The 101 on Infographic Links: Are They Worth Your Time?

SEO

The 101 on Infographic Links: Are They Worth Your Time?
Whenever it comes to monitoring links, it’s important to consider all different platforms and mediums available. Traditional content has always been and will continue to be one of the main ways to earn links back to your company website, but an infographic is not something to count out. As infographics become more popular, you now have another way to earn a backlink to your website, but there are a lot of questions to ask: Is it worth it to focus on infographic links only if they work for my industry? Are backlinks in an infographic going to be dofollow? Does Google like to see infographic links, or do they hold less weight than traditional links?

What Are Infographics?

For those who are unfamiliar, infographics are a way of presenting information to readers visually as opposed to through a traditional piece of content. There will certainly still be text in an infographic, there are just pictures to accompany that text that help to get the point across about a topic. In general, infographics are great for a few things:
  • It helps capture the attention of readers more so than a headline.
  • It makes it easier to understand topics that would normally be difficult.
  • Infographics are sometimes more likely to go viral; they’re very shareable.
  • It is faster to read an infographic, which is a positive for most.
There are many different types of infographics out there. You can have an interactive infographic where readers can actually engage and click on the graphic and be moved to new
screens, or you can have a traditional infographic that lays out information right away. Below is an example of one of my favorite infographics from Fast Co.Design explaining why it isn’t necessarily bacon that makes you fat, but pasta (although I’m not too thrilled about its message):
infographics
infographics2

Because infographics still work like a piece of content, it might make sense to put links within that infographic and then monitor backlinks. That link has a good chance of being shared and earning visibility, but companies have to ask themselves: Is a link in an infographic going to give me any SEO benefits from search engines?

What Matt Cutts Has Said about Infographic Links

Head of Google’s Webspam team Matt Cutts has touched on this subject last year in an interview with Eric Enge and SMX Advanced. As many had guessed, Google has to crack down on infographic links as more and more spammy links and spammy infographics are popping up across the web. Aside from that, Cutts gave a few other reasons why infographic links might lose a little bit of weight in the eyes of Google:

  • Missed Links. Infographics are often republished, probably even more than traditional content, because they have that extra edge you want on your website. Because links in an infographic are often embedded, those republishing often don’t even realize what links they are republishing because they overlooked it in the first place.
  • Careless Republishing. If someone were to see the link in an infographic he/she is going to republish, it might still be ignored. If the infographic looks nice, a person is going to republish it regardless of where the link points.
  • Fact Checking. When it comes time to create an infographic, Google is noticing that the fact checking is often poor.

Because many infographics are still focusing more on aesthetics over solid information and linking, the links found in an infographic are not going to hold the same weight as those found in a traditional piece of text. This is not to say that you can’t earn a link in an infographic, it just won’t be as powerful as some of your others.

The Verdict: Infographics Not a Good Primary Linking Strategy

Despite the fact that infographic links might not be worth as much for SEO, it’s still a good idea to get involved. Infographics get shared more and typically earn higher visibility on search engines for this very reason. While infographics should probably not be your main link building strategy, they can still be dofollow and they can still give you a little extra push.

You can create an infographic on your own, but many work with an outside agency to make it happen. You can visit here to learn more about how you can get started creating your own infographic or set of infographics.

Do you have an experience linking within an infographic? What are your thoughts on the topic? Let us know your story and give us your comments in the space below.



Related Articles from StayOnSearch: