Make no mistake: link building is one of the most integral search ranking factors. With a healthy backlink profile in place, websites are seen in a favourable light by Google – and this pushes them up the search results page.
Sure, you know the importance of link building. However, can the same be said for your clients or colleagues? Whether you’re building links for others or in-house, creating an informative link building report is essential. A separate report for link building is always recommended, even if you’re already deploying a comprehensive SEO campaign. Why? Because valuable links are gold in the competitive search engine game.
With this in mind, the following guide will explain what to put into an SEO link building report, the general structure of the report, what metrics to include, and more.
Collecting Data with Link Building Tools
The first step toward any SEO link building report is data collection. After all, this is the basis for the report – and you want the data to be accurate and informative for the reader.
The good news is that various tools allow you to gather the juicy information you seek – both paid and free. These tools include the ever-popular Ahrefs and SEMrush. With their assistance, you can learn more about the backlinks you’ve gathered – including where they’re from and the domain authority of host websites – and add this data to your reports.
If you’re interested, we have compiled a complete guide about the link building tools we use for our campaigns. In addition, we’ve also written an informative article on Google’s Disavow tool and how to report link building to Google, which is vital to know if you’re a digital marketer or a website owner.
Link Building Metrics to Include
You have access to the data, but now what? Next, it’s time to understand which metrics to include in your link building report.
If you’re wondering how to report link building, an important step is to not throw every single bit of available data into the document. Now, this doesn’t mean you should use this as an opportunity to hide any figures that are not reaching expectations. What it does mean, however, is you can skip adding superfluous information that isn’t useful to the reader.
You’re not trying to hit a certain word count or bulking out the document – you’re simply using this link building process report to cover important details about the campaign. But what are those important details? Here’s a closer look at the metrics to include in your link building report:
- New backlinks: Are you producing reports on a weekly, monthly, or even quarterly basis? If so, you must keep track of the number of new backlinks you’ve acquired since the previous report.
- Links lost: With a balanced report, you’re not only covering all of the ‘wins’ you are securing with your link building efforts. It’s just as important to reference less-than-ideal situations – such as backlinks that have been lost. Remember that losing links is expected, so ensure this is conveyed in the report.
- Link quality: The aim of any link building campaign is to secure high-quality, relevant links. In your report, you want to highlight the relevance of the backlinks to the host website’s niche. Furthermore, you should track the domain rating for each backlink.
- Domain rating: Speaking of domain rating, it’s also wise to monitor this metric for the website central to your link building efforts (i.e, your client’s site or even yours if you’re undertaking link building for your website). Tracking the domain rating is a way to demonstrate progress– and how backlinks support the entire SEO campaign.
- Anchor text: Anchor text is a critical element in any backlink strategy. You should monitor this to see what contextual information is being provided alongside your link. The more informative and relevant the anchor text is, the better it is for readers and search engines to understand the backlink and the page it opens.
Create (or Use) a Link Building Report Template
An SEO link building report supplies a client with an extensive collection of valuable data. Yet, it’s also about how this data is presented. Go with a basic table that includes an endless stream of data in rows and columns, and a lot of information can fly over the reader’s head.
To ensure the data is understood, you need to report your results efficiently in an easy-to-follow manner. One way of doing this is by utilising a template. While it’s possible to create one on your own, plenty of professional templates are also available and ready to use immediately – typically at a fee.
Using a template is wise because the report composition will normally remain the same – even if you’re creating link building reports for multiple clients all with different organisational structures and goals. The result: you save tons of time and effort by using the same base template for each campaign.
Within the template, don’t forget to pay close attention to visual implementation. You want to use catchy bars and coloured graphs that not only represent the data accurately and effectively but also do so in an attention-grabbing manner.
Start and Finish the Right Way
You know what the bulk of your SEO link building report entails. However, aside from reporting the data you’ve collected, you need to understand how to start and finish the report properly.
The start should be a quick summary of everything that has happened since the last report. You could also include a short personal commentary about any major updates. Then, you can make a quick bullet-point list of the work that has been done since the last report, along with how these efforts have helped achieve the campaign’s overall goals.
Finally, the end of the report can detail what needs to be done next to make improvements and continue hitting targets. This last section can include information about what you’ll be doing to help the link building campaign next, as well as suggestions on how the client should proceed with the current data.
Conclusion
There are many topics to cover when learning about SEO reporting, from link building to anchor text. It’s as broad as it is long, but knowing how to do these reports properly is an important skill for any digital marketer. With the guide as your template, you can start producing high-quality reports for your clients.
Need Help with Link Building Reports?
Needless to say, SEO link building reports aren’t a piece of cake – especially for anyone not well-versed in the ways of digital marketing. Whether you’re a website or business owner needing comprehensive professional link building reporting or already a digital marketer seeking white label SEO services, our experts at Click Intelligence have you covered at all angles.
With two decades of experience working with clients in over 40 sectors, we’re one of the UK’s leading digital marketing agencies – and one with a punchy 97% client retention rate, too. If you want to become one of our amassed client success stories, why not get in touch with our friendly specialists today?
