If you want to rank more than a click or two away from your radius, you’re going to need some links – from other sites to your site. Most of these sites should be relevant to what you do, where you are, or both.

These links probably don’t have to be hard to get, you won’t need many of them, and you may not even need them right now to make big profits. How important they are depends on many factors. But you will need some solid links sooner or later, as reinforcement to support your other SEO work. Otherwise, you will have a hard time getting ahead of your tougher competitors, staying ahead of them and preventing rankings. A version of this applies if you are a professional SEO expert: you must some Work on helping your clients get some links.

There is no one “best” type of link opportunity for many different reasons. You’ll want some “local” links, some “industry” links, some that are both, and even some that are neither. Be omnivorous and don’t overthink it. What do I mean by a “local” link? Pretty much anything, but examples include charities, chambers of commerce, schools, other businesses, and media outlets based in or focused on your area. I’ve found links from such sites to be more useful than others. “Industry links” can come from professional associations, trade magazines, blogs in your niche, conferences, etc.

At the same time, you may be paralyzed by the many choices or simply not know where to start. If it helps you move forward: I suggest focusing more on local linking opportunities. In my experience, they are more likely to help improve your Google Maps and organic rankings and even make your business less dependent on those local rankings in the first place.

Big caveat: See what works best for your Business. I hope you use my advice as a starting point, but you don’t have to take my word for it. Try to maintain a small stream of local AND non-local links, work on the rest of your SEO, and see what results you get after at least a couple of months.

Why might the average local link help you in ways that the average “industry” link might not? A few reasons:

1. Local links are likely to add up and come from a variety of sites. This is because they tend to be easier or cheaper to acquire and you are more likely to get a few of them than investing all your time and money in pursuing a link from a high-profile “authoritative” site. A single link usually won’t help you in any noticeable way, whereas accumulating links over a longer period of time will usually pay off after a few months.

2. Local links point to an important page on your site rather than a blog post or other hidden resource that is unlikely to make money. As I’ve explained in various ways over the years, sometimes nurturing your links is even more important than the quantity or quality of the links themselves. In the desert, it doesn’t matter how much water you have if you don’t conserve it or use every drop to get a little further to the next watering hole.

3. Many or most local businesses have at least a few links from local websites, regardless of whether SEO is on the minds of these business owners, whether they have tried to get those links, and whether they even know they have these links. In other words, local links are more likely to reflect the competitive landscape of businesses that are not trying to improve their rankings. In general, Google tries (often poorly) to represent online the pecking order that exists offline. As usual, I’m not saying it should be that way, but it seems that way.

4. A conclusion from the last point: Local links are less often acquired through means that Google considers unnatural or questionable. These subjective, debatable means include buying a link, good deed just for the link, guest posts just for a link, link exchange with many sites and so on. Everyone wants a link from USA todayForbes, Business Insider and other big names, but I can tell you from personal experience that you can buy your way into big publications like these (I’m not naming names today.) To varying degrees, you can do the same thing with local sites (and get local links), but those just aren’t as enticing a target for most SEOs. Prison guards try to be everywhere at once, but they can’t. So they assume that most inmates want to jump the barbed wire fence and get out, while fewer of them want to sneak into the kitchen or woodshop to make a shovel and a knife.

5. Assume for a moment (as I did) that it’s harder for Google to figure out where you are than what you do. Your service area is easier to fake than your services. You can’t pretend you fix teeth when you fix dishwashers. If you do that, you won’t get paid, you’ll get bad reviews, and you could get in legal trouble. If my educated guess is correct, a local link confirms at least part of your story for Google: your location and your territory.

6. Local websites are more likely to be curated by people who care about the community the site is targeting. An old hand or the unofficial mayor of East Tuna Fish is more likely to know what a true local business is and what isn’t.

7. You’re more likely to keep a local link long-term, and maybe even more likely to get one. Because smaller, locally focused sites are less in the crosshairs of SEOs and their frequent excesses and abuses, these sites’ policies are less likely to change over time. These sites are less likely to “nofollow” or “rel=sponsored” links, or stop linking outward altogether. (An example of the opposite is what the BBB did a few years ago, where even long-time BBB-accredited businesses quietly “nofollowed” their links.) A local site is less likely to be a swimming pool where a few bad swimmers with dirty sneakers walk in, relieve themselves in the water, and ruin the place for everyone else.

8. Local sites are more likely to get you visibility outside of Maps through Barnacle SEO, so it’s more plausible that you’re trying to put your sign on the site just because it’s clever marketing or networking, rather than because you just want the link.

9. Local websites are more likely to get you visibility outside of Google. This is another form of the paradox I’ve seen time and time again at work (but haven’t fully understood yet): the more you act like a business owner who cares about marketing but doesn’t care much about Google, the more likely Google is to discover you. Play it safe a little, and you’ll be fine.

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What’s my advice? Stop all the blabbermouthing. No more infographics, no more complicated and time-consuming outreach to “influencers,” and no more pestering bloggers to take on your guest post – at least for now. Keep it simple. Donate to a few local charities, maybe join a local chamber of commerce or similar organization, get listed in the local newspaper/birdcage liner, and see where that gets you. If you research competitors’ links, see what local Sites will link to them. Pick a few ideas that seem doable, implement them, and go from there. It’s great if you can’t wait to get more links, but there’s no need to rush. Find a pace that works for you.