of fashion products also search for these kinds of lists before making their purchases. So here’s an excellent chance to get a backlink as well as more exposure for your brand!
Find relevant "Best of" lists by using search strings like these:
- Top [100] best + “fashion [niche keyword]”
- best + [fashion niche] [year]
- list of top + [fashion niche]
Here's an example using "fashion tips" as the niche keyword:
You can get creative with keywords to find the sites that best resonate with your fashion business.
Then, write a short, direct and polite email to the owner of these lists and ask them to feature your site or article. Your article or link must be of very high quality to pass the test.
Show off your previous works, products or awards in the industry to prove your reputation in your outreach email.
Here's a template you can tweak:
Hello [Name],
I’m [Your Name], from [website or company name]. I cover [fashion niche] and have been featured on [places you’ve been featured, mentioned or quoted].
Earlier today, I had the opportunity to find your Best Of list on [URL of page]. Great material!
I've actually just recently created an [article/infographic/explainer video/whitepaper] on [title or topic] and was thinking it’d be an excellent addition to the awesome resources you've featured on your list.
Here’s a link: [your URL]
I’ll be glad to know if you found the material a fit for your list.
No obligations. Just something to help the community.
Regards,
[Your Name].
4. Gift Downloadable and Printable Designs
According to an MIT study, freebies are a great way to get people interested in your offerings.
Fashion naturally favors graphics and designs over other content types, so you're in luck here. To build a healthy backlink profile, you can gift free designs and other freebies to potential link sources.
Start by creating brilliant designs and gifts on your fashion website. These could be anything from simple designs for imprinting on t-shirts to an in-depth guide for fashion newbies.
Reach out to websites and influencers in your niche and let them know what you have on your site. You can use the following template:
Hello [Name],
I'm [Your Name] and I run a fashion outfit called [website or company name]. First off, I’m a fan of your work, and in many ways, you’ve inspired my resolve to start my business.
I’ve created a couple of brilliant designs that I believe your audience will find very helpful.
Nope, I’m not selling. It’s all for free!
I’m hoping you’ll love them enough to share with your audience. If not, it’s still a pleasure connecting with you.
Best,
[Your Name].
If your work is fantastic, you should hear back.
You don’t even need to ask so brazenly for a link. They're sure to know to add it when they share these gifts.
5. Earn Backlinks from Events
Going local is the new gold mine.
Search engines, especially Google, prioritize local content. So, if you're serious about gaining those fashion backlinks, then you should exploit this avenue.
You have a few options for local events:
Host Your Own Offline Event
This method requires some funding from your end. You can create a fashion event around your specific niche and invite local fashion brands to attend.
The goal is to get word about your brand out there and interact with other local fashion businesses. Local journalists should attend these events too, which can automatically earn you some links from local news websites.
Attend Other Local Events
If you’re a young fashion brand seeking exposure, this is the way to go. The advantages are:
- You don't have to spend a lot of valuable business hours planning the event, and
- It’s free publicity.
You can find local events by using search strings like:
- [location] + [keyword] inurl:event
- [location] [keyword] "events"
- [keyword] [location] "add event"
Try substituting other words for "event" too, like "conference," "meetup," "workshop" and so on.
You'll see a lot of event listing sites in the results, like Meetup. Sites like this are great places to find new events, as well as host your own. In many cases they also double as a directory.
If you intend to host an event, just fill out the information required to list your event. If you're looking for events to attend, search their event directory for fashion events happening near you.
During the event (whether you're hosting or attending), focus on building relationships.
Speak to others attending the event. Showcase your best work and offer to share theirs if they're interested.
Approach local journalists and tell them about your business. Offer to grant interviews or write a story for them.
Meet new people and grow your network, and backlinks will come naturally from that.
Host an Online Event
Hosting online events like webinars and tutorials for fashion enthusiasts is an inexpensive but powerful way to generate buzz about your business in the industry.
You can even reach out to influencers and leading experts in your niche and ask to interview them for your webinar.
In many cases, these influencers will be happy to share the interviews with their audience, and might even link back to your site!
6. Get Backlinks from Followers and Industry Colleagues
Your colleagues in the business are just as valuable as external link sources. You both share the same niche, and so any backlink from them would signal authority and competence.
There are a few ways you can go about this:
Guest Posting
This is a somewhat dated but still effective technique to get solid backlinks from your colleagues.
In fact, OutreachMama relied solely on this technique and in under a year, they hit the top spot on Google’s first page for four very competitive keywords.
The process for guest posting is simple:
Reach out to other fashion businesses and offer them stellar, engaging content for free.
Some content types that work well include:
- Long-form authoritative content
- Graphic design content
- Infographics
- Explainer videos
If they accept your content, they'll usually publish it with a backlink to your site in the author bio.
Blog Commenting
This involves looking out for top fashion blogs in your industry and joining the comment conversation.
Look through comment sections and find questions people have asked that you can answer, or conversations where you can bring some valuable added insights.
Note that this is a dicey technique and should be used with restraint. No one wants spam in their comment section.
Provide detailed, thoughtful responses and link to helpful articles on your site for further reading.
Social Media Sharing
Sharing on social media is the best way to amplify your work. Here are some tips:
- Place social sharing buttons strategically on your website.
- Build a following on your social media platforms. Instagram is the most effective channel for fashion brands.
- Encourage your followers to share your content.
7. Get Featured on Local Newspaper Websites
If you're a brick-and-mortar fashion brand looking to expand your reach, this is the way to go. Local newspaper websites offer you publicity to the local population—your target audience.
To use this opportunity, you first have to get their attention—and you need something newsworthy about your business that you can offer them.
Start by finding local newspapers in your city. Depending on how much of the city your business covers, this can stretch from your neighborhood through to the entire state.
Here’s a couple of Google search strings to use for this purpose:
- Local newspapers + website + [location]
- Local newspapers + online + [location]
Then, contact their editors. The editors determine what content gets published and what doesn’t.
You should be able to easily find the editor's contact details in the footer of their website, or on a dedicated Contact Us page.
Send a short but powerful pitch for your business.
Here's a sample:
Hi [Editor Name],
My name is [Your Name]. I am an avid reader of your fashion column in [newspaper name]. The diversity and range of your articles appeal to me a lot.
I double as a fashion entrepreneur (when I’m not reading [newspaper name], lol). I’ve been featured in [list publications] and run my fashion enterprise in our neighborhood.
I have an idea I believe will thrill our audience. It's about [describe idea].
Let me know if you think this might be a good fit for your publication.
Keep up the good work!
Best,
[Your Name].
If your idea is superb, they’ll get back to you with their guidelines and next steps.
If you promised content or a resource, send it on time and follow up afterward. As a guest author, you’ll get complimentary backlinks to your site and a prominent bio section.
8. Make the Big Media
While local newspapers are great, a hit with the big media can amplify your sales by a wide range.
The big media includes powerful fashion websites and e-zines. Top influencers can also be very helpful in this regard.
Here are three techniques to make this happen:
Influencer Marketing
You need to know the top shots in your specific fashion niche. The brands with the largest follower base and biggest social footprints.
Getting them to promote your brand is a huge positive value signal for their many followers.
Pottery Barn used this strategy to get the word out about their new interior design collection. As a young home decor startup, they partnered with a popular home decoration blog and got them to showcase their new collection on the influencer's blog.
This act alone garnered over four million impressions across social media and helped Pottery Barn gain solid traction in very little time.
To replicate this success, start by putting together a list of popular influencers in your niche.
Contact them on social media or by email. It pays to build a relationship with them for a while. You can do this by:
- Leaving sensible comments on their posts.
- Joining conversations on their comment boards.
- Sending appreciation emails or messages every once in a while.
Once a great relationship is established, you can pitch them your product and politely request for a promotion.
Next, you follow up.
Once the influencer's product promotion post is up, share across your social media and help build traction. You'll get a ton of healthy backlinks in return!
Big News Media
Featuring in the big news media can make all the difference in your business scaling plans.
These news outlets are the most prominent authorities in your niche, which is the reason why you must court their attention. Here's how you can do that:
1. Start local.
You should aim to get featured in a couple of local news websites before aiming for the big ones. This will help communicate your value to their editors.
2. Research their audience.
You want to know what kind of topics get their attention. Study other nuances as well like the language, tone, voice and writing style of their previous articles.
3. Find an engaging topic to discuss.
BuzzSumo is a great tool to find the topics that are generating the most buzz online. Create a list of the most engaging topics that you can cover.
4. Contact the editor.
Make a pitch to the relevant editor. For generalist magazines and online news media, find the contact for the fashion editor.
For purely fashion websites, any editor will do.
5. Create a powerful pitch and follow up.
Your pitch must communicate value, show your expertise and be relatable. You should include your past achievements and other publications where you've been featured in the past.
Also, lose the formal tone. Keep it casual and friendly.
If you don’t hear back after a week, send a follow-up email. In many cases, their inbox is a mess, and your pitch could've been lost in a sea of other emails.
Large Online Publications
These are great publications to win interviews from.
This process works best if you already have a robust following for your brand. Most major online publications will favor well-known, popular and very unique brands to feature in an interview.
If you have a solid following, pitch your brand to these publications for an interview session. They’ll be in touch if they consider you to be a good fit for their brand.
9. Get Reviewed by Fashion Bloggers
Did you know that 91% of customers aged 18-34 say they trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations?
And 67% say they consult online reviews before making any purchase decisions.
Knowing that, it's not surprising that a one-star increase in Yelp ratings can shoot up your revenue by as much as 11%.
This means the more astounding reviews you can land for your product, the better for your business.
Follow this guide to secure reviews from your fellow fashion bloggers and influencers:
A. Decide on the Product for Review
This must be a stellar product that you intend to represent your brand with.
An easy way to make this decision is to select the most anticipated or popular product with your current customers.
B. Find Suitable Fashion Bloggers
You’ll need bloggers that are in your niche and also have a decent following.
Use the following search string on Google:
fashion blog + [location]
This is what I get when I search for fashion bloggers in New York:
And then look at the blogs listed. Investigate their social media profiles, how many followers they have, and how much engagement they get on their posts.
Make a list of the most suitable blogs for your fashion business and note down their contact information for the next step.
C. Reach Out
Next, shoot the bloggers a pitch for your products.
The pitch should be short and direct, but friendly. Follow up until your review is published.
Make sure to only accept honest reviews with no lies or embellishments. Honesty is an important currency in online business.
Here’s a sample email template you can use to reach out to fashion bloggers:
Hello [Blogger Name],
I'm [Your Name] and I'm an avid follower of your blog. I run a fashion outfit in [location]. I’ve been featured in [list publications or blogs].
I’ve always kept tabs on your articles, and in many ways they’ve inspired my own products and design. The latest among these inspired products is [name of product for review]. It’s [describe product].
I’d be absolutely stoked to have you review it on your blog. I’d be even more excited to see how your audience responds to it. I know they have premium taste—after all, I am one of them!
Let me know what you think.
I'm looking forward to hearing back from you.
Regards,
[Your Name].
Once the reviews go live, you can help amplify them by sharing them on your site and social media profiles.
Leesa, a mattress and bedding company, took this route to go from an unknown entrant to a major player in the market.
The young startup had no offline store and struggled to get customers to trust their brand and products. So they started engaging bloggers in their space to promote their products with online reviews. And they insisted on only honest reviews—warts and all.
The results were outstanding. They made over $800,000 in their first month alone!
10. Spy on Successful Competitors
Your successful competitors are successful for one reason:
They're doing many things right. Chief of those things is link building.
If you want to get to their level, then you must replicate their successes.
To do this, you'll need a powerful SEO tool like SEOptimer. Among other features, it sports a backlink and competitor research tool that you can leverage to decrypt your competitors' link building strategies.
Once you've created an account, head to the "Backlink Research" tool on the left of the dashboard.
Don't know who your most successful competitors are?
Look at the top ranking websites when you search for your business niche as a keyword. For instance, if your fashion business is in the snow boots niche, you could try the following keywords:
- fashionable snow boots
- affordable snow boots
- stylish boots for snow
Make a list of all the top blogs and business websites that come up in the search results. For our example, here's a list of sites that came up for affordable snow boots:
Add those competitor domains to SEOptimer's Backlink Research tool see their backlinks.
Here you'll find all the sites that link to your competitors, as well as heaps of useful information such as where the link is placed, the anchor text used, whether it's followed or nofollowed, and much more.
This can all help you determine where and how your competitors got their backlinks. Then, do the same to get the backlinks for yourself!
Plus, SEOptimer can also automatically track your competitors and send you regular updates about the links they're getting with our Backlink Monitoring tool, so you'll always be one step ahead.
11. Find and Regain Lost Backlinks
While you may be engrossed in building more links for your business, you must also remember to monitor the ones you’ve already won.
This lets you see where your new links are coming from, spot spam links quickly and disavow them, and notice lost or broken backlinks that need to be fixed.
Lost links can happen if the linking page moves to a new URL, causing your backlink to return a 404 error page. But don't worry, you can get those valuable backlinks back.
SEOptimer comes in handy again here, this time to monitor your own backlinks.
Start by adding your website to your Backlink Monitoring dashboard.
The next page will show you a list of all the sites linking back to your domain. It profiles these sites and provides metrics and insights into the health and quality of the backlinks.
To find any lost links, click on the "Lost Links" tab.
SEOptimer will then show me all the backlinks that return a 404 page.
Reach out to the linking sites to let them know about the 404 error on their site, and politely ask if they'll redirect the old page or re-add your backlink to their new page.
12. Create Infographics and Videos
Humans love graphics.
An eye-tracking study even shows that users are more interested in images and graphics than text content.
So if you aren’t creating video and infographic assets for your site, you have to begin now. The icing on these cakes is that you can use these impressive assets to win backlinks, too!
Here’s a quick guide:
A. Research the Most Engaging Topics in Your Space
Use BuzzSumo to search for a keyword and find the top shared infographics or videos in your niche.
Study a few of them. What makes them great?
The aim here is to create material that's way better than all the others.
B. Create a Stunning Infographic or Video
I recommend you outsource this part of the job to a capable freelancer that you can find on Fiverr or Upwork.
But if you think you can take it on yourself, there are free online tools that can help.
For infographics, try Canva or Piktochart.
And for videos, you can use tools like VideoScribe.
C. Publish and Promote
Post your infographic or video as a blog post on your site and share it to your social media profiles.
Also, create an embed link on the page so that other bloggers can embed them on their sites. This gives you an automatic backlink every time it's embedded.
Then, send a message to relevant blogs and websites that have published similar content in the past. If yours is better and more recent, they're likely to post it on their site.
13. Offer Opportunities
The goal of all link building strategies is to get attention for your brand. It's that attention that converts to backlinks.
Using contests, promotions and other types of free opportunities is one of the surest ways to get the internet interested in your brand.
Here are some ways to attract this kind of attention:
Contests and Giveaways
Run a contest and give away one of your best-selling products to the winner. Doing something like this is one of the easiest ways to attract new visitors and potential buyers to your site.
Create publicity for the contest on social media, and consider running a paid ad on Facebook or Instagram to get it seen by more people.
Promotions
Like contests, promotions are every consumer’s favorite. Create timed promotions on your most popular products and post them on social media and online stores.
Scholarships and Charities
This is an easy way to get into the news for a good reason. Many news sites will lap up opportunities to report on acts of charity and support for causes. Scholarships are also very popular.
So if you want an express ticket to the news websites, consider sponsoring a local event, supporting a charitable cause, or setting up a scholarship for budding fashion students.
Free Fashion Consulting
You can also offer free consulting sessions for fashion enthusiasts.
Just make sure you make the sessions timed, so you don’t spend too many valuable business hours attending to consultation requests.
Free Virtual Tours
If you have a physical store, you can make use of modern technology to offer your customers a great experience.
Hire a designer or tech company to create a virtual mockup of your fashion store or items for customers to view remotely.
Fashion Backlinks Wrap-up
Getting tons of healthy fashion backlinks no longer holds dread and mystery.
But while it's easy to understand, it requires a great deal of commitment to follow through for useful results.
Start with the simple techniques in this article, and move your way through the list.
Don’t try to do them all at once. Excellent execution should be your watchword.
Cheers to your success in gaining those valuable backlinks for your business!
