Imagine you receive an email from a dedicated reader of your blog.
They were going through one of your articles you posted a year ago, and couldn’t help but notice that your link to the “10 Best Guitar Amps of 2023” leads… nowhere. Yup—they clicked on the link and got the good ol’ “404 page not found” error. Not a good look.
The good news is, your reader actually has a music blog of their own—and they just posted their own article called “10 Best Guitar Amps of 2024.”
Would you be interested in linking to their new article, they ask?
You gladly accept (and who wouldn’t?) and you and your reader continue on with your lives, each of you just that much better off.
Your reader has just perfectly executed the broken link building strategy.
Broken link building is the process of identifying broken links within existing content pieces, and replacing them with links to your own relevant content.
Use broken link building when you have a very limited budget, when you’re trying to build authority from the ground up, and when you’re dealing with topics that are constantly changing.
Before reaching out with a broken link building proposal, verify that the link is actually broken, your content is super relevant, and the linking website isn’t spammy. Don’t feel like you need to keep the same anchor text, and don’t forget to check your own website for broken links.
After using a backlink checker to find broken links, reach out with a concise, ultra-specific email that outlines your proposal and eliminates as many steps as possible for the recipient.
First off, what is a broken link?
A broken link is a link that leads nowhere. Maybe the page it originally pointed to has been taken down, or maybe the website owner made some tweaks and changed around the URLs. Whatever the case, the link is non-functional; out of commission; done-zo.
Broken link building is when some clever entrepreneur or SEO expert—like the reader in the introduction—uses these broken links as opportunities to insert helpful backlinks that point to their own websites.
Technically speaking, at Profit Engine we like to think of broken link building as a subset of niche editing, which is the broader strategy of inserting backlinks into existing content.
If done correctly, broken link building is an especially effective form of niche editing, because the value-add is clear as day: You’re inserting a functional, helpful link in the place of a useless, broken one.
This also makes broken links one of the most cost-effective ways to build links, since website owners usually won’t make you pay for providing them a helpful service.
Even though broken link building can be highly effective, its effectiveness is dependent on whether or not you use it in the right circumstances. Even though strategies like guest posting take a lot more work, they generally provide a lot more authority per link as well.
So there are some specific circumstances you should be aware of where broken link building often rises to the top as the most optimal link-building strategy.
Let's tailor your roadmap to success.
With extensive expertise in enhancing SERP ranking performance, we understand what truly works. Let us save you from wasting resources on ineffective strategies. A quick call with us with the option of an AI-Driven Strategy Blueprint might be all you need to attain the edge over your competition.
BOOK A CALL
This one is obvious.
Like we mentioned above, most website owners aren’t nervy enough to ask for your money after you’ve just proposed a plan to help them fix a flaw in their website, totally for free. This makes it a perfect link-building strategy for businesses with tight budgets.
If you’re a startup, a small online business, or simply going through a tough stretch where expenses seem never-ending, shift your link-building strategy over to broken link building.
Every business has been there at one point: You have a brand spanking-new website with an excellent landing page and some quality content pieces, but little to no sales and definitely no proof of expertise in your field.
It’s unlikely that a high-profile website owner in your niche will be grinning ear-to-ear upon reading your proposal for a full guest post on their website—but they’ll be very likely to say yes to your offer of fixing a few broken links scattered throughout the vast wastelands of their older blog posts.
Rinse and repeat a few times (or a few hundred times) and you’ll have built yourself some solid SEO authority and driven in a hefty dose of referral traffic.
At this point, you can start integrating guest posts and broader niche edits into your link-building strategy, since you’ll be much more of a force to be reckoned with.
This is something we touched on in our article on niche edits as well. Broken link building (and niche edits in general) are tailor-made for insertion into content that covers dynamic topics like news and tech.
If you’re in a niche like this, you’re in luck. As sources become outdated (and sometimes even get taken down if they don’t age well), broken links start popping up like the moles in whack-a-mole.
That’s where you can strut in and confront the website owner with your “offer he can’t refuse.”
You know when you get a new type of haircut, and it seems like everywhere you go, you see people with that same haircut? Or you get a new car, and now every street you drive on has one? That haircut, and that kind of car didn’t actually become more popular—you’re just paying closer attention.
The same thing happens with broken link building once you make it a focus. Throughout the course of your regular business research, you’ll be surprised just how many URLs you find that lead exactly nowhere.
We recommend creating a spreadsheet,and keeping track of every single broken link you come across—even if it’s not directly related to your niche. With collaborations and potential changes in your future operations, you never know when a new piece of content you publish could become relevant for replacing a given broken link.
Things to definitely do
Verify that the link is actually broken. Trust us—you don’t want to be that person who reaches out all professionally with a broken link building proposal, only to be ignored because the link was never broken in the first place. Use tools like Dead Link Checker or one of our recommended top five backlink checkers to ensure that each link is actually broken before reaching out.
Make sure your replacement content is ultra-relevant. Remember we said broken link building comes with an obvious value-add, and hardly anyone could say no to it? Well, it turns out that comes with a few exceptions. The main one is that you’re going to get lots of “nos” if your content misses the mark of what was intended for the link. To use the example from the introduction, an offer that puts forward the article “10 Best Guitar Pickups of 2024” is much more likely to be ignored by the website owner, since the surrounding copy is probably all about amps—not pickups.
Prioritize high-authority websites. Broken links don’t exactly grow on trees, so it’s not like you’ll have a huge choice in the matter—but wherever possible, fix broken links only for high-authority, reputable websites. You should even take this advice at the expense of your total backlink quantity. Many people think that, at the worst, backlinks from sketchy websites just don’t really help much—but the reality is that they can actually be a net negative for your website’s link profile.
Things to avoid at all costs
It’s much harder to go wrong with broken link building than it is with a strategy like guest posting—but there are still a few things to put on your “never ever do this” list.
Don’t keep the same anchor text. Okay, sometimes you can—like in the example in the introduction. But for the most part, your content probably won’t have the exact same page title as the previous piece—and even though your content needs to be relevant, it might not always cover the topic in exactly the same way. In these scenarios, propose the anchor text that works best in the context of the linking article and most accurately conveys the nature of your content.
Don’t forget to update your own site! We couldn’t resist. We said earlier that you don’t want to be that person who reaches out about fixing a broken link that isn’t actually broken—well, you definitely don’t want to be that person who tries to fix other websites’ broken links, when your own is littered with them.
If you’re looking for a deep dive on link-building outreach as a whole, check out our comprehensive link-building outreach guide.
Here we’ll be going over some practical tips for reaching out specifically with broken link building proposals.
The best way to find broken links is to use a backlink checker. We identified SEMrush as the best overall backlink checker in 2024, but there are plenty of others out there.
And for broken links that you stumble upon organically, don’t forget to use a tool like Dead Link Checker to confirm that it really is broken.
As you start building up your collection of broken links, you may start to see patterns emerge. For example, if a large content business in your industry recently went under and deactivated its website, that single event could result in hundreds or even thousands of broken links. So if you see a certain domain continually popping up as broken, hone in on it and you may reap some serious rewards.
And again, whenever you have the choice, prioritize building links on websites with high authority and reputability, and avoid websites with spammy reputations.
For business-related matters, email is still the go-to for collaborations and proposals. Almost all websites have a “Contact Us” page, and some will even have a specific form or email address for people who aren’t customers, but potential collaborators.
When it comes to writing the email, we’d normally give you a stern exhortation to make it clear how your link adds value to the linking website and its readers. But with broken link building, the value-add is kind of the whole point. You’d have to really mess up for your broken link building proposal to not mention the fact that you want to fix a broken link.
So when it comes to reaching out with a broken link building proposal, the best advice we can give you is to get specific.
Don’t say “I found a broken link on your website, and I want to replace it.”
Say “In your article ‘How To Mix Live Electric Guitars,’ I noticed your link to the ‘10 Best Guitar Amps of 2023’ is broken, since the article was removed. I have an article on my website entitled ‘10 Best Guitar Amps of 2024’—I can assure you it’s a better, more updated piece on the same topic. I’d love to insert my link in place of the broken one.”
And in the blurb, insert links to the websites and articles you mention, so the recipient can easily click on them and verify that your claims are in fact correct.
Again, the most important thing is to make sure the website owner clearly sees the value in accepting your proposal. With broken link building, the value is obvious—but you can eliminate hidden costs for the website owner by making things specific, easy, and clear right from the start. All they should have to do is say yes.
Broken link building is one of the most straightforward and effective link-building strategies out there.
It works particularly well for businesses that have tight budgets, have little to no authority in their respective niches, and deal with constantly changing topics where broken links are common.
By following some basic best practices and reaching out to website owners with concise, specific proposals, broken link building can get you started on your journey to a strong link profile.
At Profit Engine, we specialize not just in broken link building, but in niche edits, guest posts, and backlink profile management in general.
If you’re looking for an agency that can handle the backlink-building process for you from start to finish, we’ve got you covered.
Book a free strategy meeting—we’d love to talk with you.
An industry-leading AI link building strategy.
After years of experience growing brands just like yours, we know what gets results and what doesn’t. We’ll stop you from spending too much time, resources and money on backlinks that don’t help. We’ll stop you from building links on harmful or useless websites. We’ll use our AI Link Strategy to analyze your competition and give you a personalized action plan.
Find out more
