Many SEO experts harp on the fact that backlinks are the most important aspect of SEO. For this same reason, you should always be aware of how many backlinks you have. Backlinks allow Google to verify if your site is both popular and relevant for the keyword terms that you target. Simply put, the more backlinks you have, the better your organic rankings will be. Many SEO gurus suggest a variety of ways to obtain backlinks. No one way is right or best; but do not use blackhat techniques because it can get you penalized and the short term possible benefit will end badly… After you have gone through your methodology and process on obtaining backlinks, what is the best way check them? How can I find out my rate of growth? How many backlinks do I need in order to be on top of the search engines?
There are a few main ways to check your backlinks.
Yahoo – If you go to this site (http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/) and simply enter any URL you can find out how many backlinks you have and exactly where those backlinks are coming from. This site also allows you to export all the backlinks to a CSV file for analysis and evaluation.
SEO tool called SEO Quake – (http://www.seoquake.com). It’s a really cool Firefox plug in (frequently updated) that allows you not only to check your Yahoo and Google Backlinks, but also your Google PageRank, Alexa Rank, and other metrics that are significant for SEO.
LinkVelocity Tool is a really cool new SEO tool that allows you to not only track your backlinks, but also that of your competitors. It also gives you the rate at which you and your competitor’s links are increasing, so that you know at what rate you need to increase your backlinks to catch up and eventually surpass your competition. You can create a graph to see your growth rate, your competition’s growth rate. You can add multiple competitors and continually measure your progress against them over time.
Check your backlinks weekly. You should see steady progress; in absolute terms and in relative terms versus competition. Make sure to check them regularly so that you can accurately track your rate of growth or decline. If you need help obtaining backlinks you can check out this article, or if you want a more personal and in depth strategy you can always contact us for a no obligation consultation.
How Do I Check My Backlinks?
There are a few main ways to check your backlinks.
Check your backlinks weekly. You should see steady progress; in absolute terms and in relative terms versus competition. Make sure to check them regularly so that you can accurately track your rate of growth or decline. If you need help obtaining backlinks you can check out this article, or if you want a more personal and in depth strategy you can always contact us for a no obligation consultation.