Interview with the founder of AuthorityLabs Link Building Agency – Steve Anastasiadis

Today, we are interviewing Steve Anastasiadis, founder of Authoritylabs, a link building agency. AuthorityLabs is an Organic Search Marketing Company committed to increasing its client’s business through the promotion of unique content and strategic creation. This helps to earn trust in the eyes of all major search engines.

1. Please tell us something about yourself.

I love my jobs, but this is not the only thing that matters to me in life. What matters to me most is my family. My job is something that I chose to do because I find it very interesting and motivating. I also love art. Before I decided to work in digital marketing, I wanted to become a professional iconographer. I still paint icons. It is something that I believe that I will never stop doing. I simply love it! 

2. How did you get into what you do right now? Please tell us more about your journey?

 It all started when I was in University back in 2005. I was building travel web sites with Joomla, and I needed to increase the bookings. Then I started reading about search engines and how they work, and a little later, I started submitting to directories and sending out emails to promote the travel guides I was creating. After I graduated from University, I moved to the UK, where I started working as an SEO specialist for several agencies and eCommerce companies. 

3. Who are your role models?

I really admire the work of Garret French and Erica Ward. I think of them as pioneers. 

4. What inspires you?

The part of my job that inspires me is growth and creation’. I love to create. An idea, just like a painting or a song, can be built from scratch. To be honest, the harder the challenge, the more excited and driven I am to solve it. This is how my mind works!

5. Please tell us about your company.

I am the Founder of Authoritylabs. I set up the company in 2017 after working for over 12 years in the UK for big clients. Before I found Authoritylabs, I worked for the travel, fashion, home improvement, and real estate industry for several big companies.

6. What specific tools are in your link building arsenal to help you acquire links for a client who is just getting started?

First, I need to understand the industry that I am working with and then where exactly I am building links to (existing linkable assets or new that I will create). In this phase, it is essential to find the right “market-defining keywords.” 

The next step is to conduct prospecting and analysis with free and paid link building tools such as Link Prospector and an in-house link prospecting tool I created to separate viable prospects from the junk. 

7. Do you employ competitive analysis in your link building strategy for clients?

I look at competitors’ backlinks primarily at a page level to get an understanding of what the market links to and also to uncover link opportunities. It also shows which pages their paid links point to. Co-citation analysis is also a great way of finding the easier competitors’ links to get. The Majestic-SEO database is the tool that I prefer to analyze competitors’ backlinks data for clients. 

8. What are your views on no-follow vs. do-follow links?

I think that Google introduced the no-follow as a quick fix to better control how links are used on the web to improve its understanding of the link graph. However, what really happened is that by introducing the no-follow Google brought even more attention to the public about the value and importance of links. As a result, webmasters used the no-follow to control or deliberately sculpt their influence on other websites; thus, accelerating the deterioration of the link graph. 

9. Have your link building techniques changed over the years as the search industry has evolved?

When I first started doing link building back in 2005, my methods of acquiring links involved mostly high-quality directory and article submissions, forum links, and also link exchanges. I also used to run competitions and send press releases to announce important industry news.

Nowadays, I focus on content creation and outreach to the right people. Another method I have found to be very successful is expert engagement and high-traffic guest posting opportunities, as in this way, I can bring targeted traffic to my clients’ web sites.

10. What type of links are you most proud of acquiring for your site or a client’s site?

I am usually the person creating the content and conducting the outreach. Hence, every link I acquire gets me excited and makes me proud. I get especially proud of content placements on web sites such as Times.com and Huffpost.com, which improve not only the authority of my client’s websites but also their brand. 

11. Where can people contact you?

The easiest way to reach me is by visiting Authoritylabs.me