Link building – how to earn quality backlinks

Link building is the process of earning links from other websites to yours. Backlinks are a trust signal for search engines, but quality matters far more than quantity. The safest approach is content people want to cite, PR articles and relationships with partners. Mass submissions to SEO directories and paid links now tend to do more harm than good.

In short:

• A backlink is a link from another website to yours. Google uses links as one of the signals of a page’s relevance.
• One link from a relevant site with real readers beats dozens of links from directories nobody visits.
• Paid links must carry rel=sponsored or rel=nofollow, otherwise they break Google’s spam policies.
• Measure results in Search Console, Ahrefs or Majestic: referring domains, their relevance and the trend over time.

What link building is and why backlinks matter

Link building covers every activity aimed at getting other websites to link to yours. A backlink is an ordinary link on another site that points to one of your pages. According to its documentation, Google uses links as a signal when determining the relevance of pages and to discover new pages to crawl.

Links send visitors who click them and help search engines understand that your content is useful for a topic. Link building is the core of off-page work; the difference is explained in our article on on-page vs off-page SEO.

Link types: dofollow, nofollow, sponsored and ugc

A link can carry a rel attribute that tells search engines what the relationship between the sites is. A link without one is called dofollow in SEO jargon; it is not an official value, just a standard link that can pass value. Google recognises three values:

Values can be combined (for example ugc nofollow), and Google generally does not follow links marked this way. The practical rule: if you pay for a link with money, goods or services, mark it sponsored or nofollow. It can still bring traffic and brand awareness, just not ranking credit.

SEO directories: why mass submissions no longer work

Ten or more years ago, SEO directory submissions were the most common form of link building: a business paid to be listed in hundreds of directories and hoped for better rankings. Today, Google’s spam policies explicitly list low-quality directory or bookmark site links, and automated link creation, as examples of link spam.

At best, mass submissions bring nothing. At worst, they create an artificial-looking link profile. Warning signs:

• the directory accepts any site without review and its categories get no visitors,
• an offer to submit your site to hundreds of directories at once,
• the listing requires a link back from your site to the directory.

When a directory is worth it

Directories are worth it when real people use them to find suppliers: the main business listing platforms in your market, industry associations, chambers of commerce and regional business portals. Judge them by the customers they bring, not the link. Business listings are also a key part of local SEO, where consistent contact details matter most.

How to recognise a quality backlink

A quality link meets most of these criteria:

1. 1Topical relevance. A link from a construction magazine to a builder’s site makes sense; one from a cosmetics blog does not.
2. 2Real traffic. A site people actually read carries more weight than one built only for links.
3. 3Placement in the text. A link in the body of an article, with context, is worth more than a footer link.
4. 4Natural anchor text. The link text should describe the target page. If every link uses the same exact keyword, it looks manipulative.
5. 5New referring domains. Ten links from ten relevant sites usually do more than ten links from one site.

Metrics such as Domain Rating (Ahrefs) or Trust Flow (Majestic) are handy for quick comparisons, but they are third-party estimates, not Google’s assessment.

Link building strategy: methods that work long term

A sustainable link has a reason to exist even without SEO. The methods below run from the most natural.

Content that earns links

The strongest links appear on their own when you publish something worth citing: original data, calculators, comparison tables, detailed guides or a glossary. Such content needs good execution and distribution; our guide to SEO copywriting explains how to write for readers and search engines at once.

PR articles and expert contributions

An expert article in an industry publication or an interview brings traffic and credibility. In a paid article, the link must be marked sponsored or nofollow, so judge it by the publication’s readership and audience fit.

Partners, suppliers and customers

Relevant links are often within reach: the manufacturer whose products you sell, suppliers, partners, associations you belong to or events you sponsor. Ask to be listed on their partner or reference page. Avoid systematic “link to me and I’ll link to you” schemes; Google treats excessive link exchanges as spam.

Broken link building

Broken link building means finding broken links (404 errors) on relevant websites and offering the owner your content on the same topic as a replacement. They fix an error, you gain a relevant link. The Broken backlinks report in Ahrefs helps find them, including on competitors’ sites.

Internal linking

Internal linking connects pages within your own site. It costs nothing and is fully under your control. Google recommends that every important page has a link from at least one other page and that link text describes the target. In our process, internal links follow from keyword research: each keyword is assigned to one landing page and links on that topic point to it, so pages don’t compete for the same query.

What to avoid

• Buying links that pass ranking credit. Money, goods or services for an unmarked link breach Google’s spam policies.
• PBNs (private blog networks). Sites built only to link to a main site. Once detected, the links lose value and the site risks a manual action for unnatural links.
• Automated submissions and comments. Tools that drop links into forums, comments or profiles are explicitly listed as spam.
• Keyword-rich anchors at scale. Large guest post campaigns with keyword-rich anchor links are named as link spam.

How to measure link building results

Measure what links bring, not how many you have:

• referring domains and their trend over time,
• relevance and quality of new links,
• referral traffic in your analytics,
• rankings and organic traffic of the target pages.

The Links report in Google Search Console gives a free overview of top linked pages, linking sites and anchor text, but only as a sample. Ahrefs and Majestic add fuller data and history; see our overview of SEO tools.

How much does link building cost

The cost of link building depends on the work behind the links, not their number: content creation, outreach and the price of paid PR articles, which each publication sets itself. Budget for it as an investment in content and relationships. Fixed-price offers for hundreds of links usually mean directories or site networks that can hurt you.

When to bring in a specialist

You can handle the basics yourself: business listings, partner links and useful content. A specialist pays off in a competitive industry, when you inherit a site with a suspicious link profile, or when link building must work together with content and technical optimisation. We have been in the market for 8+ years and delivered 50+ projects. As part of our SEO services, we analyse your link profile and competitors and propose methods that fit your budget. To discuss your situation, book a free consultation.