SEO Backlinks: What They Are, Why They Matter, and How to Verify Them

A backlink is a hyperlink from one website pointing to yours. Behind that simple definition lies one of the most consequential signals in how Google decides which pages deserve to rank. This guide covers everything a founder or indie maker needs to know — without the fluff.

What is a backlink, exactly?

When site A publishes a page that contains a link to site B, that is a backlink from A's perspective (an outbound link) and an inbound link from B's perspective. In SEO, the term "backlink" almost always refers to inbound links — links that other sites point toward yours.

Google's original PageRank algorithm treated these links as votes of confidence. A link from a trusted, authoritative site was worth more than a link from an unknown one. Twenty-five years later, that core principle still holds. Links remain one of Google's most heavily weighted ranking signals.

Dofollow vs nofollow: what actually passes SEO value?

Not all links transmit ranking power equally. The rel attribute on an anchor tag tells search engines how to treat a link.

• Dofollow (default) — No special rel attribute, or just rel="noopener noreferrer" (a browser security attribute that does not affect SEO). These links pass PageRank. They are the type that directly help your site rank higher.
• rel="nofollow" — Introduced by Google in 2005. Tells crawlers not to follow the link or pass PageRank. Standard on comment sections, forum posts, and most user-generated content. Since 2019, Google treats nofollow as a hint rather than a directive, but in practice these links contribute little to rankings.
• rel="sponsored" — Introduced in 2019 to flag paid placements. Google expects any link whose inclusion was influenced by payment to carry this attribute. Pages with untagged paid links risk a manual penalty.
• rel="ugc" — For user-generated content: forum threads, community posts, guest contributions. Similar effect to nofollow in terms of PageRank.

When someone says "I want a dofollow backlink," they mean a link without nofollow or sponsored attributes — one that actually flows PageRank from the source site to theirs.

Why backlinks still matter in 2026

Google has reduced its dependence on links compared to the early 2010s, and AI-generated content has made on-page signals noisier. But links remain irreplaceable for one reason: they are hard to fake at scale.

Anyone can write a technically optimized page. Earning a link from a real website requires that another human found the content valuable enough to reference. That signal is genuinely difficult to manufacture, which is precisely why Google continues to weight it heavily.

Concretely, backlinks matter because they:

• Help Google discover new pages faster (crawl path)
• Transfer authority from established domains to yours
• Anchor your site within a topic cluster, signaling relevance to a subject area
• Drive direct referral traffic, independent of rankings entirely

What makes a backlink valuable?

Not all dofollow links are equal. The quality of a backlink depends on several factors:

• Domain authority of the source — A link from a high-DR site (Ahrefs Domain Rating) carries more weight than one from a brand-new domain. Tools like Ahrefs, Moz, and Semrush all publish their own authority scores, which are proxies for how much PageRank the source domain itself has accumulated.
• Topical relevance — A link from a page about SaaS tools pointing to your SaaS product is more valuable than one from an unrelated cooking blog. Google assesses contextual fit.
• Anchor text — The clickable text of the link. Keyword-rich anchor text helps confirm relevance, but over-optimized anchors (exact-match keyword stuffing) can trigger penalties.
• Link placement — A link embedded in the main body of an article is worth more than one buried in a footer or sidebar.
• Page indexability — If the source page is blocked by robots.txt, has a noindex directive, or is not crawled by Google, the backlink passes no value regardless of its rel attribute.
• Link neighborhood — A page that links to dozens of low-quality or spammy sites diminishes the value it passes to all links on that page.

How to verify that a backlink is genuinely dofollow

Before paying for or investing effort in a backlink placement, verify it yourself. Here is a reliable process.

Step 1: Inspect the HTML source

Visit the page where the link should appear. Right-click → "View Page Source" (or press Ctrl+U / Cmd+U). Search for your domain name. Check the rel attribute of the anchor tag.

A clean dofollow link looks like this:

<a href="https://yoursite.com">Your Product</a>

Or with browser security attributes that do not affect SEO:

<a href="https://yoursite.com" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Your Product</a>

These are both dofollow. What you do not want to see:

<a href="https://yoursite.com" rel="nofollow">Your Product</a>

Step 2: Check that the page is indexable

A dofollow link on a noindexed page passes no value. To verify:

• Search Google for site:sourcedomain.com/page-path. If it appears, the page is indexed.
• Use the Google Search Console URL Inspection tool if you have access to the source site.
• Check the page's HTML for <meta name="robots" content="noindex">.
• Check robots.txt at the source domain root to confirm the path is not disallowed.

Step 3: Use a backlink checker tool

Third-party tools aggregate crawl data and make it easy to audit your backlink profile without manual page-by-page inspection:

• Ahrefs Site Explorer — Industry standard. Enter your domain, go to Backlinks, filter by "Dofollow." Shows DR, anchor text, and whether the linking page is indexed.
• Google Search Console — Free. Shows which domains link to you as seen by Google. Does not show dofollow/nofollow distinction, but these are links Google has actually processed.
• Moz Link Explorer — Shows DA, spam score, and follow status. Good for a second opinion.
• Semrush Backlink Analytics — Similar to Ahrefs. Useful for competitive backlink gap analysis.

Note that these tools lag real-time by days to weeks. A freshly placed link may not appear immediately. The canonical way to verify a new link is the HTML inspection method above.

Step 4: Verify the link is not behind a redirect

Some placements use redirect chains (e.g. a tracking URL that redirects to your domain). PageRank can be diluted through redirect hops. Check whether the href attribute points directly to your URL or through an intermediary. Tools like httpstatus.io can trace redirect chains.

Common red flags when evaluating a backlink placement

• The linking page has no organic traffic (check Ahrefs "organic traffic" column)
• The domain was recently registered or recently acquired by a link seller
• The page contains dozens of outbound links to unrelated sites
• The source domain has a high spam score in Moz
• The placement page is not in Google's index
• The link requires JavaScript to render (many crawlers will miss it)

Building vs buying backlinks: what Google says

Google's official stance is clear: links that are bought and sold to manipulate PageRank violate their guidelines, regardless of the rel attribute. The risk is a manual penalty or algorithmic devaluation.

In practice, the line between "earned" and "paid" is blurry. A sponsored mention on a genuinely relevant site, tagged rel="sponsored", is both Google-compliant and valuable for referral traffic even if PageRank is not passed. A dofollow link from a spam farm is technically more powerful on paper but carries penalty risk.

The most sustainable backlink strategy for an indie product:

• Build links through genuine community participation (maker communities, startup directories, niche forums)
• Create resources that others naturally cite (data studies, tools, comprehensive guides)
• Get listed in curated directories relevant to your category
• Earn PR mentions through product launches, milestones, or original research

How many backlinks do you actually need?

There is no universal number. What matters is the gap between your backlink profile and the profiles of pages that already rank for your target keywords. Use Ahrefs or Semrush to check the top 10 results for a keyword: if they average 50 referring domains, you have a benchmark. You do not need to match them exactly — you need enough authority to be in the competitive range, combined with strong on-page relevance.

For most early-stage SaaS products and indie tools, the goal in the first year is not volume but quality: a handful of genuine links from relevant, trusted domains is worth far more than hundreds of directory spam links.

Getting a dofollow backlink as an indie maker

If you are looking for a concrete placement to start with, the FeedbackFirst sponsored backlink program offers a dofollow link on a publicly indexed, server-rendered page — with no nofollow or sponsored attribute — alongside visibility in front of an active maker community. It is a 30-day placement, not a permanent listing. A full breakdown of how it works, how the link is rendered, and what happens at expiry is available in our dedicated article on the FeedbackFirst backlink placement.