Local Link Building: How to Earn Links That Boost Local SEO

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Thibault Besson-Magdelain

Founder of Sorank, 7+ years of experience in SEO, GEO enthusiast.

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In short

local link building means earning links from websites tied to your area: local press, associations, chambers of commerce, partners and suppliers, events, schools and quality directories. These links show Google that the business is real and known locally, which supports the "prominence" factor of local rankings, and they send customers from your community. The best ones come from real relationships (a sponsorship, a partnership, a story worth covering), not from purchases, which Google treats as link spam.

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Local link building is the part of link building that serves a business with a physical area: a plumber, a dental clinic, a restaurant, a law firm. Google explains that local results depend on relevance, distance and prominence, and that prominence is based on "how many websites link to your business and how many reviews you have", in its help page on how local rankings work. For a local business, a link from the city's newspaper or the regional trade association is worth more than ten links from generic sites on the other side of the world.

What makes a local backlink valuable?

Three criteria, in this order:

Local relevance: the linking site is about your city or region (local media, town hall, association, local blog) or your sector in your area.
Editorial reality: the link exists because there is a reason for it (an article, a partnership, a sponsorship, a member listing), on a page people read.
Site quality: a maintained site with real traffic, not a page full of unrelated links.

Links from local sources also bring something general backlinks rarely do: visitors who can become customers next week. Our guide to quality backlinks details the general criteria.

Where can you get local backlinks? 12 sources compared

Source	Difficulty	SEO value	Typical approach
Local and regional press	Medium to high	High	A newsworthy story: opening, local data, an expert comment
Chamber of commerce, business clubs	Low	Medium to high	Membership, which usually includes a member profile
Trade associations and federations	Low to medium	Medium to high	Membership, certification, labels
Sponsorship of clubs and events	Low	Medium	Sponsor a sports team, a festival, a charity run
Partners and suppliers	Low	Medium	Ask for a mention on their "partners" or "where to buy" page
Schools, universities, training centers	Medium	High	Internships, job fairs, a talk, a scholarship with a real purpose
Municipality and local institutions	Medium	High	Listings of local businesses, public events, tourism office
Local events you organize	Medium	Medium to high	Workshops, open days, meetups listed on event calendars and covered by media
Local bloggers and creators	Medium	Medium	An invitation, a test, an interview (with a disclosed partnership)
Quality local and sector directories	Low	Low to medium	Claim and complete listings on serious platforms
Unlinked mentions	Low	Medium	Ask sites that already mention you to add a link
Local guides and resources you publish	Medium to high	High	A useful page (local data, a map, a guide) others want to cite

Directories are the easiest step, but their value is limited: they are first a matter of consistent local citations. Our list of business directories shows which ones are worth it. The links that make a difference come from the press, institutions and organizations, as part of a broader digital PR effort.

How do you build local links step by step?

1. List what you already do in your community

Most local businesses already sponsor something, belong to an association, work with suppliers or host events, without getting a link for it. Write the list: memberships, partners, sponsorships, donations, events attended, press coverage received.

2. Check the links you already have and those of local competitors

Use Google Search Console (Links report) for your site and a backlink tool for the competitors that appear in the local pack. Note the local sites that link to them and not to you: these are your first targets. Our free backlink analysis tool gives a first overview.

3. Claim the links you are owed

Ask each partner, association or event that should list you to add a link to your site, on the page where it makes sense. This step alone often brings a dozen links in a few weeks.

4. Create a reason to be cited

Journalists and institutions link to something useful or new: a local survey, a price index for your trade in the region, a free workshop, a guide to the neighborhood, a commented public dataset. One good local resource can earn links for years.

5. Contact the right people with a short message

Personal, short, with a clear benefit for them. See the templates below.

6. Follow up and maintain the relationships

Renew sponsorships, send news to journalists who covered you, update partner pages. Local link building is a habit, not a campaign. Our guide on how to get backlinks covers the general techniques you can add.

Outreach templates for local link building

Partner or supplier

Hello Claire, we have been working together for three years on the bathroom renovations in Lyon, and we recommend your tiles to all our clients. I noticed that your "Installers" page lists partner companies: could you add ours, with a link to our site? I can send you a short description and photos of recent projects. Thank you, Marc, Example Plumbing.

Hello, we are happy to sponsor the under-12 team again this season. Would it be possible to add our logo with a link to our site on the sponsors page of the club website? Here is the address and the logo in high resolution. Have a great season, Sophie, Example Bakery.

Local journalist

Hello Mr Martin, I run a heating company in Annecy. We analyzed 1,200 service calls from last winter: the most common breakdowns and their average cost by neighborhood. I can share the full data and comment on what households can do before the cold season. Would that interest you for an article? Best regards, Julien.

Adapt the details: the templates work because they are specific, short and offer something real. Never promise a payment for a link.

What should you avoid in local link building?

Google's spam policies define link spam as "creating links to or from a site primarily for the purpose of manipulating search rankings". The examples they list include, among others:

Buying or selling links for ranking purposes, including giving a free product in exchange for a link.
Excessive reciprocal linking ("you link to me, I link to you") and partner pages made only to cross-link.
Low-quality directory or bookmark site links: the hundreds of directories nobody visits.
Links created automatically by programs or services.

Sponsorship is not forbidden: paid links are acceptable when they carry the right attribute. Google's guide to qualifying outbound links asks to mark advertisements and paid placements with rel="sponsored". A sponsor link marked this way passes less ranking value, but it still brings visibility, visits and a local mention. Also avoid over-optimized anchors: Google's link best practices recommend anchor text that is "descriptive, reasonably concise, and relevant", which for local links is usually your business name or address. Our guide to toxic backlinks explains how to spot the risky ones.

How do you measure the effect of local links?

Indicator	Where to find it	What to look for
New linking domains	Search Console, Links report	Local and sector sites added month after month
Referral visits	Your analytics tool	Visits and contacts from local sites
Local pack positions	A local rank tracker, by area	Progress on your main "service plus city" queries
Business Profile actions	Google Business Profile performance	Calls, direction requests, website clicks
Brand mentions	Google search on your name, alerts	New articles and pages that cite you

Expect the effect over months, not days: links are one factor among others, next to the Business Profile, reviews and the content of your local pages. Our guide to multi-location SEO explains how to spread links across several locations, and the link building cost calculator helps you compare the time spent with the alternatives.

Local links and AI assistants

When ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity recommend "a good heating engineer in Annecy", they rely on sources they consider trustworthy: local media, directories, review platforms, associations, business websites. A business mentioned by the regional newspaper, listed by its trade federation and cited on partner pages appears in more of those sources. Local link building and local visibility in AI answers come from the same work: being known and cited in your area. Our study of directories in AI answers shows how often these platforms are cited.

Beyond local sources, Sorank's backlinks acquisition feature obtains natural backlinks automatically from its network of 5,000+ users, and AI mention tracking shows whether assistants cite your business on the local questions your customers ask.

The rule to keep: the best local links come from what you really do in your community; make each sponsorship, membership and partnership visible with a link. Claim those links first, then create resources worth citing.

Frequently asked questions

How many local backlinks does a local business need?

There is no target number, because it depends on the competition in your area and sector. Look at the businesses that appear in the local pack for your main query and count the local sites that link to them: that gives a realistic benchmark. A few links from local media, associations and partners often outweigh dozens of directory links.

Are directory links good for local SEO?

Listings on serious platforms (Google Business Profile, Bing Places, Apple Business Connect, the main national and sector directories) are useful mainly as consistent citations of your name, address and phone. Mass submissions to low-quality directories bring little value and appear among Google's examples of link spam. Claim the directories your customers use, then focus on editorial local links.

Do sponsorship links help SEO?

A sponsorship link is a paid link, so Google asks that it carry the rel sponsored or nofollow attribute, which limits the ranking value it passes. It still brings local visibility, visits and a mention of your business on a trusted local site. Sponsorships also often lead to editorial coverage, such as an article about the event, which can include a normal link.