A natural link is a link that exists because someone found the destination worth referencing, with no attempt to manipulate search rankings behind it. The term is close to editorial link and is often used when talking about a site's overall link profile. Google's own language contrasts natural links with unnatural ones, and its manual actions for link problems are titled "unnatural links".
Natural versus unnatural
Google describes unnatural links as links intended to manipulate rankings: bought links, link exchanges done at scale, automated links, keyword-stuffed anchors in guest posts, and similar patterns. A natural link has none of that intent behind it. It might come from a customer's blog, a news article, a forum answer or a partner's documentation.
Natural links also tend to look varied when you see many together. They come from different kinds of sites, use different anchor text (often the brand name or the bare URL), point to different pages and arrive at an uneven pace tied to real events.
Signs a profile is mostly natural
No single feature proves a link is natural, but a profile that mixes these traits is typical of normal growth.
- Anchor text dominated by brand names, URLs and generic phrases
- Links spread across homepage, product, docs and blog pages
- Linking sites that are topically related to your market
- Spikes that line up with launches, press or research releases
Can you build natural links?
You can create the conditions for them. Publishing things people want to cite and telling the right people they exist is promotion, and the resulting links are natural as long as the linking decision stays with the other site. Once you pay for links, trade them or place them yourself at scale, they stop being natural.
Example
Links after a launch
When an illustrative design-handoff tool, Plinthwork, releases a free plugin, links appear from a design newsletter, several personal blogs, a forum thread and a tutorial site. Anchors vary from "Plinthwork" to "this plugin" to the raw URL. Nobody was paid, and the spread is uneven and tied to the release, which is what natural link growth usually looks like.
Common mistakes
Faking a natural pattern
Rotating anchor text or spacing out bought links does not make them natural. The intent and the payment are what count.
Panicking over odd links
Every site picks up some strange links from scrapers and directories. Google has said its systems generally ignore those.
Questions
They overlap heavily. Editorial link stresses that an editor chose to include it. Natural link is used more broadly, including for links from forums, profiles or customers that no editor reviewed.
