Securing local backlinks can improve a brand’s online presence dramatically by increasing search engine rankings. This article distills expert insights into practical off-page seo techniques to obtain backlinks for local SEO efforts. Discover 17 clever ways to obtain a local backlink from experts who have mastered the craft. 

• Create Hyperlocal Micro-Communities
• Build Connections with Local Businesses
• Talk to Local Podcasts
• Highlight Unique Community Aspects
• Analyze Competitors’ Backlink Profiles
• Write Guest Posts for Local News
• Sponsor Local Events
• Offer Guest Posts to Local Businesses
• Engage in Community-Based Initiatives
• List on Local Directories
• Sponsor Local Sports Teams
• Support Fellow Local Businesses
• Create Linkable Content Assets
• Join Local Groups and Events
• Get Listed in Local Directories
• Use Viral Social Media Posts
• Local Blogs 

Create Hyperlocal Micro-Communities

Give up looking for directory entries; start creating hyperlocal micro-communities. Developing real relationships within specialized local online businesses is one of the easiest strategies for getting relevant local backlinks. Active Facebook groups, Nextdoor communities, or even dedicated forums for local interests or hobbies thrive in many cities. When applicable, you automatically get mentions and connections back to your site by really contributing, providing insightful advice, and becoming a known authority inside these communities. 

Once I observed a small bakery improve its ranks by only distributing baking techniques to a local foodies group. This is about building trust rather than about obvious self-promotion. Start by noting three hyperlocal online groups pertinent to your expertise and then actively support them for a month. The lesson is that developing actual local connections online reflects real-world networking and produces much more long-term benefits than any directory submission.

Rohit Vedantwar, Co-founder & SEO Expert, Supramind.com

Build Connections with Local Businesses

One of the simplest ways to obtain relevant local backlinks is by building connections with local businesses, organizations, and online directories. For example, I focus on collaborating with local marketing agencies, video production houses, or even small businesses that could benefit from our animated services. By offering value—like guest blog contributions, case studies, or cross-promotions—we earn natural backlinks while fostering meaningful partnerships.

Additionally, don’t overlook local business directories, event sponsorships, and local media coverage. These platforms often link back to your site, boosting your local search visibility. The key is to stay authentic and create mutual value—it’s not just about links; it’s about building a community footprint.

Dewi Saklina, SEO Specialist, Explainerd

Talk to Local Podcasts

I’ll say there are 3 relatively simple ways to obtain relevant local backlinks. In the end, nothing is as simple as just clicking on a button; it does require a little work, but it’s possible.

1. Talk to Podcasts in the area: If you have any local podcasts, reach out to them and suggest an episode where you can appear as a guest. Also, suggest the topic and maybe an outline. Make it as easy as possible for the podcaster to say yes. Ensure they have a website that will link to yours when the episode is released.

2. Reach out to newsletters with websites: This is a bit like the first point, but just with newsletters. You can pitch content from your website to relevant local newsletters or sponsor an issue so you can get a link to your website.

3. News sites: This is the most time-consuming but still manageable. Do a survey with people locally in your area. Based on the results, draw conclusions and write a blog post or an article about your findings. Send this blog post to local news sites for them to cite in the news.

Phillip Stemann, SEO Consultant, Phillip Stemann

Highlight Unique Community Aspects

One of the simplest and most impactful ways to secure relevant local backlinks is by creating content that highlights the unique aspects of your surrounding communities. Go beyond local landmarks and events, focusing on themes and stories that resonate universally with local audiences across the country. Think about showcasing seasonal festivals, regional cuisines, or community-driven initiatives that reflect the culture and pride of an area.

A smart implementation of this strategy is partnering with other local businesses or community organizations. For instance, collaborate with a local bakery to create a guide on “The Best Seasonal Treats in Town,” featuring recipes, stories, or behind-the-scenes videos. Or work with a community health service to craft content on topics like, “Top 5 Family-Friendly Outdoor Activities Near You.” These partnerships not only generate shared content but also open the door for backlinks from your collaborators’ websites and audiences.

Once your content is live, use it as a springboard for outreach to local bloggers, influencers, and media outlets. For example, if your content celebrates local art, you could pitch the story to a local newspaper’s lifestyle section or invite community organizations to share it as a resource. Similarly, if your guide revolves around a charity, nonprofits, and advocacy groups might link to it as part of their own outreach.

This approach taps into an existing network of community pride and partnerships, making it far more likely to earn backlinks that boost your visibility. Plus, by involving other businesses and organizations, you expand your potential audience while reinforcing your position as a connected and trusted community resource. Done right, this strategy turns simple storytelling into a dynamic, SEO-rich campaign that benefits everyone involved.

Robert Garcia, Chief SEO Strategist, MiamiSEOPro

Analyze Competitors’ Backlink Profiles

Alongside building local citations, I always analyze the backlink profiles of my local competitors. Often, you can find links there that are very easy to replicate. While paid SEO tools like SEMrush or Majestic can be used for this purpose, you can also achieve this completely for free with Ahrefs’ Free Backlink Checker. By entering a local competitor’s domain, you immediately get a glimpse of their backlink profile. Although it’s limited, checking multiple competitors can reveal interesting opportunities to build your own backlinks.

Benny Windolph, Head of SEO, HECHT INS GEFECHT

Write Guest Posts for Local News

The easiest way to get local and relevant backlinks is to reach out to local news websites and offer to write a guest post on your area of expertise and make it relevant to their readers. For example, we got a local roofer a guest post by pitching an article on how to best prepare your roof for the winter. They loved the pitch and it got us a great link back to our website.

Isaac Hammelburger, SEO, Search Pros SEO

Sponsor Local Events

Hyper-local sponsorships are such a simple yet powerful way to snag local backlinks. Think about partnering with community events, schools, or even small, niche charities. They often have “sponsors” or “partners” pages where they’ll link back to your site. And since these pages are so locally relevant, search engines tend to love them.

But the benefits go beyond just SEO. These partnerships are also a great way to boost your visibility and build trust in your community. You’re not just asking for a backlink—you’re aligning your business with something people genuinely care about. It’s a win-win that makes the connection feel authentic and lasting.

The key? Choose organizations or events that actually align with your values. When it feels real, people notice—and the relationships you build along the way are worth just as much as the links themselves.

Dillon Loomis, SEO Consultant, Pinnacle Pursuit SEO

Offer Guest Posts to Local Businesses

Here’s four ways we’ve got local backlinks fairly easily for our clients:

We work with a local concrete supplier, and they work closely with football clubs around the county. Sometimes it’s a regular sponsorship deal which gets their brand on the back of shirts and a backlink from their website. Last year, though, they contributed concrete for the rebuilding of a football stand, and that generated a lot of press coverage—and backlinks—for them.

Partnering with local charities or nonprofits benefits the community and gets you backlinks. It might just be a listing on their website, but it gets you a useful local link. A local attorney we work with always sponsors a specific event at a local charity fete. With 6 years of sponsorship under their belts the sprint event is now locally referred to using their name.

Don’t forget local press. If you’ve got a local newspaper with a good readership, get your stories in there. It could be an award your business has received, an employee’s “weird” hobby, or ways you’re working to help out a local hospital or charity. Some papers let you publish articles directly on their website, which is useful for getting a direct link back to your site.

Finally, keep reminding your happy customers how important reviews are to your success as a business. A business with 5-star reviews on reputable platforms has got an immediate advantage, so encourage customers to leave reviews on your Google Business Profile, Trip Advisor, and local directories.

The best backlinks are honest backlinks—those that match up your local connections and interests with opportunities for winning those links.

Garry West, Owner, Imagefix Ltd

Engage in Community-Based Initiatives

I’m a big fan of doing outreach to other local businesses that have a blog on their website and asking for a guest post. Sometimes, even if they don’t have a blog, I’ll offer to start one for free if they let me link out to my client. These types of posts work great because they’re already locally relevant and can actually lead to traffic to the client’s site. And the best part is that most of the time you won’t have to pay for these backlinks, and when you do, it will be much cheaper than a traditional guest post backlink.

Shawna Newman, Marketing Director & Agency Owner, Growth Cupid

List on Local Directories

Engaging in community-based initiatives is one of the most effective ways to build a strong, relevant backlink profile for local SEO. By sponsoring events like the Birmingham Community Fun Run or partnering with organizations such as the Adamsville Fall Festival, businesses can secure backlinks from event pages that highlight their involvement. Collaborating with local businesses, such as creating a co-branded guide with Staging by Sarah on “How to Prepare Your Home for Sale,” provides mutual backlinks while adding value for the audience. Similarly, featuring local businesses in blog posts like “Top 5 Coffee Shops in [City]” encourages those businesses to link back to your site from their own web pages or social media.

Hosting workshops or webinars at venues like the Huntsville Public Library or sponsoring youth sports teams like the Greenville Lions also opens opportunities for backlinks from community and school websites. Additionally, listing your business on directories such as the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce or leveraging press releases for initiatives like the Mobile Bay Clean-Up ensures links from credible, local sources. These strategies not only boost SEO performance but also establish your business as an engaged, trusted member of the community.

Mitch Cornell, Founder/CEO, Webmasons Marketing

Sponsor Local Sports Teams

Local directories are hidden gems for SEO! Looking for directories that are relevant to your business/industry can be as easy as doing a Google search of “best [industry] X” (example: best travel group tours Chicago), but don’t forget about more encompassing directories like a local chamber of commerce. Directory listing can be done manually or, depending on how ready you are to invest, it can be worth paying for a service like Semrush which lets you manage all your local directories in one place.

Lauren Plug, SEO Consultant & Sustainable Copywriter, Copy by LP

Support Fellow Local Businesses

A simple way to get local backlinks is to sponsor a local sports team.

You can find local teams that have sponsorship pages using a search that looks something like this:

• “your area” “sport (e.g., football, cricket, snooker, etc.)” “our sponsors”

Alternatively, you can use ChatGPT to help you find opportunities though I’ve had more success with Google.

Often you can get a good quality local link that will be present on their site for at least a year for just a few hundred dollars!

Daniel Richardson, Search Consultant, Dan Rich

Create Linkable Content Assets

The secret sauce is finding what benefits both sides naturally. Maybe you write an authentic review about how that local print shop created your eye-catching business cards, and they share a story about how your company solved a common challenge their customers face. This creates real value beyond just trading links. Local business award nominations. When you nominate another company for a community award, they often link back to all nominees on their website. Plus, you’re authentically supporting fellow local businesses, which tends to come full circle. 

The best strategy of all remains amazingly simple: Become an active contributing member of your local business community. Share knowledge, support each other, and create content that actually helps neighbors. The backlinks follow as an organic effect, and what’s more to the point—they are just what Google is looking for more than anything—organic connections between businesses that know and support one another in their community.

Justin Abrams, Founder & CEO, Aryo Consulting Group

Join Local Groups and Events

One effective way to obtain backlinks is by creating linkable content assets that attract backlinks via passive link-building from relevant sources over a long period. This is not the simplest way to obtain links but upfront effort to create the linkable asset pays off over the long-term because the links are acquired passively. The linkable content asset does need to be genuinely link-worthy and contain the sort of information that naturally attracts links, i.e., data, statistics, graphs, tables. So for a local business, concentrate on data about the local population and the local area. Don’t forget to use your brand logo on all visuals (graphs, charts etc) so that even if someone shares the visual without a link there will be an element of brand awareness. And remember that link-building is a marathon, not a sprint.

Michelle Symonds, SEO Consultant, Ditto Digital

Get Listed in Local Directories

The two easiest ways are joining groups and being included in local events (to varying capacities).

Local groups like chambers of commerce, networking groups, business mentorship programs, advisory committees, local charitable boards, educational programs (local high schools and colleges can have mentorship programs, internships, co-ops, or even job fairs) or virtually any other local group that has a decent website. The “decent website” piece is key.

Ultimately, one of the benefits you are getting from your involvement is having your website listed on their website with some content and information regarding the partnership. Sometimes there are even local businesses you can benefit from (for instance a local real estate agent might have a website where they list their go-to loan officers or a local beekeeper might get listed on the farmer’s market website where they sell their honey).

The other simple way to get backlinks is slightly more complicated (and possibly requires a larger budget). That would be local events. There are ways to get involved other than just sponsoring a table or paying to get included. Anytime a local charity asks for a donation, you can offer a gift card to your business (which will win you a new customer if it gets used and free publicity whether or not anyone uses it). When offering the gift card, you can email instructions to include a mention of your donation on the event page listing (maybe on Facebook, Eventbrite, or their company page) with a link to your website.

Creating a system for this is key. For example, I have a client that created an email filter for every donation request. One person checks that inbox once a week and sends them a reply asking what $ amount is appropriate for a gift card donation and in that same email requests information on how their business will be presented. Upon getting a reply they get enough information to know how much benefit they’ll receive (just publicity at the event, a website backlink, etc.) which gives them the information they need to offer the gift card.

Other ways to get URLs on event pages are offering free talks, being a guest speaker, sponsoring something for the event, having a table at a conference, etc.

Always look at the website first! Backlinks are much more powerful when they come from healthy websites.

Vince Laliberte, Head of Accounts, Taction

Use Viral Social Media Posts

One of the simplest and most effective ways to obtain relevant, local backlinks is to get your business listed in local online directories and community platforms. Here’s how you can do this:

1. Local Business Directories

• Google My Business: Ensure your Google My Business profile is complete and optimized. While the primary benefit is improved local search visibility, it can also serve as a credible backlink.

• Yelp, Bing Places, and Apple Maps: These platforms are widely used and respected, providing valuable backlinks.

• Industry-Specific Directories: Depending on your niche, there may be specialized directories (e.g., TripAdvisor for travel-related businesses, Houzz for home improvement).

2. Chamber of Commerce and Local Associations

• Join Your Local Chamber of Commerce: Most chambers offer a member directory with a link to your website.

• Local Business Associations: Participate in local business groups or associations related to your industry, which often feature member websites.

3. Community and Non-Profit Websites

• Sponsor Local Events or Teams: Sponsorships often include a backlink from the event or team’s website.

• Partner with Local Non-Profits: Collaborate on community projects or donate, leading to mentions and links on their sites.

4. Local News Outlets and Blogs

• Press Releases: Share newsworthy updates with local media outlets, which may link back to your site.

• Guest Contributions: Write articles or provide expert insights for local blogs and news websites.

5. Educational Institutions

• Local Schools and Universities: Offer to give talks, workshops, or internships. These institutions often list partners and sponsors on their websites with backlinks.

Robert Hampton, Owner, http://prodigypro.io

Local Blogs 

One of the simplest ways to get relevant backlinks from local sites is with viral social media posts such as Facebook and TikTok. Most local bloggers are looking for trending places for their blog content especially in the travel blog or food blogging niche.

Firdaus Sateem, Founder, VoidSEO