A Guide to Competitor Backlink Profile Analysis

Published on 24.10.2025 by Chizoba T

One key factor that search engines consider when ranking sites is the number of backlinks. According to one study, the top-ranking sites on Google had 3.8 more backlinks than those ranked 2-20. The Backlinko report also found that the best-performing pages often have backlinks from various domains.

If your competitor's sites have high-quality backlinks from the top domain sites, they will likely rank better than you. The good news is that you can use backlink analysis to understand your competitors' backlink profiles and remain ahead of them. This is especially true when combined with a social media competitive analysis. In this article, we will take you through the steps to analyze a competitor's backlink profile.

What is a Competitor Backlink Profile Analysis?

Competitors' profile backlink analysis is the process of reviewing competitors' inbound links to identify high-value links and potential link-building opportunities. It provides a complete overview of the links pointing to the competitor website and the improvement opportunities, such as broken links. Therefore, it offers excellent insights into the quality and quantity of backlinks, the domains that boost their authority, and how you can leverage these opportunities.

By understanding the link your competitors are linking to and the context of the link, you can use the information to improve your backlink profile, improve your website authority, and perform better than your competitors in their SERPs. While you can conduct a competitor analysis on your website, you should focus on checking competing sites, which is a key part of SEO.

Importance of Competitor Backlink Analysis In SEO

Why are backlink profiles an essential part of SEO? The more high-quality backlinks a site has, the more authority it has in the eyes of search engines. However, as noted earlier,  having backlinks from a wide range of sites shows the search engines that your content is worth paying attention to.

Additionally, when a site ranks highly on search engines due to a stronger backlink profile, it attracts even more backlinks, cementing its position at the top. When you do a competitor backlink analysis, you can discover those domains that are boosting your competitor's ranking and see if there are any opportunities to get more backlinks from them. The more strategic you become, the better the chances of getting to the top of the SERPs.

A Step-by-Step Guide on Competitor Backlink Analysis

With the right tools and a solid plan, you can uncover your competitors' backlink profiles and leverage that information to boost your own rankings. That said, here are a few steps to follow in competitor backlink analysis:

Identifying Your Competitors

When conducting a competitor analysis, identify the sites outranking you. You can leverage SEO tools to get this data without spending hours online. For instance, Semrush will show you data on competition level, total referring domains, common referring domains, and the number of backlinks. Therefore, SEO tools will provide you with a list of sites to investigate their backlink profiles.

Analyze their Backlinks

Check the number of referring domains and backlinks the competitor has, then visit the referring domains to see how they link to the competitor’s site. Many SEO tools will allow you to filter this information by metrics such as traffic and domain authority. 

Check if the sites have spammy links from domains with no traffic. You can filter these by setting a minimum traffic threshold.

Closely analyze each backlink to determine how competitors obtained it. Check the pages linking to them, which page they link to, and the anchor text they are using. Visit the page that links to the competitor to see the link’s context. Remember that if the competitor is a top brand or has many helpful pages, people will link to the site.

However, when you see a link from a domain whose anchor text consists of a keyword, this could result from guest posting. You can, therefore, save such a domain to include in your outreach program. Check for other domains using keywords in their anchor text, but remember that it's also possible to have guest posts with informational content.

 When analyzing the competitor's backlinks, pay attention to:

  • The kind of backlinks they are getting.
  • The pages the sites are ranking on.
  • Sites linking to them.
  • What is dominating their backlink profile?

When you find that a particular website is linking to a competitor, it indicates that they may also offer guest posting opportunities. While you can reach out to successful sites, avoid copying them. For instance, if they are getting a lot of referral links from press releases, you can post on news websites instead.

Link Quality Analysis

Remember that outreach isn't a one-day affair. It takes time and resources, and it's essential to focus on websites that will provide value to your site. After getting a list of sites that link to the competitors, you can analyze the quality and focus on those you think are good enough. Pay special attention to the links that:

  • Are relevant to your brand.
  • Brings decent traffic.
  • Doesn't contain low-quality or spammy backlinks.
  • Has considerable traffic dynamics.

Make sure you turn this extensive data into actionable insights.

Leverage Conventional and Non-conventional Sources

When starting with link building, go for the long-term fruits. By performing a backlink gap analysis, you can focus on domains linking to several competitors. As noted earlier, these kinds of websites may not have a problem linking back to your site. 

You can also focus on websites that don't link to your competitors. When doing that, remember that these backlinks will be the hardest to get, so you need to put more effort into getting them.

Conduct a Content Gap Analysis

If you have been conducting backlink analysis and added the right links, you can run a backlink gap analysis to identify the sites your competitors aren't ranking for. Some will be hard to reach, but others offer a great opportunity to get backlinks. Performing an SEO gap analysis can help you identify gaps between your site and the competition and improve your site's SEO.

Monitor their New and Lost Backlinks

To track the competitor's link-building efforts, pay attention to their new and lost backlinks. When doing that, remember that some links may be spammy. However, if you notice they have many new links, it's an indication of active and ongoing campaigning. You can then use the information to guide your link-building strategy.

Wrapping up

Competitive analysis can provide essential insights into your competitors' link-building strategies. However, after the analysis, you need to put the information you get into practice by reaching out to the domains linking to the competitors and requesting guest posting opportunities. After that, you are likely to turbocharge your SEO strategy, especially when combined with high-quality and interactive content.