6 Easy Tips To Outsource Link Building Without Getting Scammed

Jul 11, 2025

Link building is time-consuming and frustrating if you’re not an expert. That's why 60% of businesses choose to outsource link building. As specialists already have trusted connections and automated systems in place, it keeps the link-building cost lower and makes the process much faster. 

However, there can be a wild difference in investment cost between different agencies. Therefore, consider an expert agency that offers results while maintaining expertise. This blog covers 5 tips on how to outsource link building the right way without falling for scams, and how to avoid the costly mistakes most people make.

Decide If Outsource Link Building Is Right for You

Before choosing to outsource link building, figure out if it's the right move for your business. This isn't a one-size-fits-all decision; it depends on your current setup, resources, and what you're trying to achieve.

Outsource vs build in-house

Outsource VS Build in-house 

Building an in-house link-building team is ideal if you need complete control over your SEO strategy and have the budget to support long-term investment. 

Whereas, outsourcing is more cost-effective, especially for small and medium-sized businesses. 

Hiring a full-time, in-house link builder can cost $80,000-$100,000 annually in base salary. When you add benefits, recruitment costs, and overhead, a single link can cost upwards of $800.

You eliminate employee salaries, benefits, and training costs. Plus, you avoid spending $6,000+ annually on necessary link-building tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, and Pitchbox.

Building an in-house team from scratch takes time, often 3-6 months, to find the right talent.

Meanwhile, established agencies can begin securing links immediately, sometimes in less than 24 hours.

Signs your team lacks the resources

You should consider outsourcing link-building tasks if you spot these indicators:

  • Your team lacks link-building expertise or technical SEO knowledge 

  • Your current focus is shifted toward other business priorities

  • You need to scale quickly without adding permanent staff 

  • Your competitors have significantly higher domain authority 

  • You have promising content ranking on pages 2-3 that needs an extra push

Benefits of outsourcing link-building services

  1. Outsource link building gives you access to professionals who are experts in acquiring high-quality backlinks. 

  2. These specialists stay updated with algorithm changes and SEO. Plus, agencies have connections across various industries, which reduces the time to secure valuable links.

  3. Outsourced SEO services allow you to adjust your link-building intensity according to your needs without disrupting other tasks. For example, you can quickly boost efforts without hiring more employees during major campaigns or product launches.

  4. Beyond cost savings, outsourcing allows your staff to concentrate on important business ideas. Juggling multiple responsibilities like managing employees and developing products isn't easy. 

6 Steps to Outsource Link Building

Improving your website’s credibility, authority, and rankings takes time and skills; it doesn't happen overnight. Therefore, it's important to recognize the difference between effective strategies and shady tactics that could either boost your rankings or leave you scammed. 

Steps you should consider while outsourcing link building:  

1. Improve your site before building links 

Investing in link building without optimizing your website is like filling up a leaky bucket. Your website should benefit from those hard-earned backlinks before investing a single penny in link-building services. Verifying if Google has indexed your content is the first step. If your pages aren't indexed, they don't exist from a search perspective.

Here's a quick way to check:

Type "site:yourdomain.com" into Google's search bar to see how many pages are currently indexed. 

If the number seems way lower than it should be, you've got indexation issues that need fixing before you spend money.

Take a close look at your most important content pieces:

  • If they're already on page 2-3 of search results, they might just need a strategic backlink boost to reach page 1

  • If they're not ranking at all despite being high-quality, you likely have technical barriers blocking their success

  • Focus on keyword competition and search volume. As keywords become more competitive, you'll need to refresh content and build more quality backlinks to maintain or improve rankings.

Check your internal linking and site structure.

Your website's internal structure is the roadmap that both users and search engines follow. Without a proper structure, Google gets confused about which pages matter most. Your site should follow a pyramid structure:

  • Top tier: Homepage and main pillar pages

  • Middle tier: Subcategories or cluster pages

  • Bottom tier: Specific content pages

Fix technical SEO issues before outsourcing

Technical SEO problems can completely ruin even the most impressive backlink profile. Here are the major issues you need to fix first:

  • Page speed: Since the 2021 Core Web Vitals update, page experience has become a ranking factor. Use Google PageSpeed Insights to identify specific speed problems on both desktop and mobile.

  • Duplicate content confuses search engines and prevents the right content from being served to your audience. Use proper canonical tags, especially if you have an e-commerce site with similar product pages.

  • Broken links interrupt the user journey and signal poor content quality. Run regular site audits to find and fix broken links before paying for link-building services.

  • URL structure inconsistencies can dilute link equity. Make sure different versions of your URLs (HTTP vs. HTTPS, www vs. non-www) properly redirect to a standard URL through 301 redirects.

2. Understand the Link Building Process

Before you invest in outsourcing link building, understand what makes a backlink valuable. Knowing the basics is necessary to evaluate potential providers and set expectations for your campaigns.

What makes a good backlink?

  • Authority: Links from websites with high domain authority pass more "link juice" to your site. 

  • Relevance:  When websites in your industry or niche link to you, it signals to search engines that experts in your field value your content. 

  • Link placement: Links placed naturally within content are better than those stuffed in footers or sidebars. 

White hat vs black hat tactics

Outsource Link-building strategies fall into two main categories:

White Hat VS Black Hat 

White-hat techniques follow search engine guidelines and focus on building value.

Black hat tactics try to game the system through shortcuts

Creates high-quality, link-worthy content that people would share and find relevant.

Tends to buy backlinks (a clear violation of Google's guidelines).

Builds genuine relationships with other website owners in your industry.

Uses link farms or private blog networks (PBNs).

Gets your site listed in relevant, quality directories

Stuff keywords unnaturally into anchor text.


3. Plan Your Budget for Outsourced Link Investment Wisely

Planning your budget and understanding the costs will help you avoid both overspending and falling for suspiciously cheap services that could damage your site's reputation. Research shows that websites with fewer high-quality backlinks often outrank those with tons of low-quality links. 

Link Cost by Industry and Type

Industry/ Link Type

Average Cost per Link 

High-Competition Niches (Finance, Health, iGaming)

$400 – $1,200

Lower-Competition Niches (Automotive, Pets, etc.)

$100 – $300

Guest Post

$220 – $609

Link Insertion (Niche Edits)

$141

HARO Link

$300 – $600

Digital PR Campaigns

$1,250 – $1,500

Editorial Link (Top-Tier Sites)

$900 – $1,500+

4. Choose a Trustworthy Agency 

Don't rush to find a reliable link-building provider. It's important to thoroughly assess potential partners to protect your website from harmful practices. At Anchorial, we are dedicated to earning high-quality backlinks by working seamlessly as a team, focusing on safe, strategic, and white-hat techniques. 

Things you must consider while choosing a reliable partner: 

  • Look for case studies and testimonials: Research about the provider's reputation online. 

    • A trustworthy link-building service will proudly showcase its expertise and testimonials. 

    • Check third-party platforms and directories for unfiltered feedback from past clients. Pay attention to how long clients have been working with them.

  • Ask about their outreach and content process: Professional providers explain their link-building techniques without hiding behind technical jargon.

    • Ask how they identify link opportunities and their quality standards for backlinks. 

    • They should also offer transparent reporting, including regular updates and detailed information about acquired links.

  1. Things to avoid while opting to outsource SEO link building

Look out for these warning signs when outsourcing link building:

  1. Shady promises: No one can guarantee specific search rankings due to the numerous factors affecting position.

  2. Suspiciously low prices: Quality link building requires skilled teams and sometimes placement fees; unusually cheap services often use harmful tactics.

  3. Vague explanations: Providers who can't clearly explain their methods or dodge questions are likely using questionable practices.

  4. Black-hat techniques. Avoid services using private blog networks (PBNs), link farms, or selling links directly.

  5. Poor content quality: Low-quality or stuffed content damages your brand credibility

  6. No transparency about link sources or processes.

  7. Automated link building: Automated tools often produce spammy results.

6. Track Results and Maintain Quality

Once you've hired a link-building provider, your work isn't done. You also need to track results and maintain quality to make sure you're getting what you paid for.

Set clear KPIs and reporting expectations.

Research shows that 53% of professionals use rankings as their major KPI to evaluate the impact of link building. Hence, set specific Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) that align with your goals:

  • Link-specific metrics: Total number of backlinks, unique referring domains, and domain authority/rating of linking sites.

  • SEO impact metrics: Keyword position improvements, organic traffic growth, search visibility.

  • Business metrics: Referral traffic, conversion rates from backlink traffic.

Tools to use to verify link quality

Instead of completely believing the provider’s word, check the quality of your backlinks yourself using these tools:

Ahrefs is the most popular tool for link-building campaigns, used by 80% of surveyed professionals. It gives you a complete backlink analysis and helps identify toxic links.

Moz Link Explorer shows you domain authority and spam scores to help spot potentially harmful links.

Google Analytics lets you see actual referral traffic from your backlinks. Just go to Acquisition > All Traffic > Referrals to see which links are sending real visitors to your site.

Google Search Console helps you identify potential link-related issues before they become problems.

Conclusion

Any service promising hundreds of backlinks overnight is likely to damage your site's reputation rather than enhance it. Therefore, before signing any contract with a link-building service, ask about their strategies. Prepare your website and check technical SEO issues, poor content quality, or messy internal linking, as it can ruin your backlink profile. 

Similarly, outsource link building requires consistent efforts and provides the best opportunity to secure and improve your search visibility. Whereas shady shortcuts that offer overnight results can penalize your website. 

FAQ

How do you outsource a link building?

Outsourcing link building involves hiring a trusted third-party agency to handle the process of acquiring backlinks on your behalf. But it's consuming, and you can't handle multiple tasks simultaneously. It involves optimizing your website, choosing the right agency that can drive results, asking about their expertise, avoiding low-quality sellers and monitoring your website’s metrics. 

How to build 100 backlinks in 30 days or less?

Building 100 backlinks in a month is possible with consistent efforts, patience and smart strategies. Work with a professional link-building agency, build connections, and create high-quality content and guest posts. 

Is link building still good for SEO?

Link building is one of the most important ranking factors in Google’s algorithm. It allows you to earn high-quality backlinks and pushes you to top-ranking pages. An effective strategy improves domain authority, drives referral traffic, and helps search engines trust your site.