Fixing broken links is an essential step in maintaining a healthy backlink profile. But you’ll need to do more than that to succeed in the SEO world.
You need a backlink strategy that considers the bigger picture. This includes competitive analysis. A process that examines your competitors’ backlink profiles. The goal? To discover new opportunities for your own site.
A backlink monitor is a useful tool in this situation. It can identify broken links and track your site’s backlinks. Plus, you get a deeper look into the competitive landscape.
That way, you can continue to stay ahead in the ever-changing race for search engine rankings.
What are backlinks?
Backlinks are one of the top 8 Google ranking factors. (Source: Backlinko)
But what are they? And why are they so crucial for ranking in the search engine results pages (SERPs)?
Backlinks are incoming or inbound links that come from one website to another. When a website links to yours, that’s a backlink for your site.
These links are important for SEO because they act as a “vote of confidence” or endorsement from one site to another.
Despite constant core updates, Google still uses backlinks. How? To determine a website’s credibility, authority, and relevance. The more high-quality backlinks your site has, the better it will do in SERPs.
Check out the graphs below to see how backlinks, or referring domains, can positively impact your traffic and keyword rankings.
Why competitor analysis matters in your backlink strategy
When explaining the importance of competitor analysis, the most straightforward answer is: Why guess at your next move when you can peek at what’s already driving results for others?
Your competitors have likely already done much of the legwork by building relationships with high-quality websites and creating content that attracts links.
Sure, it’s good to reinvent the wheel. That can help your content stand out. But don’t let that be your only strategy, especially since only 5% of websites online have backlinks pointing to them. (Source: Search Logistics)
This is likely because it’s tough to gain backlinks organically.
So, it helps to analyze what your competitors have done to get backlinks. This will help you find untapped opportunities, avoid their mistakes, and carve out your own unique strategy.
What is a backlink monitor?
A backlink monitor is a tool that tracks all the links pointing to a website. It provides data on where backlinks are coming from, their quality, and whether they’re active or lost.
These tools can also help you evaluate the value of each backlink by looking at metrics like domain authority (DA), relevance, and traffic.
Backlink monitors are a must for competitor analysis. They allow you to:
- Identify your competitors’ most valuable backlink sources
- Spot trends in their backlink strategies
- Uncover opportunities to strengthen your backlink profile
SEMrush is a popular SEO tool that includes a backlink monitor. It allows you to examine your competitors’ backlinks, ranking keywords, and more.
How to use a backlink monitor for competitor analysis
You must follow certain steps to analyze your competitors’ link-building strategies with a backlink monitor.
Doing this will help you discover opportunities and refine your search engine optimization (SEO) strategy. Here’s how to make the most of it:
Identify your competitors
You might be thinking, “But I already know who my competitors are. So, what’s the point of this step?”
Well, it’s important to identify the right competitors for backlink analysis. Why? Because your business competitors might not be the same as your SEO competitors.
For example, say you’re a small local business. And you compete with a nearby chain for customers. However, your top competitors in search engine rankings are blogs or niche websites dominating the same keywords.
So, this step helps you focus on competitors with a strong SEO performance. They’re ranking for the keywords you want to target and have a solid backlink profile to learn from. You can also discover websites you weren’t aware of that compete for traffic and could affect your rankings.
Here are some tips to help you find the right competitors to analyze:
- Perform a keyword search: Use Google and other search engines to look for your primary keywords. The top-ranking websites are likely your direct competitors in terms of SEO.
- Do a niche search: Consider businesses operating in the same niche or offering similar products or services, even if they aren’t ranking above you.
- Use a backlink monitor: Use a backlink monitor to identify competitors. After putting your website in the search bar, you’ll see a list of competitors based on overlapping keywords and backlinks.
- Cast a net according to your target audience: Think about which websites or brands your target audience also visits or engages with. These would be indirect competitors worth analyzing.
- Check on sites that share sources: If another website shares a lot of the same backlink sources as you, they’re likely another relevant competitor to monitor.
Let’s look at an example. Imagine that you own a local coffee shop in Seattle. You believe your main competitor is Starbucks because of its market dominance.
Sure, this is true for business competition. But that doesn’t necessarily mean Starbucks is your biggest competitor when it comes to SEO.
In fact, when you do a Google search for the term “Seattle specialty coffee,” you find that one of the top organic results is Kuma Coffee. This isn’t a direct competitor because it’s not an actual coffee shop but a company that sells coffee.
Screenshot provided by the author
When you conduct a search for the term “best coffee shops in Capitol Hill,” you might get top organic results for yet another indirect competitor.
Online forums like Reddit and niche coffee sites like Seattle Coffee Scene are examples of sites ranking high for this keyword.
Screenshot provided by the author
You might also find blogs or travel sites like Eater Seattle and Adventures of A+K, which dominate rankings for keywords like “hidden gem coffee shops in Seattle.” These are also indirect competitors.
Screenshot provided by the author
By focusing on sites like Kuma Coffee, Seattle Coffee Scene, and Eater Seattle, you can:
- Analyze their backlink profiles to see which local publications, influencers, or niche directories are linking to them.
- Uncover opportunities to pitch your café to these same sources.
- Learn from their keyword strategy and create content that attracts backlinks, such as “Top 5 Coffee Shops to Visit in Seattle” or “Best Latte Art Cafés.”
Following this approach doesn’t mean you don’t need to look at your direct competitors. But it keeps you focused on the competitors impacting your SEO visibility.
So, when identifying competitors, always follow the SERPs. They won’t steer you wrong.
Now that that’s out of the way, let’s take a deeper look at how you can use a backlink monitor to identify your competitors.
- Start with your domain: Input your website into the tool. Look at your backlink profile to find referring domains and anchor text tied to your primary keywords.
- Check the top referring domains: Review the websites linking to your competitors’ domains.
- Analyze shared backlinks: Most backlink monitors highlight shared backlinks, which are websites that link to both you and another business. This is a quick way to identify competitors with overlapping link-building strategies.
- Use the “Competitor Report”: Some tools offer built-in competitor identification features. They analyze backlinks, which helps them suggest domains competing for exact keywords or linked by the same referring domains.
- Spot ranking competitors: You can combine backlink data with keyword rankings, depending on the tool. Focus on competitors that appear in your backlink reports and rank higher than yours for relevant terms.
Analyze their backlink sources
Dig into websites linking to competitors to identify patterns, trends, and opportunities. From there, you’ll gain actionable insights to improve your link-building strategy. Here’s how to approach it:
- Identify top linking domains: Use your backlink monitor to generate a list of domains linking to your competitors’ websites. Focus on high-authority, relevant sites that could also provide valuable backlinks to you.
These are the top linking domains to Starbucks.com:
- Assess Domain Authority and Relevance: Review the Domain Authority (DA) or Domain Rating (DR) of the sites that link to your competitors. Backlinks from high-authority websites carry more SEO weight and “link juice.” Also, consider how relevant these sites are to your niche. Backlinks from topically relevant sites will have a more substantial impact on your own rankings.
- Look for link patterns: Identify trends in the types of sites linking to your competitors. This might include industry blogs, local directories, news outlets, educational or government sites, etc. Also, look at which types of content are earning backlinks for your competitors. Pay attention to content formats like guest posts, product or service reviews, press mentions, and educational resources.
- Analyze anchor text: Review the anchor text referring domains used in the links. The anchor text will help you understand your competitors’ keyword strategy. Look at the keywords that are helping them rank. Consider using them in your content.
- Track link growth: Monitor the growth of backlinks to your competitors over time. If there’s a sudden spike, this could be related to a successful campaign, PR push, or viral content. Identifying these trends can help you replicate or capitalize on similar strategies.
- Evaluate link types: Check whether competitors are using follow or no-follow links. Follow links pass SEO value and help improve search rankings. However, no-follow links don’t contribute directly to rankings, but they can still drive traffic.
Track lost links
Lost links are backlinks that once pointed to a website but are no longer active. This can happen for many reasons, including page deletions, URL changes, or voluntary link removals.
Sometimes, these lost links can signal a gap in your competitors’ SEO strategy. From there, you can capitalize on this weakness. Or, if the lost link is due to a technical issue like a 404 error or a broken link pointing to your competitor, you can practice some link building outreach for link placements of your own.
Using your backlink monitor, schedule regular crawls of your competitors’ backlinks. This will make it easy to track any changes in their backlink profile over time.
You can also use the “Lost Links” feature in your backlink monitoring tool to see backlinks that once pointed to your competitor’s site but are no longer active.
Uncover potential opportunities
Now that you have tons of data to understand your competitors’ backlink profiles, you can start improving your own strategy.
- Are sites linking to your competitors’ but not yours? Reach out to those domains with your own content, guest posts, or partnership proposals to secure similar backlinks.
You can even create a spreadsheet for each competitor that lists all of the high-authority sites linking to them. Staying organized like this is key to keeping track of the sites you reach out to.
- In the previous section, we talked about tracking your competitors’ lost links. Contact the site that removed the link and offer your own content or product as a replacement.
- You now know about your competitors’ backlink sources. Adjust your link-building strategy to include these sources. For example, some of your competitors may be securing links from podcast interviews, industry-specific forms, or influencer content. This is a trend you can tap into as well.
- A backlink monitor can show you the anchor text your competitor used for links pointing to them. Use this data to refine your anchor text and target more relevant keywords.
- Sometimes, you can learn from competitors’ mistakes. Using a backlink monitor, you can see the types of sites your competitors are getting links from, whether they’re authoritative, spammy, or irrelevant. Use this opportunity to focus on building high-quality, relevant backlinks and avoid risky backlinks that can harm your SEO.
Let’s end with an example.
You’re in the fitness industry. Your competitor, Fabletics, has multiple backlinks from health influencers on social media and fitness blogs. As you track these backlinks, you realize these influencers often work with brands promoting fitness gear.
You don’t currently target that demographic.
However, given the data, you decide to pivot and target eco-friendly fitness influencers and blogs for your backlink-building campaigns.
You start:
- Researching influencers, bloggers, and websites within the fitness industry.
- Studying the types of content these influencers and blogs are posting. Popular pieces are product reviews, fitness tips, and guides about choosing the right fitness gear.
- Reaching out to blogs with a personalized pitch explaining your brand and the products you offer. Ask if they would consider featuring your product in an article or review.
- Finding influencers on Instagram who promote fitness. You send them your product for a review and ask for a backlink in return.
Linking up with opportunity
With competitor analysis comes many link-building opportunities.
Your competitors could have impeccable backlink profiles. That might be discouraging, and you might wonder, “How can I top that?”
However, the data you uncover about their backlink strategies can be a gold mine. It shows what’s working and the content that naturally gets links.
Look at their approaches, and you, too, can be a backlink magnet.
Still need help with scoring backlinks? Book an intro call with uSERP. We are happy to help with the heavy lifting.
