Link Reclamation

Broken inbound links — backlinks that point to 404 pages on your site — are the most common link reclamation opportunity^[1]. Use Ahrefs Site Explorer's 'Best by Links' report filtered to '404 not found' status, or Google Search Console's 'Coverage' report cross-referenced with the 'Links' external links report. For each broken page with significant inbound links: (1) If the page was moved or renamed, implement a 301 redirect from the old URL to the new one — the link equity transfers automatically. (2) If the content no longer exists, redirect to the most topically relevant active page. (3) Optionally, contact the linking webmaster to update the link to the current URL — this is especially worth doing for links from very high-authority sites where ensuring clean link equity flow matters.

When someone mentions your brand, product name, or content title without linking to you, they've essentially given you a reference without the SEO credit^[1][2]. Find unlinked mentions using: Google Alerts (set up alerts for your brand name, key product names, and founder names), Ahrefs Alerts (monitors for brand mentions without links), Mention.com, or Semrush's Brand Monitoring tool. When you find an unlinked mention, reach out to the author with a friendly email thanking them for the mention and politely asking if they'd consider adding a link — the editorial decision has already been made in your favor, so conversion rates are high (often 20-40%). Prioritize outreach to high-DA publications. Don't pursue unlinked mentions on low-quality sites — the link isn't worth the effort or the association.

The best link reclamation is proactive: preventing link loss before it happens^[2]. Before changing any URL that has inbound links, check Ahrefs or Search Console for the link count — any page with meaningful inbound links must have a 301 redirect implemented before or simultaneously with the URL change. When deleting content, redirect to the most relevant existing page or to a newly created page on the same topic. After any site migration or CMS change, immediately crawl with Screaming Frog and cross-reference with your Ahrefs backlink data to identify any missed redirects. Set up Search Console alerts for new 404 errors — a spike in 404s often indicates a URL structure change that broke existing links. Quarterly audits that check top inbound links against your site's current response codes catch issues before significant link equity is lost.