The first step in creating a solid link-building strategy is to check out your link gaps. But what does that mean, and how can you use it to discover new backlink opportunities for your website?
Here’s a simple way to approach it: Start by identifying areas where you’re missing links and then look at your competitors’ backlink profiles. This will help you spot potential links that you haven’t tapped into yet.
You’ll want to learn both basic and advanced techniques for analyzing backlinks and then use what you find to improve your strategy.
By closing these gaps, you’ll be in a better position to climb the search engine rankings.
What is a Backlink Gap Analysis?
Comparing your website’s backlink profile with your competitors’ profiles can reveal new link-building opportunities. This is what a backlink gap study does.
SEO experts look at backlinks both at the domain level and page level. They also sort the results by factors like organic traffic and domain authority to create a list of high-quality backlinks that could boost your rankings.
3 Important Benefits of a Backlink Gap Analysis
Here are three ways to boost your SEO results with a backlink gap study. And no, they don’t just involve the usual belief that backlinks are key to SEO.
1. Keep an Eye on Your Competitors
Look closely at how your competitors are building their links. You’ll gain valuable insights into:
- Which sites and types of content in your niche are getting the most links.
- The kinds of websites that often link to your competitors.
- The link-building tactics your rivals use, like influencer partnerships, infographics, guest posts, and valuable content.
- Weaknesses in your competitors’ strategies that you can exploit.
- The keyword clusters your competitors’ backlinks are targeting.
In short, studying your competitors helps guide your SEO strategy and lets you adapt quickly.
For example, you could compare the referring domains of two or three sites to spot any sudden spikes in activity. Notice that blue surge in Simform’s referring domains? That’s a sign you can create a report listing all the backlinks they gained during that time.
Keep an eye on the link-building efforts of your rivals to remain competitive.
So, research the link-building strategies your rivals used.
Benefit #2: You identify qualified link prospects
One quick way to find quality link chances and expand your prospect list is to do a backlink gap study. You may concentrate on the most authoritative and pertinent websites in your field with this focused approach, which saves a ton of time and resources. The screenshot illustrates how many valuable link possibilities from DR 90+ websites are being lost by the root domain.
Prospects for backlinks from rival websites.
As a matter of fact, a lot of SEOs, including Digital Olympus, begin formulating their link-building plans with a meticulous link gap research. In addition to identifying potential customers, it can help you determine how many links to target URLs you should generate.
Benefit #3: You identify pages to build backlinks to
By watching your competitors’ backlink profiles, you can see which types of pages or content are getting the most links. This insight helps you create similar pages to attract those valuable backlinks yourself. You can also spot which of your own pages are underperforming and might need more backlinks.
For example, if a page on your site isn’t doing well, it might be lacking backlinks. Adding more links to that page can boost its visibility and search engine ranking.
Here’s some expert advice on this:
“When we decide which pages need more links, we first check the page’s business value—its conversion rate. Next, we see if we’ve done all we can with on-page and content-UX optimizations, like adding page jumps, improving load time, or including interactive elements like videos. If we’ve covered that, we use tools like Ahrefs’ Keyword Explorer to look at the link profiles of pages ranking higher than ours. We compare the domain ratings, quantity, and quality of their links. If we think closing the link gap could help our page rank better, that’s when we decide to invest in link building.” — Emilia Korczynska, Head of Marketing at Userpilot.
Now, let’s use what we’ve learned to find and fix your link gaps.
How to Perform a Backlink Gap Analysis Step-by-Step
Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you with your backlink analysis. Each step comes with easy-to-follow tips so you can get started right away.
Note: You’ll need an SEO tool to check out your competitors’ backlink profiles. We recommend Ahrefs, but feel free to use any other tool you prefer.
Step #1: List Your Competitors
Start by making a list of websites from your industry that you see as competitors. Write down the ones that come to mind first. Then, open Google and search using relevant keywords like “keyword research tool” or “soft toy store.”
Next, find competitors who appear on the same search results page. Enter each of these URLs into Ahrefs’ Site Explorer to dig into their backlink profiles.
For example, if you focus on creating cloud-native apps, make sure to only look at competitors in that niche. Paste your target URL into Ahrefs to see the Competing Pages report.
Use Ahrefs to check out your competitors at the page level.
First, compare the pages to see which one has the most high-ranking keywords. Once you spot the top URLs, dive into their backlink profiles to understand their link-building strategy.
To find competitors at the page level, use Keyword Explorer to search by your main keywords. This tool gives you a quick look at the top 10 search results and their linking domains, making it super easy to analyze.
The keyword’s summary on the SERP.
Proceed to the following stage after you’ve chosen your competitors at the domain and page levels.
Also Read: Link Velocity Impact on Rankings
Step #2: Choose the link intersect option
Go to Link Intersect to locate a link gap for the page and the domain. This tool indicates which referring websites you are overlooking by comparing your backlink profile with those of your selected competitors.
Put differently, you will receive an extensive list of domains that point to your competitors but not to you.
Here’s how to use the Link Intersect tool:
Note: Keep in mind that Ahrefs’ Link Intersect tool has some limitations, so it might not have a complete picture of all links.
As Stacey MacNaught, SEO and Content Marketing Consultant, puts it, “The main issue with these tools is their index size. No tool can give you a full view, and metrics alone can’t replace a manual review for quality. But metrics are still useful for scaling your analysis.”
Step #3: Add Your Competitors and Target Website
When you click on Link Intersect, you’ll need to enter the domains of your competitors. You can analyze up to ten websites at once.
To get the most relevant results, choose the intersection of all the sites. This way, you’ll find websites that link to all of your competitors, making them highly relevant for your investigation. You can also adjust the level of intersection to broaden your search.
For page-level link intersections, just paste the URL of a competitor’s page.
Here’s how to use the Link Intersect tool effectively:
Step #4: Check Out the Results
Add your website along with your competitors’ domains or URLs into the tool. The Link Intersect report will then organize the results based on how many times a website links to the same sites you’re analyzing.
First, you’ll see which domains are linking to three or more of the sites you’re studying. These are the most relevant targets, but don’t miss out on other potential backlinks from trustworthy sources that the tool might flag.
To find the best opportunities, sort the report by Domain Rating (DR). This will help you spot the top link prospects, showing you which sites are getting the most backlinks.
Step #5: Understand the Context of Links
Knowing which sites link to your competitors is helpful, but understanding the context is even more important. Look into what exactly is being referenced. Are they citing specific studies, blog posts, or quotes?
To see more details, click on the arrow next to each backlink to view the referring page and anchor text.
For instance, you might find that several of your competitors get backlinks from high-authority domains thanks to contributions from industry experts. Once you figure out which links are valuable, you can start planning your own link-building strategy.
Analyze the context of backlinks.
That is all. In just 5 stages, you were able to successfully complete an advanced backlink gap analysis.
4 Best Tools for Backlink Gap Analysis
While many SEO tools provide backlink analytics, very few offer a good and up-to-date backlink database along with an excellent user experience.
These are our best choices.
Tool #1: Ahrefs
Ahrefs Overview
Ahrefs is a must-have tool for link-building teams like ours at Digital Olympus. It offers the largest backlink database and tons of filters to tailor your reports.
We use Ahrefs throughout our entire link-building process:
- Finding prospects
- Analyzing competitors
- Evaluating websites
- Monitoring backlinks
- Checking backlink gaps
One of the things we love about Ahrefs is that it updates data in real time. You can see when it last crawled a site or checked a keyword’s SERP.
Cost: The Standard plan starts at $199 per month. Even though there are cheaper plans, the link intersect feature is only available on the Standard plan.
Tool #2: Semrush
ISemrush Overview
If you asked us whether we prefer Ahrefs or Semrush, it really comes down to personal preference.
Semrush is another top-notch SEO tool with its own up-to-date backlink database. It offers similar filtering options to Ahrefs and includes a handy link gap analysis feature. Besides these, Semrush also provides a range of extra tools for content marketing, agency reporting, and more.
For link builders, Semrush has a powerful backlink checker, bulk analysis tools, and a feature for quickly analyzing and comparing link profiles. You can also use it to track your link-building success and manage outreach campaigns.
Pricing: The Pro package starts at $119.95 per month.
Tool #3: Moz
Moz Overview
Moz presents itself as a highly customizable SEO tool for businesses. It offers several useful features, including a free tool called Link Explorer.
With Moz, you can check the domain authority and spam score of your site, find broken links pointing to your website, and see both lost and new backlinks. Plus, you can compare the link profiles of up to five different sites.
Pricing: The Standard plan starts at $99 per month.
Tool #4: Serpstat
SSerpstat Overview
For small businesses on a budget looking to boost their SEO, Serpstat is a great option. It provides a solid API for real-time data and has useful features for link-building.
With Serpstat, you get a backlink gap tool, data on harmful sites, and a comprehensive backlink analysis. It also includes handy tools like Batch Analysis and Top Pages by Links.
Pricing: The $69/month Lite plan gives you access to the Link Intersect tool.
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