Backlink Monitoring

Analyse outbound links on the page for SEO link strategy.

> Note: This skill owns external/outbound link analysis. For internal link counts and structure, see the onpage-optimization skill.

1. Identify external links

For each <a href="..."> element:

• External: href starts with http:// or https://
• Classify as dofollow (default) or nofollow (if rel contains nofollow)

Report: ✅ PASS "Found N external link(s): X dofollow, Y nofollow"

2. Nofollow strategy

| Condition | Status | |---|---| | All external links are dofollow, none nofollow | ⚠️ WARN "Consider adding rel=nofollow to untrusted or sponsored links" | | Mix of dofollow and nofollow | ✅ PASS (healthy strategy) |

3. Sponsored and UGC attributes

• Links with rel="sponsored" → ✅ PASS "N link(s) properly marked as sponsored"
• Links with rel="ugc" → ✅ PASS "N link(s) marked as UGC (user-generated content)"

4. Anchor text quality

• External links with empty anchor text (and no child <img>) → ⚠️ WARN "Descriptive anchor text improves SEO"

5. Domain diversity

• Extract unique hostnames from all external link href values
• Report: ✅ PASS "Links point to N unique domain(s): list domains]"

6. No external links

• If zero external links found → ⚠️ WARN "Linking to authoritative sources can boost SEO credibility"

Best practices to suggest

• Use rel="nofollow" for untrusted, paid, or user-submitted links
• Use rel="sponsored" for paid/advertising links
• Use rel="ugc" for user-generated content (comments, forums)
• Write descriptive anchor text — avoid "click here" or empty links
• Link to authoritative, relevant external sources
• Maintain domain diversity — don't link excessively to one domain

Edge cases

• Ignore javascript:, mailto:, and tel: hrefs — these are not external links
• Links with multiple rel values (e.g. rel="nofollow sponsored") — check each value separately
• Links inside <template>, <noscript>, or hidden elements should still be audited but noted as potentially inactive
• Social media share buttons (Twitter, Facebook intents) are external but should not trigger nofollow warnings
• CDN links (e.g. cdn.jsdelivr.net, fonts.googleapis.com) are resource links, not editorial — exclude from domain diversity count