Claim brand mentions for backlinks

Step-by-step Playbooks
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Contributors

@jamaicawinshipgmail-com @andreea-macoveiciuc-content-expert @danielisler1gmail-com

Business Benefits

Drive website traffic, increase domain authority, and grow brand credibility to improve SEO.

Record starting point data for your number of backlinks, backlink authority, SERP ranking for keywords, page visits, and conversion rates.

Benchmark metrics will help you see what your starting point was before your efforts to claim unlinked brand mentions. Some tools are SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Majestic SEO.

Make a list of possible keywords that might be used in unlinked brand mentions.

For example:

  • Company name.
  • Product or service names.
  • Employee names.
  • Content names.

Find brand mentions by searching with an online tracking tool like the BrandMentions app, Ahrefs, or Screaming Frog.

Using BrandMentions:

  1. Create an account.
  2. Type in a keyword from your list into the search bar, starting with your company name.
  3. Navigate to My Mentions > Unlinked.
  4. Apply filters like most shares and performance to narrow your search.

Manually search for brand mentions using advanced Google search modifiers.

Some search modifiers that may be useful for finding brand mentions:

  • Use the tilde key (~) to search for that keyword and its synonyms.
  • Add the minus key (-) paired with site:yourwebsite.com to excludes results from the specified website.
  • Use quotation marks (" ") around a string to search for that exact text.

Create a spreadsheet with columns for URL Domain authority, Likeliness to be monitored, Negative or positive mention, Topic, and Content type, and fill it in.

To find the domain authority of a website, paste the URL into an online tool like Moz’s Link Explorer. The content type may affect the probability of a page being updated with a backlink. For example, press releases are not typically updated frequently, so they may not be worth prioritizing.

Prioritize brand mentions for your outreach campaign, with a focus on positive mentions and regularly monitored sites.

You will likely find these categories NOT worth prioritizing or pursuing:

  • Sites that are not regularly monitored or are outdated.
  • Content not edited after release like press releases.
  • Sites with low domain authority.
  • Negative mentions.

Choose a specific and relevant link for the correspondent to use.

To decide which link to use, look back at your spreadsheet to see the topic of the brand mention. For example, if the brand mention was about a specific product, you could ask the author to include a link to that product page. This is more useful and relevant to the person reading the article, and it helps you improve SEO for that product page by increasing domain authority and driving web traffic to that page.

Draft and send outreach emails that ask for backlinks while also providing value to the author.

Example ways to provide value to the author while asking for a backlink are:

  • Offer to add their backlink into your next blog post.
  • Share their article with your network.
  • Add a link to their unclaimed brand mention.
  • Offer a guest blogging position.
  • Explain why having your link will help their readers by giving them more context and information.

Some other best practice guidance for outreach emails are:

  • Personalize the email to a specific person if possible.
  • Show that you read their content.
  • Thank the author for including your brand mention.
  • Be direct about wanting a backlink.
  • Provide value.
  • Provide the specific link you want them to include.

Example email template:

Subject: Thanks for mentioning [company name]

Hi [author’s name],

I enjoyed your blog post on [article name]. Thanks for including [company name].

I was wondering if you could include a link back to [company name] to help your readers learn more about it. Here is the [link]. I would be happy to share your article to my social media channels. Let me know if this is possible.

Thanks again.

Follow up with correspondents to build relationships.

Another benefit of claiming unlinked brand mentions is the opportunity to build relationships with others in the industry. If they responded positively and added your link, follow through with what you told them you would do for them, and reach out again with another opportunity for reciprocity.

Many emails will go unanswered or receive a negative response. Follow up once weekly until you receive a yes or no. Continue to offer value, like showing them you added their link in a recent blog post. It is useful to track your outreach efforts in your spreadsheet.

Track backlink progress through tracking links and backlink audits.

Regularly monitor progress through analytics tools to compare to benchmark metrics.

Last edited by @hesh_fekry 2023-11-14T15:11:23Z