How to Check Competitors' Backlinks (and Steal What Works)
Your competitors have already done your link prospecting for you. Every site that links to them is, by definition, a site that links to businesses like yours. Checking competitor backlinks turns link building from guesswork into a checklist: see what got them ranked, keep what is replicable, skip what is junk.
Step 1: pick the right competitors
Not your business rivals, your SERP rivals. Search your money keywords and note who actually outranks you. A niche blog that owns page one is a better study target than the big brand you compete with commercially. Take 3 to 5 domains.
Step 2: pull their referring domains
Run each domain through a backlink tool, our comparison of backlink checkers covers the options. Look at referring domains, not raw backlink counts: one site linking 500 times counts roughly once. Sort by the tool's authority metric, but read it with suspicion, because domain ratings can be faked.
On free tiers you get a sample; it is usually enough to identify the patterns that matter.
Step 3: filter for links worth having
Discard first. You are hunting editorial links, so strip:
- Directories, profile pages and forum signatures
- Sites with no organic traffic (authority score without traffic is the classic fake-DR tell)
- Obvious paid placements and casino-adjacent junk, the stuff that creates toxic profiles
- Irrelevant niches, a link means little without topical proximity
What remains is your prospect list: real sites, in your topic, already proven willing to link out.
Step 4: run the gap analysis
Most tools have a "link intersect" or "backlink gap" view: sites that link to two or more of your competitors but not to you. These are the highest-probability targets on the internet for your niche. A site that linked to three of your rivals has a demonstrated habit; you are just next.
The same analysis answers the budget question: if the pages outranking you have 25 to 40 referring domains and you have 6, you know roughly how many links the keyword costs.
Step 5: replicate by source type
Each link type has its own playbook:
| What you found | How to replicate |
|---|---|
| Resource or "best tools" page | Pitch your inclusion, easiest ask there is |
| Guest post byline | The site accepts guest content; pitch a better topic |
| Broken or outdated link near their mention | Offer your page as the fix |
| Podcast or interview | Pitch yourself as a guest |
| Partner or community links | They exchange; join a structured network |
That last row is more common than most people admit. A meaningful share of any competitor's profile is partnerships and exchanges. The clean way to replicate it is a network that removes the reciprocal pattern: you place one editorial link for a matched member, earn a credit, and your link arrives from a different relevant site, never a direct swap. That is how Meeeters works, with every link verified for placement and dofollow status.
Turn it into a monthly loop
Competitor analysis is not a one-off. Set a monthly 30-minute review: new referring domains your rivals gained, new gaps opened, links you earned that they lack. Track your own side with a dofollow filter on, since nofollow mentions inflate the numbers without moving rankings much.
Start with the free version of the loop: run a free SEO analysis to get your domain rating and referring domains, then measure the gap to the sites you want to beat.
Frequently asked questions
Quick answers to the questions people ask most about this topic.
Partially. Free tiers of Ahrefs, Semrush and Moz show a limited sample of any domain's backlinks, enough to spot patterns. Full referring-domain exports need a paid plan. Your own profile is free via Google Search Console.
Quality over count. Ten links from the relevant, trafficked sites that link to several of your competitors move you more than a hundred scraped directory links. Match the referring-domain count of the pages ranking above you as a ceiling, not a quota.
Copying their good links is safe, it is just targeting sites already proven to link to your topic. The trap is copying blindly: competitor profiles also contain paid placements and spam you do not want to inherit.
I built Meeeters to make link building safe and simple: real, relevant backlinks with no reciprocal footprint and no black-hat shortcuts. Questions about your site? Write to me directly.
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