Uprankly

What is Link Monitor?

Link Monitor watches your backlinks while you work on everything else. It checks every link on a schedule, logs every change, and can automatically email the site admin to get a missing link restored. This guide walks you through the full workflow — from adding your first link to running recovery campaigns on autopilot.

Step 1: Add your links

Link Monitor needs to know what to watch before it can do anything. Go to Link Monitor > Add Links and pick one of three methods:

  • Domain Scan — enter your domain and Link Monitor pulls your existing backlinks automatically. Fastest way to get started if you don't have a list ready.
  • CSV Upload — upload a spreadsheet of your backlinks. Download the sample CSV first so you get the format right.
  • Manual Entry — add links one at a time. Useful for a specific link you just placed and want to track immediately.

For each link, you set the check frequency: Daily, every 3 days, Weekly, or Monthly. Daily for your high-value placements. Weekly or Monthly for the rest — no need to check a DR 20 link every 24 hours.

Assign links to a project while you're at it. You'll thank yourself later, especially if you're managing more than one site or client.

Step 2: Read the dashboard

Once your links are in, the dashboard gives you the full picture. Five numbers across the top tell you what's going on:

  • Active — total links being monitored
  • Found — links confirmed live, plus your coverage percentage
  • Missing — links that have been removed
  • Changed — links where something was altered (anchor text, rel attribute, destination URL)
  • Error — links that couldn't be checked

Below that, the trend chart shows 30 days of history. The delta cards flag new and lost backlinks from the last 48 hours. Check those two things first, every morning. That's your early warning system.

Step 3: Work through the link table

The Links page in the sidebar gives you the full table. Every monitored link shows its status, check frequency, spam score, stability score, and when it was last checked.

Use the filters to zero in on what needs attention:

  • Filter by Status — Missing and Changed links are your priority
  • Filter by Project if you manage multiple sites
  • Sort by Last Checked to see the freshest results first

From each row you can view full history, pull contact info, pause monitoring, or delete. You don't need to work through the whole table every day — that's what the dashboard delta cards are for.

Step 4: Check the alerts log

Go to Alerts for the full change detection history. Every event gets logged:

  • Link Removed — your backlink was deleted
  • Link Found — a new link was detected
  • Anchor Changed — the link text was modified
  • Rel Changed — the link flipped from dofollow to nofollow (or vice versa)
  • URL Changed — the link now points somewhere different
  • Page Error — HTTP error on the page
  • Page Hidden — the page was marked noindex
  • Redirected — the page now redirects

Filter by event type and date range. The presets — Last 7 Days, Last 30 Days, Last 90 Days — make weekly and monthly reviews fast. Most of the time you'll filter to Missing and Rel Changed, then move on.

Step 5: Set up recovery campaigns

When a link goes missing, you have two choices: email the site admin yourself, or let Link Monitor handle the follow-up sequence automatically.

Go to Recovery and click New Sequence. Write your outreach email and use variables like {firstname}, {domain}, and {linkurl} so each one personalizes itself. Add 1–3 follow-up emails with delays in between — 7, 14, and 21 days is a solid default.

Once the sequence is ready, go to the Links page, select your missing links, and hit Send Recovery in the bulk action bar. Choose the sequence. Emails go out automatically from there.

The Email Log tab shows what's been sent, who's received follow-ups, and whether anything failed to deliver. Check it once a week.

Step 6: Pull your reports

Reports stores daily snapshots of your monitoring data. Each snapshot shows how many links were active, found, missing, changed, and errored — plus an overall success rate.

Use the date range selector to spot trends:

  • Success rate climbing? Your recovery campaigns are working.
  • Rate dropping? You're losing links faster than you're recovering them — time to revisit your outreach.
  • Errors spiking? Target sites might be having server problems, not actual link removals.

Export any report as a CSV for client deliverables or internal reviews.

Step 7: Run a gap analysis

Link Monitor has a built-in gap analysis tool. Go to Gap Analysis, click New Gap Analysis, enter your domain and 2–5 competitors. It finds backlinks they have that you don't.

Do this quarterly. You'll see exactly which sites have started linking to your competitors since your last check — and those are warm targets worth pitching.

Step 8: Lock in your settings

Go to Settings before you leave:

  • Alert preferences — turn on email alerts for Link Removed and Rel Changed. Turn off anything that's just noise for your workflow.
  • Email accounts — connect Gmail, Outlook, or SMTP for recovery sends. If you have multiple accounts, set the priority order.
  • Monitoring defaults — set your default check frequency and recovery template for new links. This matters when you're importing in bulk and don't want to configure each link manually.

The daily routine

Once you're set up, this is what the actual workflow looks like:

  1. Morning — scan the delta cards on the dashboard. Two minutes, tops.
  2. New missing links — assign a recovery sequence the same day they drop.
  3. Weekly — open Alerts and look for Changed or Redirected events.
  4. Monthly — export a report CSV for client reporting or your own records.
  5. Quarterly — run a gap analysis to see what competitors have picked up.

Link Monitor handles the watching. Your job is to act on what it finds.