Link Building
Link Audit
Quick definition
A link audit is a systematic review of a website's backlink profile to identify strengths, weaknesses, and toxic risks.
A proper link audit catalogues every referring domain, classifies it by quality and relevance, flags toxic patterns, and benchmarks the profile against direct competitors.
Why Link Audit matters
Audits expose three big issues: spammy links to disavow, anchor over-optimization to dilute, and lost or broken links to reclaim. They also reveal which pages are under-linked relative to their commercial value.
How Link Audit works in practice
Run a full audit at the start of any major SEO engagement, and quarterly thereafter. Tie audit findings directly to the next quarter's outreach, reclamation, and disavow plans.
Best practices
- Run quarterly, not just at engagement kickoff.
- Always benchmark against 3–5 direct competitors.
- Tie findings to concrete outreach actions.
- Track DR, referring-domain growth, and toxic ratio over time.