Link building: how to earn backlinks that Google and AI trust.

You know links matter. So does your inbox: every week another email offers “high-DR backlinks” at a fixed price per link. Meanwhile, competitors whose work is no better than yours sit above you on Google, and when someone asks ChatGPT for a recommendation in your field, your name is missing.

The way out is to earn links instead of buying them. Become worth citing for the publications your clients already read, then let your own site pass that authority on to the pages that need to rank. This guide covers what link building is, which backlinks carry weight, what Google itself says about links, which strategies fit a brand with standards and a seven-step plan to start. It rests on Google Search Central documentation and on studies we read at the source, and where the evidence runs out, we say so. In our own SEO programmes, links come after the foundations, never before them.

What is link building?

Link building is everything you do to get other websites to link to yours. Such an inbound link is called a backlink. A good backlink does several jobs at once. Google discovers new pages through links, reads the link text to understand what a page is about and treats the link as a recommendation. And people click on it.

How Google uses backlinks

In its guide to ranking systems, Google writes that it has various systems that understand how pages link to each other, to work out what pages are about and which might be most helpful for a query. PageRank, one of the core systems Google used when it first launched, is still part of those core ranking systems, according to Google.

So a link is not a vote that counts the same everywhere. Google weighs where the link sits, who placed it, which words surround it and whether it looks natural. That is why the number of backlinks tells you little, and the number of referring domains tells you more. Ten links from ten different trade publications say something very different from ten links in the footer of one site.

How a link is built

Technically, a link is an <a> element with an href attribute that holds the destination address. The words between the tags are the anchor text. An optional rel attribute tells Google how you relate to the linked page, such as rel="sponsored" for a paid link. According to Google’s link best practices, it can generally only crawl a link that is an <a> element with an href. How to choose the words that carry a link is covered in our guide to anchor text.

Does link building still work in 2026?

Yes, though not the way it did ten years ago. In an analysis of 11.8 million search results, Backlinko found that the number one result on Google had an average of 3.8 times more backlinks than the results in positions 2 to 10. The number of referring domains also correlated with higher rankings, and roughly 95% of all pages in the dataset had no backlinks at all. It is a correlation study from 2020, not proof of cause, but it matches what Google says about PageRank.

What changed is how Google treats manipulation. It first fought link spam at scale with Penguin, announced in 2012 and folded into its core ranking systems in 2016. Since December 2022, its AI system SpamBrain can detect and neutralise links that exist only to influence rankings. The volume game is over. What remains are links a reader would actually follow.

Internal links, external links and backlinks

An internal link points from one page on your website to another page on the same site. An external link points to a different website. Seen from your site it is an outbound link, seen from the receiving site it is a backlink. Link building is mostly about that last kind. Internal links get their own section further down, because they are the part of link building you control completely.

Link building terms in plain English

What makes a good backlink?

A good backlink sits on a relevant website with real readers, inside the body text, with accurate anchor text, and it exists because an editor chose to place it. None of these signals works in isolation. The table shows what to check when you assess a source.

One question sums up the table: would you still want this link if Google did not exist? If the answer is yes, because it sends visitors who fit your business or because it raises your credibility with clients, you are on the right track. If the link exists only for an algorithm, it is rarely worth the risk.

For a premium brand, relevance beats authority. A link from the trade magazine your clients read fits you better than one from a large general news portal nobody in your market visits.

What are Google’s rules on links?

Google defines link spam as creating links to or from a site primarily to manipulate search rankings. That is written in Google’s spam policies. Sites that break those policies may rank lower or disappear from results altogether. Google detects violations with automated systems and, where needed, human review that can lead to a manual action.

What Google counts as link spam

The policy lists concrete examples. In short:

• buying or selling links for ranking purposes, whether for money, goods or services, or by sending someone a product in exchange for a post with a link;
• excessive link exchanges (“link to me and I’ll link to you”) and partner pages that exist only to cross-link;
• automated programs or services that create links to your site;
• requiring a link in terms of service or a contract without letting the other party qualify it;
• text ads or text links that pass ranking credit;
• links from low-quality directories and bookmark sites;
• links in widgets, footers or templates distributed across many sites;
• low-value content created mainly to manipulate links and ranking signals.

That last point covers a lot of the “guest posts” you can order at a fixed price. Plenty of guest articles are fine. An article that exists only to carry an exact-match anchor link fits the description precisely.

Paid links need sponsored or nofollow

Google accepts that buying and selling links is a normal part of advertising and sponsorship. It is not a violation, as long as the link carries rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow". Google introduced sponsored and ugc in September 2019 and has preferred sponsored for paid links ever since. That applies to an advertorial on a news site, a logo on the website of an event you sponsor and a blogger who received a product from you.

A qualified link does not count as an endorsement, but it can still bring visitors and awareness. That is a perfectly good reason to advertise. It will not buy you rankings.

SpamBrain and the end of the volume game

On 14 December 2022, Google started rolling out the December 2022 link spam update. It uses SpamBrain, Google’s AI-based spam prevention system, which can now detect both sites buying links and sites used to pass outgoing links. Any credit those unnatural links passed is lost. The update affected all languages.

That changes the maths. At best, you pay for links Google ignores. At worst, you receive a manual action, which shows up in Search Console.

Why link packages and PBNs are a risk

A PBN (private blog network) is a group of websites that exists mainly to pass links, often built on expired domains that still carry old backlinks. Since 2022, SpamBrain has been able to detect exactly these sites. Google also names repurposing an expired domain to manipulate rankings as a separate spam practice: expired domain abuse.

Link packages often run on the same sources. For a premium brand there are two more problems. Your name appears on sites your clients would never read, sometimes next to content you do not want to be associated with. And the links are not yours: when the subscription ends, they can disappear as quickly as they arrived. That is why we do not buy links to influence rankings, not even “safely” or “in small numbers”.

When to use the disavow tool (and when not)

The disavow tool in Search Console asks Google to ignore specific links. Google itself says that most sites will not need to use this tool, because in most cases Google can assess which links to trust without help. Use it only when both conditions apply:

• you have a considerable number of spammy, artificial or low-quality links pointing to your site;
• those links have caused a manual action, or likely will.

Try to get the links removed first. Google calls disavow an advanced feature that can harm your performance if used incorrectly, and a new list takes a few weeks to be processed. A high “toxic score” in an SEO tool is not, on its own, a reason to disavow. For known spam sites, Google says it typically ignores the links already.

Link building strategies for premium brands

Good link building starts with something worth linking to. For a premium brand that means a clear story, knowledge or data of your own, real relationships and a website that lives up to the story. If you cannot yet say exactly whom you serve and why they should choose you, start with your positioning and brand script. Journalists and partners link to brands they can explain in one sentence. We cover the brand side in more depth in SEO for luxury brands.

Digital PR built on your own data

Journalists look for news, numbers and interpretation. If you have data nobody else has, you have a story. Think of an annual analysis of your own orders, a survey among your clients or a trend you are first to see in your field. Publish the findings on your own site with the method and the charts, then send a short pitch to the few editors who genuinely cover your subject. One feature in the trade title your clients read takes you further than ten mentions on sites nobody in your market visits.

Assets worth citing

Some pages earn links because they are the best answer to a question: a clear guide, a calculator, a glossary, an honest comparison or original photography that others use with a credit. SEOs call these linkable assets. They only work when they are demonstrably better than what already exists. A rewrite of the current top three on Google earns no links.

Expert commentary for journalists

Editors often need an expert quickly. People who are reachable, have a well-founded opinion and can give it in two sentences get quoted. Keep a short expert page with your specialisms, a photo and contact details, follow journalist requests in your field and respond only when you genuinely add something. Not every quote comes with a link. Every mention does put your name in the right places, and that counts in AI answers.

Partner, supplier and stockist pages

The easiest good links are often waiting for you already. Suppliers with a stockist page, brands you carry, platforms you work with, training programmes, certifications and industry associations you belong to. Ask to be listed, with a link to the right page. Google draws one line here: partner pages that exist only to cross-link count as link spam. A real collaboration that tells visitors something useful does not.

Local and industry listings

For a business with a physical location, local signals count. A complete Google Business Profile is not a backlink, but Google names it as a way to become visible in AI responses and other search results. Beyond that, listings in industry directories people actually use, local media and the site of your business association all help. A list of a hundred free directories is exactly what Google means by low-quality directory links. If you sponsor a local event and get a link in return, it should carry rel="sponsored".

Link building across countries and languages

A brand that serves several markets needs links from each of them. A German page gains more from a German trade journal than from a Dutch one, because relevance includes language and audience. Treat every language version as a page with its own link targets, and use hreflang so Google shows the right version in each country. Hreflang points searchers to the right page; it earns no authority on its own. This site runs in English, Dutch and German, and each version targets its own local searches.

Unlinked brand mentions

Sometimes people write about you without linking. Mention alerts in Ahrefs or a Google Alert on your brand name will surface those articles. A friendly email with the right URL can be enough. Even without a link, the mention has value: further down you will see that brand mentions correlate strongly with visibility in AI answers.

Broken link building

Broken link building means finding links on relevant sites that no longer work and offering your page as the replacement. It helps the site owner, because a dead link is bad for their readers, and it helps you. Start with your own site. Pages that return a 404 error but still have backlinks should be restored or redirected with a 301 to the best live page. In Ahrefs you find them in Site Explorer under Best by links, filtered to status code 404.

Guest articles, only where the audience is real

A guest article in a trade publication or on a partner’s platform can work very well. You reach readers who are your clients and you show what you know. It becomes a problem when the article exists only for the link. Write only for sites you would read yourself, deliver something the editor would publish without a link and let the editor choose the link. A site with a price list for “guest posts with a dofollow link” sells links, not readers.

How do you start link building? A seven-step plan

Start with an audit of what you already have, compare yourself with the pages that outrank you, then work from the easiest wins to the hardest. Seven steps, in this order:

1. Check your current profile. The Links report in Google Search Console shows your top linking sites and linking text. Ahrefs Site Explorer adds the trend in referring domains. Do you recognise the sites, and do they describe you accurately?
2. Benchmark the pages that rank. For each important search, count the referring domains of the top results, not their individual backlinks. Ahrefs builds its Keyword Difficulty score from that same count.
3. Choose the pages that deserve links. Usually that is a handful of service pages that need to rank, plus one asset worth citing, such as original data, a calculator or a definitive guide.
4. Build a prospect list. Start with partners, suppliers and associations, then add trade media, unlinked mentions, broken links and sites that link to several competitors but not to you (Ahrefs Link Intersect shows those).
5. Pitch one person at a time. A short email that refers to the editor’s own work and explains what their readers gain beats a template sent to hundreds.
6. Pass the value on. Link from the pages that earn backlinks to the pages that need to rank, with descriptive anchor text.
7. Measure monthly and adjust. Track referring domains, the rankings of target pages, referral visits and enquiries, and drop tactics that bring links without visitors or movement.

Plan in months. The first links from partners can arrive within weeks; authority for a competitive search takes longer.

Internal links: the part you fully control

Internal links are link building without asking anyone’s permission. They help Google find your pages, show how topics relate and pass the value of your strongest pages to the ones that need to rank.

Google puts it plainly: every page you care about should have a link from at least one other page on your site. Use descriptive anchor text instead of “click here”, and place the link in a sentence that gives it context.

How to approach it:

1. Find the pages with the most backlinks. The Links report in Search Console shows your top linked pages. In Ahrefs it is the Best by links report.
2. Link from those pages to the service pages and articles you want to move up.
3. Build clusters: one comprehensive page on a topic, like this one, with articles that each go deeper into one sub-question, linked in both directions.
4. Check that no important page is orphaned. A page without internal links is harder for Google to find, and visitors will not find it at all.

On a new website, we set that structure in the sitemap before anything is designed. You can read more about that on our webdesign page.

Do backlinks help you appear in AI answers?

Yes, mostly indirectly: backlinks help you rank, and Google’s AI features build on those rankings. Mentions of your brand on other sites appear to play a role of their own on top of that.

In its guide to generative AI features in Search, Google writes that AI Overviews and AI Mode are rooted in its core Search ranking and quality systems. The AI retrieves relevant pages from the index and grounds its answer in them. If you are not found organically, you are less likely to be cited.

A study by Ahrefs of 75,000 brands looked at which factors correlate with brand mentions in Google’s AI Overviews, using Spearman correlation.

Brands in the top quarter for web mentions averaged 169 mentions in AI Overviews, against 14 for the quarter below. Around 26% of the brands studied did not appear in AI Overviews at all. Ahrefs itself stresses that correlation is not causation.

For link building, this shifts the goal from the link to the mention. An interview in a trade publication, a place in an honest comparison, a quote in a news story or a conversation on a podcast all help, even without a link. A link with your brand name as anchor text helps twice. ChatGPT and Perplexity also search the live web and show their sources, so the same mentions can surface there.

Google does add a warning: chasing inauthentic mentions is less useful than it seems, because the systems that block spam also protect its AI features. Genuine mentions are earned the same way genuine links are. For the rest of the work involved, read our guide to GEO services.

How to measure link building

Measure link building on three levels. Is the number of referring domains growing? Are the pages the links point to moving up? And do the links bring visitors and enquiries? The number of backlinks on its own tells you little.

Google Search Console (free)

The Links report shows your top linked pages, the sites that link to you most and your top linking text. Google adds two caveats: the report is a sample, not a complete list, and it does not show whether a link is nofollow. You can export your latest links, up to 100,000 rows. Above all, check whether you recognise the linking sites and whether they describe your business accurately. For visibility in AI features, Search Console has a separate Generative AI performance report, available to all sites since 31 August 2026.

Ahrefs

Ahrefs crawls the web with its own bot and calls its index of live backlinks the largest in the world. Site Explorer shows your own links and your competitors’. Link Intersect finds sites that link to several competitors but not to you. Alerts notify you of new and lost links and new mentions, and Brand Radar tracks how often AI assistants mention your brand. What Ahrefs costs and when it pays off is covered in What is Ahrefs?. How to use it in a weekly routine is in How to use Ahrefs.

Other tools with link data include Semrush, Majestic and Moz. Their scores, such as DR, DA, Authority Score and Trust Flow, help you compare sources. None of them is a Google metric. Judge your link building on rankings, clicks and enquiries.

Link building services: what to look for

Buy link building as part of an SEO programme, not as a standalone package of links. A good partner starts with your positioning and content, shows you in advance which sites you would appear on and labels paid placements honestly.

Link building services make sense when you lack the time or network for PR and outreach, or when competitors have a large lead in authority. They do not make sense when your website has technical problems or when there are no pages yet that are worth linking to. Then the budget goes to the wrong place.

Questions to ask any link building agency

• Which sites do you want me to appear on, and why do they fit my clients?
• Do you pay for placements, and if so, do they get rel="sponsored"?
• Do you run your own network of sites?
• What happens to the links when we stop working together?
• Do you report on referring domains, rankings of the linked pages and enquiries, or only on the number of links?
• Who checks every text and every pitch before it goes out?

Common link building mistakes

• Steering on link counts or DR instead of relevance.
• Using the same exact-match anchor text over and over.
• Pointing every link at the homepage while the service pages need to rank.
• Placing paid links without a sponsored label.
• Starting link building before the website and content are ready.
• Forgetting internal links.
• Stopping after three months, when building authority takes many months.

What link building costs

There is no honest average price for link building, because the work varies so much. PR, content and outreach cost hours, not a price per link. Be wary of rates per link or per DR band: buying links for ranking purposes is exactly what Google calls link spam. We treat link building as part of our SEO approach. SEO at Viralistic starts at a few hundred euros per month for a focused programme and grows with scope.

How we help

At Viralistic, link building is part of our SEO programme, never a separate product. We start with what is worth linking to: your positioning, a fast and healthy website and content that shows your expertise. Then we work on links and mentions through PR, partners, trade media and your own internal structure. We measure with Google Search Console and Ahrefs, and a person checks every pitch and every text, also when AI helped.

For SilverDrive, a premium chauffeur service, you can see that order in the SEO growth programme: first “Keyword mapping and city pages”, then “Blog content and image SEO”, and only as the third phase “Backlinks and Google reviews”.

Sometimes link building is not the next step. If your pages are not properly indexed or your service pages do not answer the question clearly, we say so and start there. How those steps fit together is explained in our guide to ranking higher on Google. The principle stays the same throughout: a few earned links from sources your clients trust, passed on by a well-built site, outperform any package. Want to know where your link profile stands today? Plan a strategic call and we will look at it together.

Frequently asked questions

What is link building and why does it matter?

Link building is earning links from other websites to yours. It matters because Google uses links to find pages, understand them and judge which are most helpful, and PageRank is still part of its core ranking systems. Good links also send visitors directly, and brand mentions on other sites correlate with visibility in AI answers.

How much does link building cost?

Earned links have no unit price. They cost time: research, content and contact with editors and partners. Paid placements exist, but Google requires them to carry rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow", which means they do not count as endorsements. Anyone selling a price per link for better rankings is selling what Google calls link spam. Budget in hours, not links.

How many backlinks do I need?

There is no fixed number. Look at the pages that rank for your search and count their referring domains, not their individual backlinks; Ahrefs bases its Keyword Difficulty score on the same count. In a niche market a few good links can be enough. A competitive search needs more, and above all a page that is better than the rest.

What are the main types of link building?

There are four: earning links with content others cite, asking for links through outreach, adding links yourself through listings and profiles, and buying links. Earned links build the most authority. Asking works when your page adds value for their readers. Added links give a new site a basic presence. Bought links for rankings break Google’s spam policies.

Is buying backlinks illegal?

In most places buying a link is not a crime, but it breaks Google’s spam policies unless the link carries rel="sponsored" or rel="nofollow". Advertising law adds a second layer. In the EU, paid editorial content has to be recognisable as advertising, and in the US the FTC’s Endorsement Guides expect material connections, such as payment, to be disclosed.

Is link building still worth it with AI search?

Yes. Google says its AI Overviews and AI Mode are rooted in its core ranking systems, so the links that help you rank also help you get retrieved. Brand mentions seem to matter more: in an Ahrefs study of 75,000 brands, web mentions correlated far more strongly with AI Overview visibility than backlinks did. Good link building earns both.

Can I do link building myself?

Yes. Start with what you already have. Ask suppliers, partners and associations to list you, follow up on unlinked mentions of your brand and fix old pages with backlinks that now return errors. Offer expert commentary to journalists in your field. Outside help becomes useful when you need PR, data stories or outreach at a scale your team cannot carry.

How long does link building take to show results?

Plan in months, not weeks. Google first has to crawl the linking page, and authority builds across many links. On our SEO page we name three to six months of steady, well-structured content for competitive searches. A link from a trade publication can still send visitors straight away, so measure referral traffic as well as rankings.