Backlink analysis

Backlink analysis checks the quality, origin and risks of your links: tools such as Ahrefs, Semrush or Sistrix show referring domains, anchor texts, deep links and country sources. This helps you spot risks and plan link building in a targeted way.

Search engines like Google place great value on links. To assess the value and risk of links, a thorough backlink analysis is important. There are numerous free and paid tools on the market that can be used for search engine optimisation. Google Search Console provides a first overview free of charge. For a professional analysis, specialised tools such as Ahrefs, Semrush, Majestic or Sistrix are recommended.

Key metrics for backlink analysis: what matters for links?

What data do these tools provide in a backlink analysis? Here are the most important SEO-relevant metrics:

Backlink popularity
Web page popularity
Domain popularity
Host popularity
IP address popularity
Class C network popularity

Popularity here means quantity: how many links point to your own site (link popularity), and from how many different domains do these backlinks come (domain popularity)? There are no universal benchmarks for when these values are good or bad. A fashion shop may need several hundred backlinks from almost as many domains, while a retailer in a small niche can already achieve good rankings with a few strong, topically relevant links. What matters is always the comparison with the competitors ranking at the top for your most important search terms. Besides quantity, the quality and topical relevance of the linking pages count above all.

Anchor texts, link types and geographical origin – and their importance for SEO

Anchor texts are the words a link is placed on. They also belong in the analysis. Being linked only with “www.mydomain.com” is less helpful from an SEO perspective than occasional descriptive anchors such as “women's running shoes” or the name of your most important category. Too many exact-match keyword anchors, on the other hand, look unnatural. All common tools show which anchor texts were linked how often and to which page. A distinction is also made between links to the homepage and links to subpages, so-called deep links. For online shops, deep links to categories and products are particularly valuable, because that is where revenue is generated. There is no fixed ratio – the mix should suit the business model and look natural.

The analysis also shows where links come from geographically. An unusually high number of foreign link sources with no connection to your market should be examined more closely – it may indicate spam or bought links. Exception: you are doing SEO for that target region.

Identifying link sources through backlink analysis

Many tools also offer functions for finding new link sources – for example by comparing your backlinks with those of your competitors. However, you shouldn't rely on this blindly, but check each source before trying to get a link from it. So: backlink analysis first, then operational link building.