## Goodreads

Goodreads is a book discovery and reader community owned by Amazon. Verified authors can claim an author profile and add an official website link that appears on a public Goodreads author page.

- URL: https://www.goodreads.com/
- Guide: https://backlinkbadger.com/provider/goodreads/
- Link type: dofollow
- Free option: yes
- Domain authority: 15/100
- Spam score: 2/100
- Difficulty: 65/100
- Estimated time: 45 minutes
- Requirements: Goodreads account, Published book listing, Author identity proof, Author website URL

Goodreads is only worth targeting if you are an author, publisher, or marketer who can legitimately claim an author profile. The fastest legitimate backlink path is not a normal reader profile; it is the website field on a verified Goodreads Author page.

### Method: Claim an author profile and add your website

1. Create or sign in to a Goodreads account.
2. Open the [Goodreads Author Program](https://www.goodreads.com/author/program) page and confirm that your book, or soon-to-be-published book, is already in the Goodreads database.
3. Search Goodreads for your most popular book by ISBN, ASIN, or title.
4. Open the author name from the book page, scroll to the bottom of the author profile, and use **Is this you? Let us know!** to submit the claim.
5. After approval, update the author profile with a real author website. Keep the profile bio, photo, and book listings complete so the page does not look like a bare link drop.

A public Goodreads author profile can show the author website as a direct external link. In the inspected example below, the author website link uses `rel="noopener noreferrer"` and does not include `nofollow`, `ugc`, or `sponsored`.

[Image: Goodreads author profile showing a direct author website link]

### Link quality notes

The author website field is the backlink surface to prioritize. On the same inspected author page, a Twitter/social link was marked `rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer"`, so do not assume every external link on Goodreads has the same behavior.

This is also not a scalable generic profile-link tactic. If you do not have a real book listing and a claimable author identity, Goodreads is a poor fit and the application may not be approved. For legitimate authors, the link is useful because the profile is public, tied to the book graph, and likely to be trusted more than a throwaway user profile.