SEO 101 Tip 4: Piggyback on competitors’ links

No primary category set

FusewaveFollowing on from SEO 101 Tip 1: Build Relationships and Tip 2: Guest Blogging, and Tip 3: Create quality content for natural links, John from Fusewave‘s fourth tip is to Piggyback on competitors’ links

Easy link building tip 4: Piggyback on competitors’ links

Quality inbound links are a must if you want your domain to climb the search rankings. We’ve discussed a number of ways to get top class backlinks to your site in this series of Easy link building tips, and my fourth top tip is: piggyback on your competitors’ links.

We have established that quality beats quantity when it comes to links, and that relevance and trust are also vital. I have also admitted that getting great links isn’t a walk in the park, although there are many things you can do.
Building relationships and creating fantastic content are a couple of useful link building techniques, but in addition to this you should make use of the hard work of your competitors.

MinerHow to mine competitors’ backlinks

Mining through your competitors’ backlinks is a great way to find links that could be beneficial for you or your clients. It can also be an extremely efficient way to build links without spending hours scouring the web for suitable sites to approach. Furthermore, if competitors in your industry have secured quality links from certain websites, there is a good chance you can do some link building from those sites too.

The process

• Go to Open Site Explorer: This is a specially designed search engine for links, from the guys at SEOMoz.
• Enter your competitor’s URL: Open Site Explorer can tell you a site’s Domain Authority, Page Authority and the total number of links pointing back to it, plus other interesting data.
Simply follow the screen shots

STEP 1) Enter the domain into the search bar then hit search

Site explorer

STEP 2) Select ‘Export to CSV’ to export the data provided and there you have it

Site explorer 2

• Link Analysis: Go through you’re excel file and select the ‘low hanging fruit’ such as niche directories that you can submit to and guest blogging opportunities.
• Reach out: Once you know where a competitor has got their links you can simply reach out to the sites in order to piggyback on their work and get links that are just as good.

This method may seem a little but cheeky but it is a completely legitimate way to secure some quality links, while making use of the effort of your competitors. Would they hesitate to piggyback on your hard work if it garnered them a few top quality inbound links?

So, if you want to build some great links back to your domain or to clients’ websites, it pays to check out the competition.

Piggy BackBenefits of piggybacking

• Saves time
• Saves money
• Points out sites that are likely to offer good links
• You can target top ranking competitor links
• Prevents competition outpacing you

I hope you are intrigued by the benefits of piggybacking on competitors’ links as part of a successful link building campaign. In my next post I will conclude my 5 Easy link building tips by discussing the value of downloadable giveaways.

P.S. Get in touch if you would like a little help with Open Site Explorer

RELATED POSTS..

Amazon-Reviews

Amazon as a search engine: How to leverage product consideration

Amazon-SEO

Amazon SEO: Third-party tools

Amazon-SEO-1

Amazon SEO: Top 5 visibility tips

Etsy-Quick-View-option

Etsy answers merchants’ queries on Etsy SEO and listings

Pricesearcher-logo-stacked

Google Comparison Shopping Services is a win for Pricesearcher

ChannelX Guide...

Featured in this article from the ChannelX Guide – companies that can help you grow and manage your business.

Register for Newsletter

Receive 5 newsletters per week

Gain access to all research

Be notified of upcoming events and webinars