How to Do a Backlink Audit? A Step-by-Step Guide!

This article provides a detailed guide on how to do a backlink audit, including collecting link data, checking referring domains, reviewing anchor text, recovering broken backlinks, investigating suspicious links, and creating an action plan.

Have you ever wondered whether the backlinks pointing to your website are helping people discover your business or sending them to outdated pages?

Imagine running an online business with hundreds of backlinks. A useful industry article links to a deleted product page. Several unfamiliar websites have copied your content. Your SEO tool flags dozens of links as “toxic”. Meanwhile, a relevant publication has quietly removed an important reference to your website.

Each situation needs a different response. Redirecting a deleted page, investigating a missing link, and reviewing an artificial link campaign are separate tasks.

That is why a proper backlink audit goes beyond downloading a report and deleting everything highlighted in red.

Whether you manage a blog, local business, e-commerce store, SaaS website, or agency account, this guide will help you review backlinks systematically and decide what deserves your attention.

In this guide, we will explain how backlink audits work, show you how to review your links step by step, and walk through a practical way to prioritise fixes, document decisions, and monitor results.

Let’s explore it together!

What Is a Backlink Audit?

A backlink audit is the process of collecting and reviewing links from other websites to your website. It evaluates their relevance, placement, destination, availability, and potential manipulation, then produces actions to preserve useful references, fix broken journeys, and investigate genuine policy concerns.

For example, if a business publication links to your research, you want that research to remain accessible. If an old SEO campaign created artificial links, you need to understand the campaign before deciding what to remove.

An audit answers practical questions:

• Who links to our website, and why?
• Which pages attract relevant references?
• Do those links still work?
• Have important links disappeared?
• Is there evidence of a link scheme?
• Which fixes should we complete first?

Important Backlink Terms:

Term	Simple meaning
Backlink	A link from another website to yours
Referring domain	A website domain that provides one or more backlinks
Source URL	The page containing the backlink
Target URL	Your page that receives the link
Anchor text	The clickable words used in a text link
Link attribute	A value such as nofollow, sponsored, or ugc describing the link relationship
Lost backlink	A previously detected link that a tool no longer finds
Broken backlink	An incoming link pointing to a missing page, commonly a 404

One website can create thousands of backlinks through a repeated footer. Those backlinks still come from one referring domain.

Always distinguish link volume from the number and usefulness of independent sources.

Why Is a Backlink Audit Important?

A backlink audit helps you maintain the references your website has already earned.

1. Recover Useful Traffic: A visitor following a link to a missing guide reaches a dead end. Restoring the guide or providing a relevant replacement improves that journey. This is a practical benefit even before you consider any possible SEO effect.
2. Understand Your Strongest Content: If original research attracts industry references while service pages attract few, your audit reveals what publishers find useful. You can maintain those assets and plan related resources.
3. Investigate Past SEO Work: Businesses sometimes inherit campaigns without clear records. An audit connects placements with invoices, agency reports, and publisher agreements so that unexplained patterns can be investigated.
4. Protect Website Migrations: Domain changes, redesigns, and URL updates can break established references. Reviewing linked pages before and after a migration helps you catch missing redirects and incorrect destinations.
5. Improve Marketing Decisions: A small specialist publication may send qualified enquiries. A large number of irrelevant links may produce no useful visits. Reviewing both links and business outcomes gives your team better evidence for future investment.

An audit creates opportunities for improvement; it does not guarantee higher rankings or recovery from a traffic decline.

How Backlink Auditing Has Changed

Earlier link-building practices often focused heavily on quantity. Automated submissions, repeated keyword anchors, and mass-produced placements made backlink reports difficult to interpret.

Google launched Penguin in 2012. In September 2016, Google announced that Penguin had become part of its core algorithm, with more granular treatment of spam and updates connected to recrawling and reindexing.

The practical lesson is that reviewing links requires more judgement than simply counting them Modern backlink auditing combines technical maintenance, publisher relevance, campaign history, and policy review.

It also separates three ideas that are frequently confused: an unfamiliar link, a third-party risk score, and evidence of deliberate manipulation.

What Do You Need Before Starting?

Before starting your backlink audit, gather the tools, access, and records you need to review links accurately and organise your findings.

Prepare access to:

• Google Search Console for the correct website property.
• A spreadsheet for your link inventory and decisions.
• A backlink analysis platform if your budget allows.
• A crawler or HTTP checking tool for target URLs.
• Analytics reports for referral visits and conversions.
• Previous campaign records, migration notes, and any existing disavow file.

A beginner can start with Search Console and a spreadsheet.

For a larger website, combining exports with a commercial backlink index can improve coverage and make investigation easier.

Choose a reporting period and write down the audit date. Without that baseline, comparing future reports becomes confusing.

How to Do a Backlink Audit: Step-by-Step Guide

Follow these steps to organise your backlink data, investigate important issues, and turn your findings into practical improvements.

1. Define the Scope and Objective

Decide whether you are auditing the entire domain, a subdomain, a section, or a particular page.

For example, a company may run its main website at example.com, its blog under /blog/, and documentation on a separate subdomain. A report limited to one hostname may miss other areas.

Write one clear objective:

“Review backlinks to our website, recover broken destinations, and investigate links created by the previous SEO agency.”

Also record recent changes. A product launch, domain migration, or content deletion can explain patterns that would otherwise look unusual.

2. Check Manual Actions and Establish a Baseline

Review Search Console’s Manual Actions report before interpreting suspicious links. Also check security issues and recent site changes when investigating a performance decline.

An algorithmic ranking change is different from a manual action. A tool warning does not establish either one.

Create a baseline containing:

Baseline item	What to record
Audit scope	Domain, hostname, section, or URL
Link sources	Search Console and any commercial datasets
Referring domains	Count according to each source
Important destinations	Main commercial pages and frequently cited resources
Performance context	Organic trends, referral visits, and recent changes
Historical actions	Previous removals, disavow submissions, or migrations

Keep each provider’s counts labelled separately. Adding different tools’ totals together does not produce a reliable total.

3. Export Backlink Data

In Search Console, open Links and review external links, top linking sites, linked pages, and linking text.

Export the relevant tables and available link samples. Google states that this report is a sample rather than a complete backlink inventory. It can include historical links and does not identify whether a link is marked nofollow.

Next, export source URLs, target URLs, anchors, link attributes, and discovery information from your backlink platform where available.

Record the dataset beside every row.

When two tools disagree, you will know where each observation originated. No export should be treated as a perfect, live map of the web. Your next steps must verify the links that influence decisions.

4. Build and Clean Your Master Inventory

Combine the exports into one working sheet while keeping untouched copies of the originals.

Useful columns include:

Column	Purpose
Source URL and domain	Identify the referring page and publisher
Target and final URL	Record where the link points and ultimately lands
Anchor and attributes	Understand wording and relationship
HTTP response	Identify missing, redirected, or failing destinations
Dataset and observation date	Track where the evidence came from
Review notes	Explain the context and uncertainty
Decision, owner, deadline	Turn findings into assigned work
Recheck result	Confirm whether the action worked

Deduplicate repeated source–target pairs for analysis. Preserve meaningful URL differences: parameters can change page content, so do not remove them blindly.

Group rows by referring domain for pattern analysis, but retain page-level detail. One publisher can have several legitimate references with different contexts.

5. Review the Overall Backlink Profile

Look at referring domains, linked pages, link attributes, anchor categories, and new or lost links.

Ask what explains the pattern before deciding whether it is concerning. For example, a sudden increase after a widely shared research report may be expected. Hundreds of repeated links from one website may come from a template change.

A discovery date generally tells you when a tool found a link. It does not necessarily reveal the original publication date.

Choose a manageable review order:

1. Important linked pages that currently fail.
2. Valuable links reported as lost.
3. Unexplained campaign patterns.
4. Other flagged or unfamiliar sources.
5. A sample of apparently ordinary links.

Sampling ordinary links helps you avoid building the entire audit around a tool’s warnings.

6. Evaluate Relevance and Editorial Context

Review the page, its audience, and the reason for the reference.

Ask:

• Does the surrounding content explain why your page is useful?
• Is the source relevant to your topic, location, or audience?
• Is the link visible and understandable to readers?
• Does the publisher appear to exercise editorial judgement?
• Does the destination fulfil the promise of the anchor?

A local Dehradun news article linking to a regional business can be relevant even if the publication covers many subjects. Similarly, an overseas developer tutorial may be relevant to an Indian software company.

Geography and language provide context; they are not automatic pass-or-fail rules. Assess the specific referring page. A recognisable domain name alone does not establish the value of every page it hosts.

7. Analyse Anchor Text Without Chasing Ratios

Group anchors into:

• Branded names.
• Website URLs.
• Generic phrases.
• Topical descriptions.
• Commercial keywords.
• Image or empty anchors.

Look for repeated wording that deserves investigation.

If unrelated websites use the same sales phrase around the same destination, compare those placements with campaign records.

However, exact wording can occur naturally. A tool name, article title, or recognised technical term may be repeated by independent publishers.

There is no universal anchor-text percentage that guarantees a safe backlink profile.

Do not rewrite useful references merely to fit an arbitrary chart. For image links, inspect the image context and available alternative text. A blank anchor field in an export does not prove that the link is hidden or manipulative.

8. Check Link Attributes and Commercial Relationships

Inspect the link HTML where necessary and record nofollow, sponsored, or ugc values. “Dofollow” is common industry shorthand, rather than a special attribute you need to add.

Google’s spam policies distinguish advertising from links created to manipulate rankings. Paid advertising and sponsorship links should be appropriately qualified; Google accepts nofollow or sponsored for these relationships.

During the audit, compare commercial placements with their actual attributes and agreements. If a placement needs correction, document the issue and request appropriate qualification or removal.

Do not treat every qualified link as worthless.

A relevant sponsored article, community reference, or publication link can still help readers discover your business.

9. Find Broken Destinations and Redirect Problems

Extract the unique target URLs and check their current HTTP responses and final destinations.

Investigate:

• 404 or 410 responses.
• Persistent server errors.
• Redirect loops and unnecessary chains.
• Links landing on an unrelated page.
• Important pages accidentally blocked or marked noindex.

Ahrefs provides a Broken backlinks report and a Best by links report that can be filtered for 404 pages. These can help identify destinations worth checking.

For a valuable missing page, choose an appropriate solution:

• Restore useful content when it was removed accidentally.
• Redirect a permanently moved page to its close replacement.
• Ask the publisher to update a wrong URL.
• Keep the missing-page response when no suitable replacement exists.

Avoid redirecting every deleted URL to the homepage. A person seeking a specific guide should reach a resource that answers the same need.

Recheck the final page after any fix, including its content, canonical URL, and indexability where relevant.

10. Investigate Lost Backlinks

Verify a lost link before contacting the publisher.

The source page may have moved, the link may have changed destination, or the tool may have encountered a temporary access problem. Sometimes the reference is genuinely gone.

For an important link, check the current source, search the publisher’s website for the article, and compare it with your previous record.

If a factual correction would help readers, send a short, specific request explaining the problem and the correct resource.

Respect editorial decisions. A publisher removing an outdated reference does not automatically owe you a replacement link. Record the outcome and stop repeated outreach when the publisher declines or the reference is no longer useful.

11. Investigate Suspicious Patterns Manually

Possible investigation triggers include automated comment campaigns, irrelevant keyword anchors, apparent link networks, or records of placements purchased specifically for ranking manipulation.

A trigger is a reason to review evidence, not an automatic removal instruction. Compare page context, repeated patterns, ownership clues, and campaign history.

Shared hosting or similar design alone is weak evidence: many unrelated businesses use the same infrastructure.

Separate stronger evidence from uncertainty:

Observation	Sensible interpretation
A new relevant publisher has a low authority score	Review normally; preserve useful references
A scraper republishes your article and links back	Record if useful; avoid automatic escalation
Old invoices document automated link packages	Investigate the campaign and affected placements
Unrelated sites repeat identical commercial anchors	Review sources, timing, and campaign records
A source is inaccessible during one check	Recheck before classifying it

Third-party authority and toxicity metrics are proprietary assessments.

Ahrefs explicitly cautions against using DR, UR, or another metric alone to determine disavow decisions.

12. Classify Links and Apply the Right Action

Use practical categories:

Category	Typical situation	Action
Keep	Relevant, working reference	Maintain the destination
Fix	Useful link reaches a broken or wrong page	Restore, redirect, or request correction
Reclaim	Valuable reference appears lost	Verify and contact when appropriate
Monitor	Uncertain source or unexplained pattern	Record evidence and review later
Address manipulation	Documented problematic campaign	Correct or remove placements; assess escalation

When Should You Use Google’s Disavow Tool?

Google says most websites do not need it. Its stated threshold combines a considerable number of spammy, artificial, or low-quality links with a manual action, or a likelihood of one.

Where those conditions apply, try to remove problematic links first. Consider disavowal for links that cannot be removed, with experienced review of the evidence and scope.

Before submitting anything, preserve the existing file and review the complete replacement carefully.A new submission replaces the existing list. The tool requires an appropriate URL-prefix property; Domain properties are unsupported.

A domain-level exclusion is broader than excluding one URL. Do not upload an unreviewed tool export, and do not use disavowal simply because traffic fell.

13. Assign, Verify, and Monitor

Every finding should have an owner, deadline, and verification method.

For example:

“Developer to redirect the retired guide to its equivalent replacement; SEO manager to confirm the final destination and content.”

Separate completed work from expected benefits.

You can verify that a broken journey now works. You cannot immediately prove that it caused a later ranking increase.

Compare subsequent exports using consistent scopes, and maintain a short change log so that the next audit starts with context.

Which Backlink Audit Tools Should You Use?

Choose tools according to the decisions you need to make.

Tool	Useful role	Important limitation
Google Search Console	Google-discovered link samples and linking text	Incomplete inventory; limited link-level detail
Ahrefs	Backlink investigation and broken-destination discovery	Its index and metrics are independent of Google
Semrush Backlink Audit	Review queues, risk flags, and campaign workflow	Toxicity scores require manual interpretation
Majestic	Link context, anchors, and proprietary Flow Metrics	Scores are estimates, rather than ranking guarantees
Screaming Frog SEO Spider	Checking known target URLs and redirects	A website crawl does not discover the whole external backlink profile
Analytics platform	Referral traffic and conversion context	Attribution and collection limitations affect reporting
Excel or Google Sheets	Evidence, decisions, ownership, and follow-up	Requires consistent records and maintenance

Semrush documents its toxicity markers as a way to prioritise investigation. Majestic provides link context and estimated quality and quantity metrics.

Screaming Frog’s configuration supports redirect analysis for supplied URLs. Check current plan limits and export allowances before purchasing.

One suitable backlink dataset plus careful verification may be enough for a small business.

Practical Example: Auditing a Business Website

Consider a fictional Indian SaaS company. Its merged inventory contains 1,200 source–target pairs from 180 referring domains.

These numbers illustrate the process and are not client results.

The audit finds:

Finding	Evidence	Action
An industry guide links to a deleted tutorial	Live source; target returns 404	Restore the useful tutorial
A news article links through an old URL chain	Final content is relevant	Simplify the redirect path
Forty links come from one publisher’s template	Same repeated placement	Review once at pattern level
A specialist blog has a low authority score	Relevant article and accurate reference	Keep
Old records show an automated link campaign	Matching invoices and placements	Investigate and address the campaign

The report prioritises working destinations and documented concerns.

It does not label every unfamiliar domain as dangerous or claim that removing a certain number of links will recover rankings.

How to Prioritise Your Audit Findings

Use impact, evidence, and effort together.

1. Urgent Issues: Prioritise a confirmed manual action, a broken destination receiving valuable visits, or a migration error affecting important references. These findings have a clear reason for immediate attention.
2. High-Priority Issues: Focus next on lost editorial references worth recovering, incorrect links from relevant publishers, and documented campaign issues. Include enough evidence for the person completing the task to understand the problem.
3. Routine Improvements: Maintain cited resources, review uncertain patterns, and compare content opportunities. These activities support ongoing website maintenance.
4. Low-Priority Observations: An isolated metric change without supporting evidence usually deserves less attention than a verified broken destination. For a limited team, start with changes you control. Fixing your own missing page can be more achievable than persuading a publisher to update an old article.

Common Challenges and Practical Solutions

During a backlink audit, you may encounter incomplete data, conflicting reports, or links that are difficult to verify. Here are common challenges and practical ways to handle them.

1. Different Tools Show Different Counts: Use provider-labelled baselines. Differences in crawling, filtering, and URL handling make exact agreement unlikely. Investigate meaningful changes instead of forcing identical totals.
2. The Website Has Too Many Links: Group by domain, destination, anchor pattern, and campaign. Review representative examples, while checking every item proposed for removal or disavowal before acting. This makes the review manageable without letting a broad pattern replace individual verification where it matters.
3. Referral Traffic Is Missing: A link without recorded visits may still be a useful citation. Equally, a high metric does not establish business value. Combine analytics with editorial context rather than judging from one signal.
4. The Source Page Cannot Be Accessed: Mark it as unverified and retry. For suspected malicious pages, use appropriate analysis tools and avoid downloading files. Inaccessibility alone does not prove spam.
5. Traffic Fell Around the Same Time: Investigate technical errors, indexing, content changes, demand, and other explanations alongside backlinks. Timing can suggest a question; it cannot establish causation.

Expert Tips and Common Mistakes

A useful audit preserves evidence and makes its reasoning easy to review.

1. Expert Tips for Better Backlink Audits

• Save original exports: Keep an untouched version of each dataset.
• Date every verification: Record when a link or destination was checked.
• Review important sources individually: Read the referring page and surrounding content.
• Explain every decision: Record why a link is being kept, fixed, or investigated.
• Maintain cited resources: Update research, tutorials, and tools that regularly earn references.
• Include development work: Many useful fixes involve redirects, missing pages, or website configuration.
• Label uncertainty: Use “unverified” or “needs review” when evidence is incomplete.

2. Common Mistakes to Avoid

• Disavowing every low-score domain.
• Treating an exact-match anchor as proof of manipulation.
• Assuming foreign-language links are automatically harmful.
• Reporting thousands of repeated links as independent endorsements.
• Redirecting unrelated deleted content to the homepage.
• Promising rankings based on a “clean” tool dashboard.

A useful audit finding explains what happened, why it matters, and how the team will verify the fix.

How Often Should You Do a Backlink Audit?

Use a schedule suited to your website rather than a universal rule. For a small, stable website, consider a quarterly review with occasional checks on important linked pages.

For an active publisher, e-commerce store, or agency account, monthly monitoring with a deeper quarterly audit can be practical.

During a migration or major campaign, check relevant destinations more frequently. Investigate manual actions and significant unexplained changes promptly.

Keep routine monitoring focused on:

• New and lost important links.
• Target-page availability.
• Incorrect destinations.
• Unfinished actions.
• Significant campaign changes.

A complete manual re-review of every ordinary link each month may add little value.

FAQs:)

Conclusion:)

Learning how to do a backlink audit starts with understanding who links to your website and whether those references remain useful.

Collect your link data, review important referring pages, analyse anchor text, and check that backlinks lead to relevant, working destinations.

Investigate suspicious patterns carefully, document your decisions, and treat third-party scores as prompts for review. Use Google’s disavow tool only when the evidence meets its guidance.

At Oflox®, the practical lesson is straightforward: turn audit findings into clear actions that maintain valuable references and improve the reader’s journey.

“The value of a backlink audit lies in the decisions you make and the useful connections you preserve.” — Mr Rahman, Oflox®

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Have you audited your website’s backlinks? Share the most useful issue you discovered and the biggest challenge you faced in the comments below.