Key points at a glance
- According to Google, a business's prominence depends partly on how many websites link to it. That makes links one building block of local ranking.
- The valuable ones are links from your surroundings: tourism board, city or municipal portal, suppliers, clubs, events, the local press and food blogs.
- Most good links come from real relationships and occasions. You just have to ask and make it easy for your partners.
- Buying links, swapping them at scale or generating them automatically breaks Google's spam policies. Paid links must be marked as such.
- A link only works if it leads to a good landing page: menu, parties, events or rooms rather than an empty home page.
This post is general information and does not replace legal or tax advice. Rules change and some differ between federal states: check the details with your chamber of commerce (WKO) or IHK, the competent authority or your tax adviser.
Why links matter for local ranking
Google ranks local results by three factors: relevance, distance and prominence. On prominence, Google states explicitly that the number of websites that link to your business counts, along with the number and rating of your reviews. Google does not reveal how much weight each factor carries. What is certain: a venue that people in the region talk about and link to looks to search engines like a venue guests know.
Links are only part of the picture. Without a complete Google Business Profile, consistent details and a website with a text menu, even the best links achieve little. The guide Local SEO for hospitality gives an overview of all the building blocks. This one covers the part most often forgotten: links from other sites.
What makes a good local link
Not every link is worth the same. A single link from your town's website or a well-known regional newspaper says more about your venue than a hundred listings in directories nobody visits. Four questions help you judge.
| Question | Strong link | Weak link |
|---|---|---|
| Does the source fit you? | Regional tourism board, city portal, winemaker, local paper | Unrelated industries, sites from other countries with no connection |
| Do real people visit the page? | Events calendar, food blog with readers | Link collections and directories without visitors |
| Is the link in context? | Article about your venue, partner list with a description | Long list with hundreds of links and no text |
| Was it given freely? | Recommendation, report, real partnership | Bought, swapped or placed automatically |
Mentions without a link are not worthless either: they make your venue better known, and search engines and AI assistants read them too. The free AI chatbot preview shows whether ChatGPT and other assistants already recommend your venue. When you spot a mention, you can politely ask whether a link to your website could be added. Editors and partners usually say yes if you send the right link along.
The best sources of local links
The good news: almost every hospitality business already has relationships that can turn into links. The overview below shows the main sources and how to get there. Listings in business directories and platforms are covered in a separate guide to business directories.
| Source | How to get there | Especially for |
|---|---|---|
| Tourism board, tourist information, city marketing | Register your business and keep the listing with photos and website link up to date; often tied to a membership or a fee | Hotel, Heuriger, day-trip venue, Wirtshaus |
| City and municipal portal | Check the municipality's hospitality directory, events calendar and market page and ask to be listed | All venues |
| Suppliers and producers | Ask your brewery, winemaker, roastery, bakery or farm to name you on their "where to buy" page | Restaurant, café, bar, wine bar |
| Clubs and sport | Sponsoring, club parties, a regulars' table or catering with a mention on the club's website | Wirtshaus, snack bar, catering |
| Events and markets | Take part with your venue or stall in festivals, markets and town fairs and get onto the exhibitor list | Food truck, bar, club, catering |
| Local press and regional media | Report real occasions: opening, anniversary, new concept, social commitment | All venues |
| Food blogs and restaurant guides | Invite bloggers without conditions; keep restaurant guide listings complete | Restaurant, café, bar |
Suppliers, clubs and events
The easiest links come from people you already work with. Many breweries, wineries and roasteries list the venues that serve their products on their website. A phone call or a short email is often enough to appear there with a link. In return, you can name and link your partners on your own website: guests find that interesting, as long as it describes a real collaboration and is not just a swap list.
- Suppliers: "Our beer comes from …", "Coffee from the … roastery". Ask whether your venue can be added to their list of partner businesses.
- Clubs: football club, brass band, volunteer fire brigade, cultural society. If you cater a festival or sponsor the shirts, you often end up on the sponsors page.
- Events: town festival, Christmas market, wine hiking day, street food festival. Exhibitor lists often link to the participants' websites.
- Neighbouring businesses: hotels without a restaurant, wedding venues, theatres or cinemas are happy to recommend places nearby.
- Schools and courses: cooking classes, barista workshops or apprenticeship training can be mentioned on the websites of educational institutions.
Your own events are a particularly good occasion: a wine evening with the winemaker, a Mother's Day brunch or a quiz night end up in the events calendars of the town, the region and the media if you submit them in time. The guide Promoting events online explains how to make events visible online.
Press and food blogs
Regional newspapers, city magazines and local online media are always looking for stories from the area. A new head chef, a 25th anniversary, a partnership with the farm next door or a charity campaign are topics editors like to pick up. The link to your website then often follows on its own. How to write a press release and build contacts with editors is covered in the guide to press relations.
Find an occasion
What is genuinely new or special? Opening, renovation, new concept, award, anniversary, social commitment.
Write short and concrete
Who, what, when, where and why in a few paragraphs, plus two or three good photos with usage rights.
Send the website link
Name the right landing page, such as the event page or the menu, not just the home page.
Invite food bloggers
Invite bloggers from the region without making a positive review or a link a condition.
Follow up and say thanks
Share published articles, say thank you and, if the link is missing, politely ask for it to be added.
What you should not do
Your inbox probably gets regular offers like "100 backlinks for your restaurant" or "guest posts on strong sites". Google groups such practices under link spam in its spam policies: links created mainly to manipulate rankings. These include bought links that pass ranking credit, excessive link swaps, automatically generated links, links from low-quality directories, and guest posts or press releases with keyword-optimised anchor text. Google can ignore such links or demote a website. At best, the money is wasted.
How to get it right
- Ask partners, suppliers and clubs for a mention with a link
- Report real occasions to the local press and city magazines
- Keep listings with the tourism board and municipality complete
- Have paid placements and sponsoring links marked as sponsored
- Ask for links to fitting subpages, such as parties or events
Better not
- Buy link packages or accept backlink offers from your spam folder
- Swap links at scale or create link pages just for that
- Get listed in hundreds of directories without visitors
- Offer food blogs a voucher only in return for a positive post with a link
- Dictate anchor texts like "best cheap restaurant Vienna"
Good landing pages on your website
A link is only as good as the page it lands on. Someone coming from the region's wine calendar is looking for the wine evening, not the home page. Someone arriving via a wedding venue's website wants to see your offer for parties. Dedicated pages for the menu, parties, catering, events or rooms make your website linkable. What belongs on them is covered in the guide Restaurant website: the 13 things your guests look for.
- Clear, permanent addresses: one page per offer that does not change every season.
- Up-to-date content: opening hours, menu and dates must be correct, otherwise the link loses its value for guests. The free opening hours generator keeps your hours consistent everywhere.
- Press area: logo, photos, a short text about your venue and a contact. That makes linking easy for editors and partners.
- Fast on phones: most visitors come from a smartphone, and a slow page throws the click away.
A website people like to link to
See in the free preview how your venue could look with dedicated pages for the menu, parties and events.
A free preview of your venue website, designed by us.
How to proceed step by step
Building links for a venue is not a weekend project but a habit. Plan one small task every month rather than one big campaign a year. The checklist below helps you get started.
Local backlinks checklist
- List all suppliers, partners and clubs you work with
- Check whether the tourism board, municipality and city portal list your venue with a website link
- Ask partners to add you to their list of venues and send the right link along
- Submit your own events to events calendars in good time
- Send one real occasion per quarter to the local press
- Create a press area with logo, photos and a short text on your website
- Look for mentions without a link and politely ask for one
- Have paid links and sponsoring marked as sponsored
