Choosing a link building services agency on published evidence

Agencies with a verified published price

How to shortlist a link building services agency

1. Make them describe the acquisition method in writing. Ask exactly how a link is obtained: original research and outreach, expert commentary, digital public relations, resource page placement, or payment to a publisher. Get the answer in writing before you discuss price, because it is the only fact that determines whether you are buying an asset or a liability.
2. Ask for a sample of links delivered in the last quarter. Live URLs, not a spreadsheet of domain metrics. Open ten of them and read the page. Ask whether a real person would arrive at that article, whether the site publishes anything other than guest posts, and whether the surrounding content looks like a publication or a link inventory.
3. Filter on the disclosed minimum engagement. Ask every candidate for the smallest engagement they will accept and the minimum term, in writing. Link work priced per link and link work priced as a retainer are not comparable, and the minimum removes more names from a shortlist than any other single question you can ask.
4. Fix the reporting, the targets and the replacement policy. Agree which pages are being built to, how a delivered link is reported, what happens if a link is removed or the page is deleted within a few months, and who signs off on the sites before outreach. Settle all of it before the first invoice rather than after the first disappointing report.

What separates digital PR from a link inventory

The honest version of this work looks like public relations. An agency creates something worth citing, a piece of original data, a survey of your customers, an expert who will comment on a live story, and then pitches journalists and editors who might use it. Placements are unpredictable in timing and site, the good ones are genuinely hard to get, and the pricing reflects a team of people doing outreach for weeks. The reporting is honest about misses as well as hits.

The other version buys placements on websites that accept payment for articles. It is reliable, quick, cheap per unit and precisely what Google's spam policies describe as a link scheme when the links pass ranking signals. Agencies rarely say so outright, which is why the method question has to be asked directly and answered in writing. A provider who guarantees a fixed number of links per month at a fixed price on named metrics is almost always describing the second version, whatever the proposal calls it.

You can also do neither and still improve your link profile, by publishing the kind of reference material people cite without being asked. That is slower, and it is the only approach with no downside risk at all.

What our index records, and what it cannot

For every agency listed we record what the firm itself publishes: starting prices or price ranges where stated, the minimum engagement where disclosed, named clients where the agency names them, service lines and location. Each entry carries the date it was checked. We do not accept payment for placement or ranking, and where a firm publishes nothing about price we record that absence rather than estimating a figure, because an estimate would be indistinguishable from an invention.

What no directory can verify is the method behind a delivered link, which is why the process above puts the method question first and the price question third. Use the index to build a comparable shortlist quickly, then do the sample check yourself. Ten minutes of reading ten delivered pages tells you more than any metric in any tool.

Questions people actually ask

How much should link building cost?

Rather than anchor on a single figure, collect three numbers from every candidate: the minimum engagement, the minimum term, and the expected volume of placements per month. Retainers and per link pricing are not directly comparable, and a low unit price almost always indicates payment to publishers rather than outreach.

Are paid links actually risky?

Google's spam policies name link schemes, including buying or selling links that pass ranking signals, as a violation. In practice the risk shows up as wasted spend when links are devalued, and occasionally as a manual action. If a provider will not describe the method in writing, treat that as an answer.

Should we buy links or digital PR?

If the point is durable authority, digital public relations and genuinely citable assets are the defensible route. They cost more per placement and deliver unpredictably. Judge them over two quarters on referring domains earned, coverage quality and the referral traffic that arrives, not on a monthly link count.

How do we know a link was worth it?

Record the target pages before the engagement starts, then track referring domains to those pages, impressions and rankings for the queries they target, and any referral visits. Agree the measurement in advance so the comparison is not reconstructed later from whichever chart looks best.

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