🔗 Backlink Opportunity Finder

Automatically discover broken backlink opportunities at scale. Enter your target keywords, and the actor scrapes Google, crawls every ranking page, finds dead external links (404/410), and extracts contact info — all in one run.

Stop manually hunting for broken links. Get a ready-to-use outreach list with opportunity scores, broken URLs, anchor texts, and contact details.

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What it does

Keywords → Google SERP → Crawl ranking pages → Find broken outbound links → Extract contacts → Scored opportunities

1. Searches Google for your keywords using dedicated SERP proxies
2. Crawls each ranking page with an anti-detection browser (Camoufox)
3. Extracts all external dofollow links and checks their HTTP status
4. Flags dead links (404, 410) as replacement opportunities
5. Pulls contact info (emails, socials, contact pages) from each site
6. Scores every opportunity (0–100) based on broken link count and contact availability
7. Outputs only pages where broken links were found — zero noise

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Why this actor

• Anti-detection: Uses Camoufox (hardened Firefox) — not regular Playwright browsers. Passes bot detection on sites that block typical scrapers.
• Pipeline architecture: SERP scraping and URL crawling run in parallel. Results start flowing as soon as the first keyword is scraped — no waiting.
• Smart proxy escalation: Starts without proxy, auto-escalates to datacenter → residential only when a site blocks. Saves proxy costs.
• Social/UGC filtering: Automatically skips Facebook, YouTube, Reddit, LinkedIn, X/Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, Wikipedia, and 10+ other sites that never accept guest posts.
• Outreach-ready output: Every result includes emails, social profiles, and contact page URLs extracted from the site footer.
• Three output formats: Detailed (full data), Summary (condensed), CSV-friendly (flat, ready for spreadsheets).

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Input example

{
    "keywords": ["best seo tools 2025", "link building strategies guide"],
    "googleDomain": "google.com",
    "resultsPerKeyword": 10,
    "searchLanguage": "en",
    "searchCountry": "us",
    "maxConcurrency": 5,
    "outputFormat": "detailed"
}

Only keywords is required. Everything else has sensible defaults.

Input reference

Field	Type	Default	Description
keywords	string[]	required	Search keywords to find opportunities for
googleDomain	string	google.com	Google domain (supports .co.uk, .de, .fr, .es, .it, .com.br, .ca, .com.au, .co.in, .co.jp)
resultsPerKeyword	integer	10	Google results to collect per keyword (1–100)
searchLanguage	string	en	Google search language code
searchCountry	string	us	Google search country code
maxConcurrency	integer	5	Parallel browser instances for crawling (1–20)
requestTimeout	integer	30	Page load timeout in seconds
maxPagesPerDomain	integer	50	Max pages to crawl per domain
skipDomains	string[]	[]	Additional domains to skip (social sites are auto-blocked)
checkExternalLinks	boolean	true	Check external links for broken status
linkCheckTimeout	integer	10	Timeout per link check in seconds
maxExternalLinksPerPage	integer	100	Max external links to check per page
targetStatusCodes	integer[]	[404, 410]	HTTP codes that count as "broken"
extractContactInfo	boolean	true	Extract emails and social links
extractEmails	boolean	true	Extract email addresses
extractSocialLinks	boolean	true	Extract social media profiles
forceProxy	boolean	false	Skip no-proxy attempt, start with datacenter proxy
outputFormat	string	detailed	Output format: detailed, summary, or csv-friendly

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Output example (detailed format)

{
    "keyword": "best seo tools 2025",
    "serpRank": 4,
    "opportunityScore": 70,
    "scrapedAt": "2026-02-24T14:02:07.153Z",
    "sourcePage": {
        "url": "https://backlinko.com/link-building-strategies",
        "title": "Link Building Strategies: The Complete List",
        "domain": "backlinko.com",
        "snippet": "Here are the best link building strategies for 2025..."
    },
    "brokenLinks": [
        {
            "#": 1,
            "brokenUrl": "https://example.com/dead-page",
            "anchorText": "keyword research tool",
            "statusCode": 404,
            "rel": "dofollow"
        }
    ],
    "brokenLinkCount": 5,
    "totalDofollowLinksOnPage": 56,
    "contact": {
        "emails": ["outreach@backlinko.com"],
        "socialLinks": [
            { "platform": "twitter", "url": "https://twitter.com/backlinko" }
        ],
        "contactPageUrl": "https://backlinko.com/contact"
    }
}

Output formats

Detailed

Full data with nested objects. Best for programmatic use and integrations.

Summary

Condensed view with top-level fields. First email and contact page only.

CSV-friendly

Flat structure with pipe-separated values. Export directly to CSV/Google Sheets for outreach campaigns.

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Opportunity scoring

Each result gets a score from 0 to 100:

Condition	Points
Has broken links	+30
More than 3 broken links	+20
More than 10 broken links	+10
Has any contact info	+20
Has email address	+10
Has contact page URL	+10

Higher score = easier outreach + more replacement opportunities.

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Auto-blocked domains

These sites are automatically skipped (no outreach value):

Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, X/Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, Quora, Medium, Tumblr, Threads, Snapchat, Discord, WhatsApp, Telegram, Wikipedia

Add more via the skipDomains input field.

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How proxy works

Phase	Proxy	Why
Google SERP scraping	Dedicated SERP proxy	Required for Google — handles CAPTCHAs and rate limits
Website crawling (start)	No proxy	Most sites don't block — saves cost
Website crawling (blocked)	Datacenter proxy	Auto-escalates on 403/429/503
Website crawling (still blocked)	Residential proxy	Final escalation for heavily protected sites

The actor tracks proxy level per domain. If example.com blocks you, it escalates only for that domain — other sites keep running without proxy.

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Use cases

• Link building outreach: Find pages linking to dead resources in your niche, then pitch your content as a replacement
• Competitor backlink analysis: Search for competitor brand keywords, find which sites link to dead competitor pages
• Content gap discovery: Broken links reveal topics where content has disappeared — create fresh content to fill the gap
• SEO agency workflows: Run weekly for client keywords, export CSV, feed into your outreach CRM
• Niche research: Discover which sites in a niche have the most broken outbound links (low maintenance = high outreach success)

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Pricing

Pay-per-event — you only pay for what you use. No monthly subscription.

Event	Price	When it's charged
keyword-search	$0.07	Each keyword scraped from Google SERP
opportunity-found	$0.15	Each page with broken links added to your results

The actor start event is handled automatically by Apify at ~$0.00005 per start.

Cost examples

Scenario	Keywords	Opportunities found	Total cost
Quick check	5	~8	~$1.55
Standard run	20	~30	~$5.90
Deep research	50	~75	~$14.75
Agency weekly	100	~150	~$29.50

You set a spending limit per run — the actor stops gracefully when it's reached. No surprise charges.

Comparable SaaS tools (Ahrefs, SEMrush broken link reports) cost $99–$249/month. Standalone broken link checkers don't scrape SERP or extract contacts.

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Tips for best results

• Start with 5–10 keywords per run to gauge results, then scale up
• Use long-tail keywords like "best [topic] resources list" — resource pages have more outbound links
• Set resultsPerKeyword to 20–50 for deeper coverage
• Use csv-friendly output format for direct import into Google Sheets or outreach tools
• Run weekly on the same keywords — new broken links appear constantly as sites go offline