How Product Hunt built 100M+ backlinks 🤯

Product Hunt's strategy to achieve an extremely high Domain Rating of 90 via backlinks (2 min read).

Welcome to Product Spotlight 🥇. In this section, we shine the Spotlight on products that are taking things up a notch - be it reducing friction, designing killer onboardings, using novel acquisition methods...the list is endless 😄.

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Think SEO is outdated? Maybe if you’re doing it like everybody else.

Product Hunt, a website that curates the best new products, has established itself as the go-to place for:

1. Tech enthusiasts eagerly looking to discover new products

2. The makers of these products to gain traction and validation from the market

On the way, it’s managed to build one of the most authoritative websites having a domain rating of 90 with over 100M backlinks. How exactly did it manage to do this?

Product Hunt’s ranking according to Ahrefs

It’s common knowledge today how Typeform managed to build over 100M backlinks. You embed a Typeform on your website, and that form has a code snippet which links directly to Typeform’s website, effectively working as a backlink.

What many don’t know is that Product Hunt used broadly this same tactic, albeit in a novel way more suited to their product. 🤓

The secret to their success? Badges. Yup. These little things.

Product Hunt gives out badges for many categories - Product of the Day, Product of the Week, etc.

These badges serve three purposes:

1. For the badge receiver, it’s social proof that their product was found to be one of the best by the tech community

2. Increase Product Hunt’s visibility to everyone landing on the page

3. Perhaps most importantly, serve as direct backlinks to Product Hunt’s website, increasing their domain authority

Over time, Product Hunt accumulated millions of backlinks across thousands of domains that now proudly show off these badges 🥇.

To double down on this strategy, they now let websites even add a “featured on Product Hunt” badge, further increasing their visibility and website authority.

Anyone with a post on Product Hunt can add this badge to their website, even if they haven’t been featured on the homepage.

Quick takeaway: The best tech companies are able to use already established channels like SEO in new ways that align with their product to leapfrog past their competitors. 🚀

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That’s it for this Spotlight. Thanks for joining us!

And while you’re here, remember, there are only 3 rules to life:

1. Be kind to everyone you meet

2. Don’t take yourself too seriously

3. Drink lots of water

See you next week!