How to Use Broken Link Building to Earn Relevant Backlinks

What if you could find websites that already want to link to a useful resource—but the resource they're linking to no longer exists?

That's the opportunity behind broken link building.

Instead of trying to convince a website owner to add a completely new external link, you identify an existing broken link on a relevant page and offer a useful replacement. When the replacement genuinely improves the page for its readers, the website owner has a practical reason to consider adding your link.

Done strategically, broken link building can become a repeatable way to discover relevant link building opportunities.

What Is Broken Link Building?

Broken link building is an SEO tactic where you find a broken or dead external link on another website, create or identify a suitable replacement resource, and contact the site owner to suggest replacing the broken link with your working resource.

The basic process looks like this:

Find broken link → Analyze the original resource → Create or identify a replacement → Find relevant prospects → Conduct outreach → Earn the backlink

The technique works because you're not asking a publisher to add a random link to their page.

You're pointing out a problem that already exists and offering a potential solution.

Why Broken Link Building Can Work

Broken links create a poor experience for website visitors.

Someone clicks a link expecting useful information and instead reaches a missing page, error message, or irrelevant destination.

For publishers, fixing those links can help keep their content useful and up to date.

For link builders, this creates an opportunity.

If you have a resource that genuinely replaces the missing information, your outreach can be highly relevant to the page you're targeting.

The key word is relevant.

The goal isn't to find thousands of broken links and send automated emails. It's to identify broken links where your content makes sense as a replacement.

Step 1: Find Relevant Websites

Start by defining the websites and topics that matter to your campaign.

Look for:

• Industry publications

• Niche blogs

• Resource pages

• Educational websites

• Professional organizations

• Industry guides

• Statistics and research pages

Your prospects should be relevant to your business and the content you want to promote.

A broken link on a high-authority website isn't automatically a good opportunity if the subject has nothing to do with your website.

Step 2: Find Broken Links

The next step is to find broken links within relevant websites.

Backlink and SEO tools can help identify links pointing to pages that are no longer available.

You can also examine competitor websites and their backlink profiles.

For example, suppose a competitor once published a detailed guide that earned links from several industry websites. If that guide has subsequently disappeared, the pages that linked to it may contain broken backlinks.

That can create an interesting prospecting opportunity.

Instead of starting with a random website, you are starting with a page that has already demonstrated a willingness to reference similar information.

Step 3: Investigate the Broken Resource

Don't immediately pitch your own content after finding a broken link.

First, understand what the missing page contained.

If possible, examine archived versions of the page or other available references to determine:

• What topic did it cover?

• Who was the intended audience?

• What information did it provide?

• Why did the referring page link to it?

• What type of resource was it?

This matters because your replacement needs to serve a similar purpose.

If the broken page was an original research report, replacing it with a generic 500-word blog post probably won't provide the same value.

Step 4: Create a Genuine Replacement Resource

This is the most important part of a successful broken link building strategy.

You need a resource that deserves to replace the broken page.

There are several ways to approach this.

Recreate the Core Resource

If the original information is still useful and can be responsibly recreated, develop a comprehensive modern version.

Improve the Information

Update outdated information, add new research, expand important sections, and make the resource more useful.

Create a Better Alternative

You don't always need to reproduce the original page exactly.

If the old resource covered a subject that has evolved, create a current and more useful resource that serves the same underlying need.

Build a Useful Asset

Sometimes the best replacement is a tool, calculator, dataset, template, research report, or visual resource rather than another article.

The important question is:

Would a reader benefit from this replacement?

If the answer is yes, your outreach becomes much more compelling.

Step 5: Check the Link Context

Before contacting the publisher, examine exactly where the broken link appears.

Look at the surrounding paragraph and the purpose of the link.

For example, a broken link might appear in a section explaining a particular SEO concept.

If your resource explains that same concept in detail, the contextual fit is strong.

But if your resource only tangentially relates to the subject, the opportunity is weak.

Context matters because search engines and users both benefit from links that make sense within the surrounding content.

Step 6: Build a List of Broken Backlinks

Once you identify strong opportunities, organize them into a prospect list.

Useful fields include:

Field	What to Record
Website	Referring domain
Page	Page containing the broken link
Broken URL	Original destination
Topic	Subject of the missing resource
Replacement	Your relevant resource
Contact	Editor or website owner
Relevance	High, medium, or low
Status	Not contacted, contacted, replied, acquired

You can also record authority and traffic metrics to help prioritize prospects.

This makes your broken link-building campaign easier to manage and scale.

Step 7: Write Relevant Outreach

Your outreach email should be straightforward.

Tell the publisher:

1. You found a broken link.

2. Where it appears.

3. What the broken resource was about.

4. That you have a relevant replacement.

5. Where they can find it.

For example:

Hi [Name],

I was reading your article on [topic] and noticed that the link to [resource] no longer appears to be working.

We recently published a detailed resource covering [topic], which may work as an updated reference for that section.

You can find it here: [URL]

Hope that helps!

The email doesn't need to be elaborate.

The value comes from the specificity of the opportunity, not from writing a long sales pitch.

Step 8: Prioritize Quality Over Quantity

One common mistake with broken link building is chasing every broken link you can find.

Don't.

Prioritize opportunities based on:

• Topical relevance

• Quality of the referring website

• Context of the broken link

• Quality of your replacement resource

• Potential referral traffic

• Likelihood of a successful replacement

A highly relevant broken link on a respected industry publication can be significantly more valuable than dozens of unrelated opportunities.

Step 9: Follow Up Thoughtfully

Website owners may not respond to your first message.

A brief follow-up can be appropriate.

However, don't repeatedly send the same request.

If the recipient doesn't respond after reasonable follow-up attempts, move on to other prospects.

Broken link building works best when your outreach feels like a useful notification rather than an aggressive backlink request.

Common Broken Link Building Mistakes

Creating a Weak Replacement

If your resource isn't genuinely useful, the publisher has little reason to replace the broken link.

Ignoring Relevance

A broken link isn't valuable simply because it exists.

Pitching Without Checking Context

Always inspect the page before contacting the publisher.

Automating Everything

Automation can help organize prospecting, but completely generic outreach often produces poor results.

Focusing Only on Authority Metrics

A relevant, useful website can be more strategically valuable than a domain chosen solely because it has a high metric.

Turn Broken Links Into a Sustainable Link-Building Strategy

Broken link building is most effective when you treat it as a value-first tactic rather than a shortcut to backlinks.

Start by identifying relevant websites. Find broken links within useful content. Investigate the missing resource and understand why the original link existed. Then create a replacement that genuinely helps the publisher and its audience.

From there, conduct targeted backlink outreach, track your prospects, and prioritize opportunities based on relevance and quality.

The biggest advantage of this approach is that you're not creating a reason for someone to link to you out of thin air.

You're finding an existing information need and providing a useful replacement.

That's what makes broken link building such a practical component of a broader link building strategy.