If you’ve been building your business for any length of time, you’ve probably come across the opportunity to buy backlinks. Since backlinks are an essential component of search engine optimization (SEO), it’s a tempting offer. A large number of companies that offer this service promise to give you hundreds or even thousands of backlinks to your website for a fixed, low price. The implication is that these links will help your website rank higher in the search engines, but that may not be the case.
Not all backlinks are equal; some are good and others are bad. Good links will help you gain visibility in the search engines and generate more traffic. Bad links are not only a waste of money, but they can also hurt your SEO efforts. To avoid potential problems, it’s important to get your backlinks the right way.
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What’s involved in buying links?
Buying links is fairly straightforward. For a basic price, a website owner will add a link to your website inside of their content. This might be on a random page or inside of a blog post.
What you need to be aware of is the fact that there are white hat (good) and black hat (bad) methods for getting backlinks. If you use black hat methods, you can expect poor results and possibly even penalties against your website from search engines. Black hat link building is more of a scheme than a strategy that will only drain your wallet. Your links will be useless and they’ll probably disappear quickly.
On the other hand, you’ll benefit by using white hat link building techniques, like acquiring quality links on relevant, high-authority websites.
Do you need to buy backlinks?
This is an important question, but it doesn’t come with an easy answer. Some people say you should never buy backlinks, while others say it’s sometimes necessary. The truth is somewhere in the middle.
Some small businesses and individuals can gain visibility in the search engines and rank higher for profitable keyword searches without ever spending money on backlinks. Although it’s not required, backlinks can still give them a big boost.
On the other hand, large businesses operating in high competition markets don’t always have a choice. Some industries are so competitive it makes paid backlinks a requirement. For example, national law firms, car manufacturers, insurance companies, and banking institutions are constantly engaging in link buying.
If you’re in the same industry as a major national player, you’ll have a hard time gaining traction without buying backlinks simply because that’s what your competition is doing continually.
The other factor to consider is that most websites won’t give you a link even using white hat methods unless you pay them a fee. These website owners know it’s profitable to charge for links and they’ve turned it into a business. Sometimes there’s no way around paying.
Buying backlinks should be done carefully
If you’re going to exchange money for backlinks, it’s crucial that you do it strategically, intentionally, and carefully. Paying for links outright is always a bad idea. When done right, you’ll pay for the production and publication of quality content that includes a backlink to your site. A solid backlink building strategy will ensure you acquire the right links and an intentional approach will keep you using only white hat methods.
The end result will be high-quality backlinks published on high-authority websites in your niche, which will generate relevant traffic and can increase your conversion rates.
Before we get into discussing good paid link building strategies, you need to know why some people avoid paid links altogether so you can avoid the pitfalls.
The main reason some business owners won’t buy backlinks is because search engines, like Google, don’t want anyone to exchange money for links. Doing so is considered an artificial link scheme and it’s against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
However, when you use white hat methods, which will be discussed in detail below, you’re not just paying someone for a link. There is an exchange of value that benefits visitors and the link is, of course, included.
Link building methods to avoid
The following methods to get backlinks are not advisable.
- Using freelance websites
Popular freelance websites can be a good resource for certain tasks, but they’re not ideal for link building. Professionals who know how to build quality links aren’t going to mess around selling cheap services on these sites. What you’ll get on freelance sites will be the type of bad backlink building services that give you bulk links for a low price and are likely going to be of no value.
Many link building services offered on freelance gig websites end up posting links as comment spam or in directories, which won’t help you at all.
Real link building can’t be done as a one-time thing for a fee. Successful backlink building requires a strategy and time to execute.
- Using private blog networks (PBNs)
A private blog network is a group of websites owned by the same person and they exist for the sole purpose of providing backlinks to other websites. Owning all the sites makes it easy to generate thousands of backlinks with minimal effort. Although it’s easy, this is a black hat strategy and Google strictly forbids the use of PBNs. If your links get placed inside of a PBN, you’re likely to experience being deranked instead of ranking higher.
- Services that guarantee results
Since backlink building takes time and gets results over the long-term, nobody can guarantee specific results, especially in a short time frame. If someone guarantees you a specific number of backlinks, they’re most likely using a PBN.
- Promises of instant results
If a company or individual promises immediate results, they’re likely using a PBN. Real backlink building takes time and can take a few weeks to see your links go live.
Good link building methods to use
Many individuals and businesses successfully increase their ranking in the search engines using white hat link building methods. Here’s what they’re doing and why it works:
- Manual outreach
Manually reaching out to website owners about getting a link placement isn’t fast, but it’s the most effective way to get targeted backlinks. When you contact individual website owners, you can choose which sites you want to ask, giving you full control over ensuring your backlinks are targeted within your industry.
This method will help you get backlinks for web pages that don’t otherwise have many links, which can be good for generating traffic in addition to ranking higher. Most of the time you’ll also be able to choose your specific anchor text, although some sites have rules about that.
The downside to this method is that sites that will link your content are also linking other people’s content, and if the owner of the site isn’t careful they might get classified as a link farm.
- Fully investigating a website before using it
Before getting links on a site, it’s important to analyze the site to make sure it’s a good fit. In addition to having a high Domain Authority (DA) score, look for sites with a professional design, original content, a niche focus, and clearly marked guest posts.
Sites to avoid are ones that publish low-quality content and give the appearance of being spam.
- Hiring a digital marketing agency
The most effective white hat backlink building method is hiring an agency to build your backlink profile for you. When you work with an agency, they’ll do all the hard work for you, leverage existing relationships with high-quality publishers, and you’ll get all the benefits of their expertise.
This is different from hiring a freelancer because a good agency won’t use sneaky black hat methods. To find a good agency, ask them what strategies they use and express your concerns. They should be able to address all of your concerns to put you at ease. You’ll also want to look through their case studies to see the results they’ve gotten for other clients.
- Publishing sponsored content
Getting backlinks is not just for ranking higher in the search engines. You can also generate relevant traffic from readers. Publishing sponsored posts is one of the best ways to get backlinks from websites you know people in your niche are reading. The posts will be marked “sponsored” and the links will be given the rel=”sponsored” attribute, which means it won’t pass PageRank to your site. However, targeted sponsored posts can help you generate the traffic you need for conversions.
How much do backlinks cost in 2024?
The amount of money you’ll pay for a single backlink will vary depending on the website’s authority along with how much the owner wants to charge. Generally speaking, a link on lower authority sites can cost $250, while a link on a high authority, well-known, established site can cost $500 or even a couple thousand dollars. This doesn’t necessarily include the fee for having the content written.
Who can you buy white hat backlinks from?
The most common source for backlinks is bloggers. In addition to the links themselves being valuable, it takes time and effort to load posts and format links, so it makes sense that they’d at least charge something for the service. However, most bloggers who earn a living selling backlinks follow Google’s guidelines and mark the posts as “sponsored.” This ensures readers know there has been a monetary exchange for the link so they aren’t misled regarding promotional content. It also prevents the link from passing PageRank to your website, which means it’s not going to help you rank higher.
Although bloggers willing to sell you links can be found all over the internet, you’re better off working with a professional link building agency.
Why build backlinks through a professional agency?
The main benefit of working with an agency is avoiding the disappointment that comes with using black hat link building methods whether or not you are aware.
If you don’t hire an agency, you risk:
- Wasting your money. Companies and individuals on sites like Fiverr often advertise a large number of backlinks for what seems like a reasonably low price. Usually, these links are worthless and aren’t even going to stick for long. Even if they don’t get your website penalized, they won’t be good enough to help you rank in the search engines. Often, bulk links are posted to discussion forums and directories, which get ignored by Google.
Another possibility is that Google already knows about the sites the links come from and has devalued all links from those sites, which means they’ll be a waste of money. - Getting penalized by Google. Many people get away with black hat link building, but that doesn’t mean you won’t get a manual action from Google. If someone reviews your website and thinks you’ve violated Google’s Webmaster Guidelines, you could end up with a penalty that will suppress your site in the search results or you might get blacklisted.
Need to build high-quality, authority backlinks? We can help!
If you’re looking for an experienced, professional digital marketing agency to help you generate a backlink profile that will get you ranking higher in the search engine results and generate relevant traffic in your niche, you’re in the right place. Contact us today to find out why big brands trust us to build their links and to learn more about our white hat link building services.
Tim has spent more than two decades in organic online marketing, working with some of the most well-recognized online brands in scaling their content marketing campaigns.
Connect with Tim on Linkedin & Twitter.
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