Backlinks are one of the most essential components of every SEO plan, with key factors that influence search engine results pages. If other authoritative websites link back to the content you’ve written, search engines will recognize this and conclude that your website is a worthwhile and informative place to visit, which can vastly improve your search engine rankings, increase domain authority, and bring traffic to your site. But getting backlinks is not enough—you have to assess their effectiveness to be able to fine-tune the process. Understanding whether your backlinking efforts are paying off or not is crucial, so that you can be sure that your efforts are not going to waste.
Measuring your backlink results correctly helps fine-tune your strategies. You’ll be able to recognize which parts of the strategies work well and which ones need adjusting. With the right process of analysis and comprehension of each link’s role for your site, you will begin to understand how to succeed on a long-term basis.
In this article, we will discuss which metrics you should focus on and discuss how you can evaluate the quality of your backlinks—to keep your strategy functioning optimally.
Key Metrics to Track
When evaluating the effectiveness of your backlink strategy, you should pay attention to indicators that reflect the state of your SEO. These metrics will give you a clear picture of how your backlinks are fitting into the overall goal of boosting traffic, visibility, and more importantly, the authority of your site.
Domain Authority (DA)
Domain Authority is a metric developed by Moz; it estimates a site’s ability to rank on a SERP (Search Engine Result Page). Actually, it depends on many factors such as the quality and quantity of backlinks that link to your site. An optimum DA helps to gain an optimum ranking.
How to Track
Websites like Moz, Ahrefs, and SEMrush are used to track the Domain Authority for your site over time. The dynamics of DA can act as a barometer of how well your backlink campaign is doing over time.
Referral Traffic
Referral visitors are those who have visited your site from a backlink on another site. This metric is important because it quantifies the amount of direct traffic that your backlinks are bringing, and the amount of visibility your site is getting.
How to Track
Referral traffic can be easily monitored through Google Analytics. You can also track the overall number of users that have visited your site through backlinks to get a better understanding of your strategy’s overall effectiveness.
Keyword Rankings
Backlinks play a critical role in improving your website’s rankings for specific keywords. When websites with a high DA link to your content, search engines have a clear indication that the content is valuable and should rank well for the linked keywords.
How to Track
Websites like Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Google Search Console allow you to monitor movements of keywords and determine which backlinks may have the greatest effect.
Tools for Measuring Backlink Success
These tools are considered by many to be the best way to track your backlink success:
Ahrefs
An all-in-one platform for monitoring Domain Rating, referral traffic, keyword movement, and much more. Also, it gives an idea about the overall health of your backlink profile.
Moz
A site analysis from Moz offers detailed site information; it provides details about Domain Authority and backlink quality.
SEMrush
Yet another tool that provides backlink analysis, keyword analysis, and traffic data which can help you determine how successful your backlink strategies are.
Analyzing Link Quality
Besides the aforementioned parameters, you must also identify the quality of backlinks. It is important for a backlink to be from an authoritative source in the subject’s specific niche, with content relevant to your site’s content, and that website’s SERP position should be high as well.
Evaluating the Authority or Acquired Backlinks
As with any form of link analysis, one of the initial methodologies that can be used to identify the quality of links pointing to your site is the evaluation of the sites themselves. Links from relevant, trusted sources are worth more and are more likely to help your ranking than links from sites of low authority or those that are unrelated to your site.
How to Assess Authority
Domain Authority (DA) or Domain Rating (DR) are both useful to determine the effectiveness of the websites linking to the content. A higher DA or DR means that the site is more credible, and in turn, more influential.
Relevance to Your Niche
The keyword relevance of the linking site is another parameter that holds much significance when determining the value of a backlink. Links from sites that are in the same field as your own site are more important than those from sites that are not in your field or completely unrelated.
How to Assess Relevance
Check the content of the linking site to ascertain whether it is relevant to your industry, products or services. The backlink’s relevance to the topic of your site can also be estimated with the help of Ahrefs, Moz, etc.
Content Placement and Anchor Text Usage
The location of the backlink within the linking site content and how the anchor text is incorporated can also influence backlink success.
Backlinks that are implemented in strings of quality and relevant content get a better rating compared to those placed in random places, or within irrelevant content. To ensure backlink success, the actual text of the hyperlink, or the words that are labeled with the hyperlink, should describe the keywords that you want the website to rank. By including the target keyword in the anchor text, you are likely to enhance the ranking of your keyword and offer increased SEO value.
Monitoring Competitor Backlinks
It is important to note that one of the useful techniques for backlink auditing is a competitor backlink analysis. Knowing where competitors get their backlinks from, how they get them, and what strategies they deploy will allow you to improve your strategy.
Why Competitor Backlink Analysis is Important
Competitor backlink analysis lets you know what that is happening within your industry; you see what gaps are out there that you may not be capitalizing on. When you look for competitors’ backlinks, you can see the patterns, like which kind of posts generate the most backlinks or which websites link the most to the competitors.
Tools Used for Competitive Backlink Analysis
Several tools are available to help you analyze your competition:
Ahrefs
This tool enables you to view all of the backlinks for any given site. It provides you with reports on the authority, relevancy, and quality of the links. You can also see when a link was added or removed over time.
Majestic
In relation to the analysis of backlinks, Majestic offers detailed results and is valuable in the assessment of backlink success.
SEMrush
SEMrush provides competitive backlink analysis and helps you to compare backlinks across different rivals—so you know where you need to strengthen.
How to Leverage Competitor Data to Refine Your Strategy
Once you’ve gathered data on your competitors’ backlinks, you can use this information to adjust your own strategy:
Identify New Backlink Sources
If you identify those sites that backlink with your competitors frequently, these sites can be considered for your outreach.
Analyze Content Types
The next step is to determine which types of content are generally generating backlinks for your competitors, i.e. guides, infographics, or case studies, and create some in the corresponding area.
Learn From Competitor Mistakes
If you are reviewing your competitors’ backlinks, and you see that many of them were obtained from poor or unrelated sites, do not repeat the same mistake—try to obtain only the best quality, niche-specific links.
Adjusting Your Strategy
It should also be noted that there are significant changes to search engine algorithms from time to time, and therefore, the way backlinks will be valued also changes with time. It’s important to stay informed about these updates and adjust your strategy accordingly.
In the case that search engines start to devalue the types of backlinks that you are using, e.g., paid links, over-optimized anchor texts, etc., then it is in your site’s best interest to switch to the more natural and white-hat techniques of link building.
Optimizing for Long-Term Success
Ensuring a smooth backlink strategy is not a one-time effort; its success means continuous adjusting and fine tuning to ensure stable long-term SEO results. To keep the process active and build a steady increase in the business’s search rankings and domain authority, it is necessary to incorporate constant check-ups and tweaks into your overall plans.
The long-term perspective is very important in SEO, and consistent measurement and analysis are vital prerequisites. Daily or weekly checks can help you track patterns and take note of positive changes or problems before they escalate.