Off-Page SEO Tricks – Steal Your Competitors Backlinks

Are you tired of competitors outranking you? Do you want to steal their ranking, traffic, and backlinks? Good. Because that’s exactly what I am planning to share with you today.

Google has finally accepted that content and backlinks are the most crucial part of its search results algorithm. This means, if your competitors are ranking above you, they have more backlinks than you. Is it a bad thing? Not exactly. Because if people are linking to your competitor’s website, they would be happy to link to you too. The only question is, how would they know of your presence? And how will you know about these people who are linking back to your competitor’s website? That’s exactly what we will be covering in this post.

But before we go any further, you need to identify your competitors. It seems easy though, but trust me, it is more complex than actually though off.

So, Exactly Who are Your Competitors?

Often a business owner considers large brands as their competitors. If you are amongst them, then it might get very difficult to compete and demotivating too. But if you still consider large brands as your competitors, then think again.

When you think of ‘sports drink’, you might think the competitors would be Gatorade, Red Bull, Vitaminwater, Powerade, etc. But when you search it, none of these companies are even listed on the first page. So, are they actually your SEO competitors? Obviously not, especially if you are thinking of stealing their backlinks. Then, who exactly your competitors are? There are two types of competitors from whom you can steal the links.

• Domain-Level

These are the websites that compete with you on the whole and not just for a keyword or two. This means there will be competition between the two of you for several search terms across various webpages.

• Page-Level

These are the websites that do not compete on the whole but still is a competition for a keyword or any specific topic.

For example, we have a blog post on ‘product description tips’. When you search that specific keyword, you see a blog of Shopify ranking for the same keyword. Shopify isn’t our domain-wide competitor, but it is definitely for the page-level.

Methods to Find Your Competitors

• Using Ahrefs

To find domain-level competitors, visit the site explorer tool https://ahrefs.com/site-explorer and enter your domain. The tool will show you a list of domains listed according to the various common keywords. Make a note of them on a sheet for further references.

To find all the page-level competitors, visit the keyword explorer tool https://ahrefs.com/keywords-explorer and enter the primary keyword you want the results for. It will show you a list of websites that compete with you for that particular keyword. Make a note of all relevant page-level competitors.

• Top 10 Ranking Pages for the Keywords

You can also use Google search engine results for knowing the domain-level and page-level competitors. Just enter the keyword in the search bar, and check the top 10 ranking pages for that specific keyword. It will give you an idea of all the competitors. Make a note of all the websites that reoccur for most of the keywords as they are your primary competitors for backlinks.

Spying on Competitor’s Links

• Where and How Competitors are Getting Links

Now that you have a decent idea about your competitors, the next step is to find where exactly are they getting these links from? So, let’s start the reverse engineering process.

Go back to the site explorer tool and check your competitor’s website. Go to the referring domains in the backlink profile and select dofollow. You will be able to see where these backlinks are coming from. You do carry out the process for a few of your competitors, you will be able to see a pattern like links coming forums, directories, blogs, etc.

• Common Backlink Types and Sources

For knowing the type of backlink or sources, check the anchors and look for any branded anchors. If you can find any, it means they have derived it from either a guest post, editorial mentions, testimonials, or directories.

The branded anchors are a great boost to your SEO profile. And if you see your competitors have branded mentions, it means that the link building strategy works great in your niche.

• Type of Content That Gets More Links

Now select best by links in the Pages section of your competitor’s profile in the site explorer tool. When you carry out this search for a few more competitors, you will get a clear idea of what types of content or topics attract maximum backlinks for your niche.

How to Steal Your Competitor’s Backlinks

• Guest Post

This is one of the best ways to get backlinks as well as spread the word about your business too. But finding a guest post opportunity is a difficult and tedious job. So, how are you going to do it? Simple, copy what your competitor is doing.

You would have come across a few guest authors while checking the links in the tool. To reach out to them, you can use one of the three methods:

• 1. Use ‘Topic + “author name” + inurl:author -competitorsdomain.com
  2. Use the Content Explorer tool https://ahrefs.com/content-explorer/?source=robbierichards to find about all the posts written by a specific author.
  3. Use Google Images for any posts with a headshot of an author.

• Reach Out Via Emails and Build Relationships

Building relationships with someone your competitor is constantly in touch with brings many future opportunities. For example, if they are linking to your competitor, they will definitely link to you for similar content or a superior one.

How do you find these relationship opportunities? Simple. Make use of Ahrefs Site Explorer tool again. Check the best by links section and add 200 status to check the links. Now, copy the first ten results to the Link Intersect https://ahrefs.com/link-intersect SEO tool. By hitting opportunities, you can see the links that have been in common to forge your relationships.

• Create Better Content

Till now, I was talking about domain-level competitors. But if you look at the page-level, the best way is to create better content. Check the type and topics of content that have the most backlinks. And then, create something better. You can also find other similar pages to your content and steal their links too.

• Jump on The Competitor’s Broken Link Opportunity

Although it isn’t considered a gentleman’s move, it still offers you results. And that’s what matters at times. So, check your competitor’s broken link by using an SEO tool like Link Checker https://ahrefs.com/broken-link-checker. Check all the domains that are referring to that content, and then steal it for yourself.

• Partner with Nonprofits and Offer Special Discounts

Now, again pull up your competitor’s backlink profile. Can you find any non-profit or sponsor of an event? Note that information somewhere because even if you aren’t able to sponsor that specific event, you can find something along the same lines. These can be a good opportunity at times to get a few links pointing at your website.

• Get Links with Product Reviews

Another easier way of getting a quality backlink is by donating products to the bloggers to review it. This gives you a backlink as well as traffic and increases your trust-score. You only need to find bloggers who review products similar to your niche. One of the easiest ways to do that is to check the people who have reviewed products of your competitor and approach them.

Also Read: Top 5 SEO Tips for Google Rankings in Upcoming Years

Conclusion

Stealing competitor’s backlinks and SEO strategies are no-doubt very effective in boosting search engine ranks and increasing website traffic. What’s more? It can save you time, money, and extra effort. You get everything served on a plate just by doing some basic research. So, use this easy-to-follow blueprint and rank higher on the search engine result pages.