What am I missing?

[Engange]

One website in my niche got from being on the second page to 3rd place in like a month.
I couldn't find any backlinks on Majestic or Ahref, so I assume they either block all crawlers, or have a secret tactic not involving backlinks.
Is there any other crawler I can use not as popular as Majestic and Ahref to check out their workl?

 

[PremiumAds]

Maybe they're just creating quality content?

 

[Engange]

Maybe they're just creating quality content?

On their website?
They aren't

 

[shopzind]

Difficult to get competition backlinks when they block crawlers. But you could search on google for their bare url.

 

[Engange]

Difficult to get competition backlinks when they block crawlers. But you could search on google for their bare url.

What do you mean?
How do I do that?

Also, if a website blocks all of the crawlers, wouldn't Google suspect it?

 

[bartosimpsonio]

Also, if a website blocks all of the crawlers, wouldn't Google suspect it?

Google wouldn't be able to know.

Also blocking spammy crawlers that consume bandwidth with zero return is actually OK.

 

[nickcookies]

Try those "free backlink checker" in search results, for example: openlinkprofiler.org, these are less-known crawlers.