Is 400 backlinks considered a lot to beat out?

[Big Chris]

I have a niche that I want to dig into but the site has about 400 backlinks pointing the site which has the keywords optimized for (not main root). The backlinks are mostly blogs, directories, etc with lower page rank.

Would this be considered a hard niche to compete with?

[NicoleBeckett]

Not really, especially if they're lower-quality links. Start by going through your top 3 competitors' links, and see if you can get links from some of the same places. For example, if they have a link from XYZ Directory, see if you can sign up and get a link on there, too.

At the same time, focus on building quality one-way links. For example, writing a guest post for a popular blog in your niche will give you a good one-way link. Or, writing great articles that get syndicated by a bunch of sites will get you good one-way links. You don't necessarily need 401 links to beat this person; you just need enough quality links to present yourself as a better authority.

Also, keep updating your website. I've noticed that every time I add something new, I jump at least a spot or 2 in the rankings. The search engines love sites that have unique, fresh content.

Good luck!

[orvn]

Originally Posted by Big Chris

I have a niche that I want to dig into but the site has about 400 backlinks pointing the site which has the keywords optimized for (not main root). The backlinks are mostly blogs, directories, etc with lower page rank.

Would this be considered a hard niche to compete with?

400 isn't incredibly low, but it's still below-par in my opinion, should be too hard to beat out. But that's a very generalized statement.

Of course a more important factor is the authority of these links, you can analyze the links here: Backlinks Checker Tool - Backlink Watch

Check their PR and traffic rating, you might even be able to 'steal' some of the better links

[mayorlan]

To me 400 backlinks to a top site can be beat off.You just have to get a game plan as to how to get quality backlinks and not quantity backlink.You may never need up to 400 backlinks to beat that if those 400 are not quality ones.You may even steal some backlinks from them if they are quality ones,at least they have done the work of fishing those site out for links,you just leverage on that.

[Brad Callen]

It totally depends on the quality of those 400 links. Analyze the PR, anchor text, total number of outbound links on the link page, domain age to get a better feel for how solid it really is.

What about the other nine sites on page one? Check out their back link profile as well and there are many programs that will collect this data for you quickly.

[paulgl]

You are under the assumption that 401 backlinks will magically take you
to the top. It may. It may not. There are so many other intangibles. Google may
never put you #1, above another site, no matter how great you think
you are. People forget that there is no magic formula. Build authority.

Backlinks in no way, shape, or form, tells you anything about how hard
it is to beat something. I beat many, and have waaaaay fewer backlinks.
I concentrate on authority, relevance.

Nobody knows anything about what authority google gives to certain
sites. Why people jump in with complete speculation, even "oh yeah"
is beyond me. But it's why this forum gets filled with,
"I did more, did this, did that, and still google hates me..."

Paul

[Mikedb]

If you use 50 good backlinks you can beat even sites with 100,000 backlinks.
It is not all in the numbers, many factors come into places and specially what Brad said. Also see if the backlinks are going to their homepage or an inner page.
You will see that sites have many backlinks to their hompage but not many to an inner page that is optimzed for that keyword and that is a mistake

regards,

Mike

[lotre]

but what if a site is around 10 years old, is very big as it is kind of a health portal where people ask questions but not got many links?

[Mr.S]

I agree with couple of the posts here, there are many factors that will influence whether you will beat the other persons' website. My friend did the research, build way more back links than competition had and still wasn't near the first page, but if you focus an a long term strategy you will get to the top eventually. Good luck

[jzumpella]

The health portal site sounds like a very good authority site with a ton of unique content, I'd highly doubt you'd outrank that site unless you put in a ton of effort to SEO, both on and off-page.

[jhonsean]

Quantity is not the basis, its the quality of backlinks.

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by Mikedb

If you use 50 good backlinks you can beat even sites with 100,000 backlinks.
Mike

It's not even about a total number of backlinks. There is no way you can make
a statement that all you need is 50 good links to beat another site. You need
a whole host of things to come together.

Complete speculation.

And I'll repeat: Complete speculation about why a site is #1. Looking at
the number of backlinks is actually a little silly when you think about it.

Google does not rank sites by the sheer number of backlinks. I wish people
would stop the insanity about some phantom number of backlinks.

Asking a question like,
"This site has 400 backlinks. Can I beat it with 401?"
Is as silly as asking,
"This site has a red banner. Can I beat it with a red one and green one?"

Paul

[hovirag]

Backlinks don't really count in SEO. I have a site with one backlink no one or two on google, way ahead of others with thousands of links.
In my opinion a good URL (KEYWORD), keyword title, keyword tabs and good content are those that really count.

[32paul52]

Backlinks dont count? think againg- unless you have an exact domain in a market which no-one is interested in........

Originally Posted by hovirag

Backlinks don't really count in SEO. I have a site with one backlink no one or two on google, way ahead of others with thousands of links.
In my opinion a good URL (KEYWORD), keyword title, keyword tabs and good content are those that really count.

I would take a close look at th backlinks - i use Linkpopularity.com and look for pages with PR, but it is beatable