HARO, or “Help A Reporter Out,” is one of the best link-building services available right now. If you want to have excellent domain authority (DA), i.e., 60 for your website, you should look for high DA platforms that link you back.
If you haven’t heard about the HARO link building service before, it’s about time.
What is HARO?
HARO is a platform where authentic information and quotes are available. But how does this help your website?
Bloggers and journalists who spend hours creating useful content get help from HARO. The platform provides them with authentic quotes and information to add to their articles.
No doubt, content on your website tells your visitors who you actually are. In fact, more than 57% of SEO experts say that on-page content development is the most effective SEO technique.
However, if that web content is inauthentic or doesn’t provide value to the users, Google is not going to rank your website.
So, if you successfully submit your reply to a HARO query, you are going to get a strong backlink from the media.
Here’s how it works.
As the name suggests, HARO connects journalists covering news stories with authentic sources who want to contribute. Journalists send their requests through HARO, and sources with the right qualification respond to those requests.
Sources with qualified pitches are connected to the journalists and get mentioned in their news stories. Also, the news publication, where the stories are published, link back to the source’s website or blog.
So, if you’re an expert in any field, and can answer queries related to your niche or expertise, HARO gives you an excellent opportunity to get some high-quality links to your blog or website.
How Does HARO Link Building Service Work?
After knowing what HARO is, let’s talk about how the HARO link-building service works.
First of all, journalists and influencers submit their queries to the HARO platform. They do that because they want a high authority source that answers their relevant queries.
Now, those inquirers submit their queries about a particular topic on HARO. The topics covered may be related to:
- Technology
- Lifestyle
- Travel
- Fitness, etc.
If you are an expert on that topic, your reply might reach the inquirer. In return, both of you will benefit.
This means that:
- The inquirer’s query will be published
- Your website will get recognition on SERP.
The process of getting backlinks this way may be time-consuming, but it’s worth it. Besides, it gives your website a big media coverage via reputable journalists and influencers.
Below, we’ll discuss how you can get backlinks from HARO.
Get Backlinks from HARO
Right now, more than 50,000 bloggers and journalists are actively using HARO. Let’s explore what those numbers mean.
If you sign up on HARO today, you will have a good opportunity to get your voice heard. Now, let’s move on to how to get links from HARO back to your website.
Sign Up for HARO
Go to the HARO website and click the sign-up button. You will see the form. Simply fill out that form.
After entering all your credentials, you will receive a verification email. Confirm the verification. Once you open that link, you will be sent to the HARO welcome page.
Once done, let’s move to set up your profile.
Set Up Profile
Just like any other link-building service, you have to set up your profile in HARO. On the My Account page, select “Source” as the account type. Why?
When you become a source, only then can you reply to the HARO queries. That way, your website will receive media coverage and high domain authority (DA) white hat backlinks if the inquirer deems your reply plausible.
While setting up the profile, you have to carefully select what queries you would like to receive. This means selecting only those niches in which your expertise lies.
Besides, HARO specifically looks for expert replies with respect to the inquirer’s topic.
The “HARO Preferences” tab has a list of topics. You can select the topics that are related to your expertise and interest, and you can provide good information related to them. However, the “Master HARO” list will be automatically checked.
Plus, you can unsubscribe from the list anytime you want. The greyed-out list means that queries related to these topics are not ready yet.
Start Sending Your Replies
After setting up your profile, you are all set to reply to HARO queries.
Moreover, you will start receiving emails from HARO 3 times a day, Monday-Friday, which includes the following details:
- Blogger’s or Journalist’s Name (optional)
- Category
- Email to Reply to (might be anonymous)
- Media Outlet
- Deadline
- Query
Before answering a query, understand that a journalist receives hundreds of replies to one query. Therefore, make sure you provide valuable content in the reply.
Basically, HARO reporters usually look for publication-ready information. That means you have to be topic-specific without including unnecessary stuff.
Now, when you are done writing your response, it’s time to log in to HARO.
- Go to the My Pitches tab.
- From there, click on the Submit A New Pitch button.
- Fill in the boxes and click Submit.
It takes a good amount of time to write a killer response to a HARO query. Therefore, it’s important to track your response to save your time as well as energy.
Track Your HARO Responses
Now, it’s not necessary that the inquirer will contact you once your response gets selected. It’s because an inquirer receives tons of replies on a single query. Therefore, you can subscribe to get the newsfeed about their publications.
Smart tracking applications like Google Alerts use your exact HARO response name. It’s a smart way to automate the tracking process of your HARO replies. Besides, sometimes reporters have no idea when their publication will go live.
Therefore, using an online tracking tool might be a better option rather than manually checking out every publication.
Moreover, this will also notify you when your response is used. That way, you can instantly promote that publication on social media platforms. This will bring in more organic traffic to your website.
So, that’s how HARO helps you get high authority backlinks that will boost your website’s ranking on SERP. However, it’s important to keep the following points in mind while preparing a HARO response:
- Try to respond as quickly as possible because journalism is about the present.
- Include only relevant information in the email to avoid getting ignored by the reporter.
- Don’t be too promotional in your response.
- Avoid including attachments to your responses. However, you can drop a downloadable link if it makes your response more authoritative.
Conclusion
Everyone wants to have high DA backlinks to rank on top SERP positions.
One of the ways you can get quality links back to your site is through HARO link-building service. That said, you have to stay vigilant while sending replies to the reporters.
Once you get the coverage from a reporter, your website’s SERP ranking will rise like never .
