Introduction
This is an analysis of the Search Engine Optimisation techniques and landscape in the Insurance Brokers industry in Australia with a particular focus on backlink analysis.
Summary
Our analysis suggests that the backlinks in this industry are dominated by affiliations such as partnerships, memberships and sponsorships. We found many industry bodies and ‘groups’ or ‘collectives’ of brokers which had websites and linked out to their member businesses. Further analysis is needed to see if other markets follow the same trends.
Data
We collected a total of 258 unique linking domains, 157 were from .au domains and 101 were from non .au domains. The analysis is focused on the .au domains only.
Onsite Optimisation
While this analysis is primarily focused on backlink analysis, its helpful to get a sense of the degree of optimisation in the industry. We’ve chosen to use the very simple measure of homepage title optimisation rating on a scale of Not Optimised, Basic Optimisation, Well Optimised & Overly Optimised.
This industry has a fairly high level of competition which is reflected by a relatively high level of onsite optimisation (of the homepage title).
Link Reasons
This section looks at the reasons why websites in this industry give links. Small business backlink profiles are typically dominated by “Attribution Links” which are given for some reason not directly related to the target page (page being linked to) and “Self Created Links” which are links created by someone associated with the target page for the purpose of self promotion. Click the box below for further analysis of the link reasons.
Affiliation Links
Affiliation links are those given due to some kind of affiliation between the source website (website the link is going from) and target website (website link is going to).
Directories
Business directories are one of the most abundant link building opportunities on the web but many of them have very little to zero value for SEO. The gems that are definitely worth considering are those directories that are topically and/or locationally relevant to your business. This section looks at the directories discovered in this analysis.
Article/List Types
Links within articles and lists are usually the most powerful so it helps to know what types of pages are giving these types of links.