This guide walks you through your first backlink analysis in LinkRocket. By the end, you'll know how to analyze any domain, navigate the results dashboard, and understand what the data means for your SEO strategy.
Analyzing a Domain
Running a backlink analysis takes just a few steps. You can analyze your own domain to audit your link profile, or enter a competitor's domain to research their strategy.
Navigate to Backlink Analysis from the main menu in your LinkRocket dashboard.
Enter the domain you want to analyze in the search box. Use the root domain format (e.g.,
example.com) rather than a full URL with pages or protocols.Click Analyze or press Enter to begin the scan.
Wait for the analysis to complete. Most scans finish within 10–30 seconds, though larger domains with extensive backlink profiles may take slightly longer.
Once the scan finishes, you'll land on the Overview dashboard, which displays a summary of the domain's backlink profile.
Tip: Bookmark competitor domains you analyze frequently. LinkRocket saves your recent analyses, making it easy to revisit them without re-entering the URL.
Navigating the Overview Dashboard
The Overview dashboard presents several key metrics at a glance. Each metric tells you something different about the domain's backlink health.
Domain Rank (DR) is a score from 0 to 100 that reflects the overall authority of the website based on its backlink profile. Higher scores indicate stronger perceived authority, though this metric should be considered alongside relevance and link quality.
Total Backlinks shows the raw count of individual links pointing to the domain. This number includes every link from every page, so a single referring site could contribute many backlinks.
Referring Domains counts the number of unique websites linking to the domain. SEO professionals often prioritize this metric because diverse link sources signal broader credibility.
Trust Flow and Citation Flow are complementary metrics. Trust Flow measures link quality based on how closely linked the domain is to known trustworthy seed sites. Citation Flow measures link quantity. A healthy profile typically shows Trust Flow close to or exceeding Citation Flow.
Viewing Individual Backlinks
Click the Backlinks tab to see a detailed list of every link pointing to the analyzed domain. For each backlink, LinkRocket displays:
Column | Description |
|---|---|
Source URL | The specific page containing the link |
Target URL | The page on the analyzed domain receiving the link |
Anchor Text | The clickable text used in the link |
Domain Rank | The authority score of the linking domain |
Link Type | Whether the link is Dofollow (passes authority) or Nofollow (does not pass authority) |
First Seen | When LinkRocket first discovered the link |
Last Seen | When LinkRocket most recently verified the link exists |
Scroll through this list to spot patterns, identify your strongest links, or flag potentially problematic ones.
What to Do Next
After completing your first analysis, consider these next steps:
Run the same analysis on two or three competitors in your space. Comparing your metrics side by side reveals where you're strong and where you have room to grow.
Explore the Anchor Text distribution chart to see whether your profile looks natural or shows signs of over-optimization. We cover healthy anchor text patterns in a dedicated article.
Export your data if you need to share findings with a client or perform deeper analysis in a spreadsheet.