Higher education websites (edu sites) are perceived as high-authority and trustworthy. It is no surprise that websites like Harvard.edu and Yale.edu have DR 90+ ratings.
Securing inbound links from such domains can boost your website’s visibility to search engines, encourage visitors to trust your site, and increase referral traffic.
But here’s the catch—you need an effective link-building strategy to secure relevant, high-authority edu backlinks.
This guide covers how to get backlinks from edu sites, including the best domains to target for edu inbound links.
Let’s get started!
We recommend reading the whole article for an in-depth guide on getting backlinks from edu sites.
But if you cannot read it right away, here are the best ways to go about it:
In reality, it takes months, sometimes years, to implement a link-building strategy to secure edu backlinks. Still, there’s no guarantee that the domain owners will accept your backlink requests.
Here’s a more effective way out: choose the right link building agency to help you streamline your backlinking strategy.
Profit Engine is the best place to buy backlinks from edu sites to boost your website’s domain authority and rating quickly. Our team offers strategy-driven link-building solutions to help website owners struggling to rank and land high-quality edu backlinks.
Schedule a free, no-obligation call so we can start working on your edu backlinking strategy!
Edu is a domain name system for educational institutions, specifically colleges and universities.
As such, edu backlinks are simply inbound links from higher education websites. Edu websites are considered high-authority for several reasons:
Consequently, search engines view edu websites as high-authority, explaining why they rank high on SERPs for relevant search phrases.
Next, let’s discuss how edu backlinks offer SEO value for your website:
We have compiled a list of the best edu sites to consider for link-building opportunities. Let’s discuss them below:
Backlinks from these edu sites can help boost your website’s authority, earning you a higher ranking on SERPs. However, you need the right strategy to secure relevant edu backlinks that add value to your SEO efforts.
Below are the best ways to get backlinks from edu sites:
Find opportunities to publish guest posts on edu websites and link the blogs back to your web pages. Use advanced search queries on search engines like Google to find higher education institutions open to contributions.
Create content related to your niche to guarantee that the post is accurate and authoritative.
Leverage link-building tools to identify blogs on edu domains where you can insert outbound links to your website.
Focus on web pages whose content relates to your sector. This makes it easier to request the domain admin to insert a backlink to your website, where students can get additional context.
However, note that niche edits is very different from guest posting.
The former involves adding your backlink to existing blogs, while the latter entails publishing content on edu websites.
Did you know you could get HARO link building opportunities from edu websites? Well, you can.
Many colleges and universities run articles and news releases, which provide opportunities to provide your expert commentary on topics related to your industry. You could then request that the editors include your backlink in the articles.
These first three strategies are the best ways to get backlinks from edu sites.
However, to maximize them and quickly gain backlink placements that boost your website’s SEO performance, you should work with a link-building agency.
At Profit Engine, we prioritize results-focused link-building strategies tailored to your website’s SEO needs. We help you get genuine backlink placements through guest posting, niche edits, and HARO link-building, either as stand-alone strategies or a cocktail of them all.
Get your edu backlink strategy today!
Next, let’s look at some additional ways to get backlinks from the edu sites.
Colleges actively seek internships and employment opportunities for their students. Adding a job page encourages learning institutions to list your website as part of students' resources, earning your site an edu backlink.
You could contact various career services departments and inform them of the open positions.
Identify professors, department heads, and research scholars specializing in areas related to your sector and approach them for interview opportunities.
Publish the interview on your website and request that the faculty members add the link to their university profile section.
Leverage your alumni status to get an edu backlink for your website. Request the alumni association to highlight your achievements, such as industry awards or a groundbreaking invention.
Your alumni association will likely cover your story, after which you could request that they add your website link alongside the story.
Educational institutions are always looking for recent research papers to add to their libraries. Funding a study on a high-interest topic and getting the paper published in a peer-reviewed journal creates an opportunity to earn edu backlinks from multiple websites.
Consider locking the article behind a paywall on third-party platforms but allowing free access on your website. Also, reach out to relevant faculty members and explain how your research paper contributes to existing literature.
Identify edu websites with a dedicated resource section and request the domain admin to include your site in the list. However, your website's content must be relevant to the courses offered by the institution.
Suppose you run a telehealth clinic. Aim to have your website listed on resource pages related to tech or public health.
Many edu websites have a dedicated Student Life section where they share tips about navigating college. This includes a list of places where students can get affordable products or services.
As such, provide student discounts to attract more customers and increase the chances of being listed on the university website and earning an edu backlink.
Higher education institutions often encourage corporations to sponsor students from low socioeconomic backgrounds or donate to other causes within the school.
Such monetary contributions could get your brand listed as one of the institution’s corporate partners. This makes it easier to request the domain admin to add a link to the mention.
We’ll finish this guide by answering commonly asked questions about getting backlinks from edu sites:
The easiest way to get edu backlinks is to get listed on their resource pages.
This method is convenient because you do not need to create unique content for the backlink.
Yes and no. There are no restrictions on which websites can get an edu backlink.
However, most edu domain owners have stringent guidelines when approving backlink requests, often locking websites without helpful or relevant content.
There’s no limit to how many edu backlinks you need for SEO impact. It depends on factors like the edu websites’ relevance and domain authority.
For example, five DR 90 edu backlinks might offer more SEO juice than 10 DR 60 links.
Yes. Edu backlinks work for all niches, given that most sectors have related courses offered in institutions of higher learning.
However, we recommend securing backlinks from relevant edu domains to maximize SEO impact.
Getting backlink placements from edu domains signals search engines that your website contains accurate, authoritative information that readers would find helpful. This could boost your website’s perceived domain authority and rating, which helps your site rank higher on SERPs.
However, securing edu backlinks is challenging as most learning institutions are quite strict about linking to external websites.
As such, we recommend partnering with a link-building company to reduce the turnaround time.
Our team at Profit Engine has years of experience helping online businesses and SEO agencies secure backlink placements in edu domains. We leverage data and AI to find trusted, high-authority link-building opportunities, which we vet manually to guarantee they are genuine and safe.
Schedule a free, no-obligation call to learn how we can help you boost your website’s authority with edu backlinks!