Why stores lose rankings to competitors
Two stores can sell the same product at the same price with similar pages, and one still ranks far ahead. Often the difference is links. The leading store has been mentioned in gift guides, product roundups and blog posts for years, and its category pages carry that strength.
The hard part for ecommerce is that nobody naturally links to a product page. Links have to be earned through places where linking to products makes sense, and found one by one. That is slow, which is why most stores either skip it or buy risky links in bulk.
Where ecommerce links come from
| Source | Example | BacklinksBot strategy |
|---|---|---|
| Product roundups | "Best running shoes for flat feet" | Listicle inclusion |
| Gift guides | Seasonal gift lists on blogs and magazines | Listicle inclusion |
| Pages linking to rival stores | Reviews and guides that link to competitors | Competitor link copying (Growth and Agency) |
| Niche resource pages | Care guides, sizing guides, buying guides | Resource pages |
| Mentions of your brand | Reviews or posts that name your store without a link | Unlinked brand mentions |
| Dead links to discontinued products | Guides pointing to products that no longer exist | Broken link building |
| Writer requests | Journalists asking for product picks or expert tips | Journalist requests (Growth and Agency) |
One analysis, no signup. The first five targets with DR, strategy and why they fit.
Find my link gapsPick the right pages to link
For a store, the target page on your site matters as much as the linking page. Category pages and buying guides usually make the best targets, because they rank for the broad terms that drive sales and they stay live longer than single products. Product pages work for roundups that name a specific item.
In each campaign you tell the bot which pages on your site to promote. It matches each prospect to the best page, for example a "best X" list to your category page and a dead link to a discontinued product to your current equivalent. Every record on the board shows which of your pages the link points to.
How BacklinksBot runs it for a store
- 1 Run a link gap analysis against the stores that outrank you, up to 3 competitors on Starter, 5 on Growth and 10 on Agency.
- 2 Review the scored list: DR on the BacklinksBot DR scale, the strategy for each page and why it fits.
- 3 Let the bot write a personal email per page and send it from your store's mailbox, within daily caps.
- 4 Watch replies move through the board, with up to two follow-ups and drafted answers.
- 5 When a link goes live, the bot checks it on the page and keeps monitoring it, with a recovery email if it disappears.
Watch out for paid ecommerce links
Many roundup sites ask stores for a fee to be included. Some are fine sponsored placements; many are link schemes. Google asks for rel="sponsored" on any paid link, and has since 2019. When a publisher asks for money, BacklinksBot moves the card to Negotiating, proposes the sponsored tag and explains the risk. You decide, and if you approve, you pay the publisher directly within your campaign budget. We never charge per link and never take a cut.
The bot never uses PBNs, link farms, comment spam or automated forum links. Read the full rules on white hat link building.
Seasonal timing
Gift guides and seasonal roundups are planned weeks ahead. Editors update them before holidays and big sales events. A campaign that starts early gives editors time to read, reply and add you before the guide goes live. With the board, you can see which seasonal prospects are still waiting and nudge the campaign before the window closes.
Measuring ecommerce link building
Links are a means, not the goal. For a store, the goal is more organic visits to category and product pages, and more sales from them. Links take time to show up in rankings, so measure in two layers.
In the short term, watch the board. How many prospects reply, how many links go live, which strategies work best for your category, and, on Growth and Agency, the cost per link. These numbers show whether outreach is healthy.
Over several months, compare rankings and organic traffic for the category pages you promoted with pages you did not promote. Every live link record shows which page on your site it points to, and Growth and Agency export to CSV, so you can line links up with your own analytics.
Plans for stores
Starter at $199 a month, or $99 billed yearly, covers one store with resource pages, listicles, broken links, unlinked mentions and lost link recovery. Growth at $499 a month, or $249 billed yearly, adds competitor link copying, journalist requests, autopilot, cost per link and daily monitoring for up to 3 stores. Compare on the pricing page, or first see who links to rival stores with the link gap demo. To learn the analysis in depth, read competitor backlink gap analysis.
Questions people ask
What is ecommerce link building?
It is earning links to an online store from relevant sites, such as product roundups, gift guides, buying guides and brand mentions, to help category and product pages rank.
Should I build links to product pages or category pages?
Mostly category pages and buying guides, since they target broad terms and stay live longer. Product pages fit roundups that name a specific item.
Is it safe to pay for inclusion in gift guides?
Only with rel="sponsored", as Google asks for paid links. Paid links that pass ranking credit break Google's spam policies.
How do I find who links to competing stores?
Run a link gap analysis. The BacklinksBot demo lists pages that link to your competitors but not to you, with the first five targets shown in full.
How long until ecommerce links affect rankings?
Links usually go live over weeks, and ranking changes take longer. It depends on your category and how strong your competitors are.