In the race for a position on the first page of Google, optimizing content, improving website techniques, or improving user experience is not enough. A key but often overlooked factor is the backlink system.
In particular, competitor backlink analysis can help you get ahead, discover the high-quality link sources they own, and understand the SEO strategy they are implementing. Thanks to that, you can build a smarter, more economical, and effective backlink plan that improves your domain authority in the eyes of search engines.
In this article, we will guide you on how to analyze your competitors’ backlinks from A to Z: from choosing tools, collecting data, evaluating link quality, to how to take advantage of opportunities to improve the ranking of your own website.
What is Competitor Backlink Analysis?
Competitor backlink analysis is the process of examining the backlinks (inbound links) of your competitors’ websites to understand their link-building strategies and identify potential opportunities for your own website.
By analyzing this data, you can uncover websites linking to competitors that don’t link to you, understand which backlinks are most valuable, and discover new content ideas.
In addition, you will be able to find out some important things about their SEO strategy and also some opportunities to improve your website’s link profile.
Why Should You Perform Competitor Backlink Analysis?
Competitor backlink analysis is crucial for SEO because it helps you understand your rivals’ strategies and identify opportunities to improve your own website’s backlink profile and search engine rankings.
By analyzing where your competitors are getting their backlinks, you can uncover valuable link-building opportunities, discover new content ideas, and ultimately outrank them in search results.
- Learn link-building strategies: Looking at backlinks helps you see how your competitors create links. You can use their successful methods for your website.
- Find common link sources: Looking at your competitor’s backlinks, you’ll get a list of referring domains linking to sites just like yours. You can target these sites to obtain your links.
- Find new link opportunities: Analyzing your competitors helps you find sites that you wouldn’t have found otherwise. These links pointing to their content might also be of interest to you.
3 Steps to Perform Competitor Backlink Analysis
Building a competitor backlink analysis is a structured way of discovering the most useful insights. Go through 3 important steps, and you will get a better view of what your competitors are doing in link building and how you can enhance your link-building efforts.
Step 1: Find Your Competitors’ Websites
The first is identifying your direct competitors. Some sites target the same audience and keywords as your site. You can find them by searching for keywords in your niche or using a competitor backlink analysis tool like Ahrefs or SEMrush to find out which sites rank highly for your target keywords.
Another way is to search the domains of your website to find competitors. First, check the authority score to ensure the website is relevant to your niche.
Your screen will also show key metrics like domain rating, backlink count, and referring domains. Click on the “Competitors” tab to see websites with a similar link profile.
Next, you can see how many backlinks are available on your competitor’s websites. The competition level is the summary.
Step 2: Define Link Gap
The backlink gap illustrates the main differences between your website and your competitors’ websites.
Identify and keep a list of your key competitors: use backlink analysis software tools like Backlink Gap to analyze the backlinks received by their sites. Note how many backlinks they have, plus their quality, and try to identify what kind of content attracts links. To understand what works for a better SEO strategy, pay attention not just to anchor texts but to link diversity.
There are 3 particular options: Root Domain, Subdomain, and URL:
- Root Domain: You can check all links, suitable for those who want to overview of competitors’ websites.
- Subdomain: The tool just analyzes subdomains. You should use the function when comparing two blogs.
- URL: If you want to compare specific URLs from 2 posts, let’s choose the URL option.
Finally, you enter “Find prospects”, and everything is in your hands!
Step 3: Analyze Competitor Backlink Strategies
Here, you can find all the filters for detailed figures. Let’s focus on various options from “Best” to “All”. Based on what you are looking for, you can choose and plan a backlink strategy suited to your websites.
One small tip is that you can filter “Authority Score” to define exact ranges. Advanced filters are also the best choice when you want to include or exclude any factor.
By looking at the backlinks of competitors, identify the common sources that multiple competitors are getting their links from. These sites can be perfect targets for your link-building efforts. Reach out to them to discuss backlink opportunities, offering up high-quality content, or other collaborations that could earn a link.
Bonus Tips for Advanced Competitor Backlink Analysis
Another effective way of analyzing your competitors is to examine the common content with the most links pointing to it. As a result, content drives a lot of link-building.
This is made easy with the use of tools such as Ahrefs Site Explorer. Simply input the URL or URLs of your competitors and the tool will show you which of their pages receives the most backlinks. By doing so, you’ll learn what types of content are linkable and can create similar pieces to earn backlinks on your site for SEO purposes.
Final Thought
In the journey of website optimization, competitor backlink analysis is a strategic step, helping you understand who is leading and how they are doing it. Instead of competing in the dark, you can rely on specific data to make informed decisions, from finding link sources to content orientation.
However, backlink analysis is not just about collecting data, but also a story about strategy, relationships, and a deep understanding of the industry. If you are looking for a team that can accompany and support you in building an effective and safe backlink system, Jeenam is the solution.
With in-depth experience in the field of link building, Jeenam will help you connect with the right link sources, improve rankings, and maintain a sustainable presence on search engines.
