In the ever-evolving SEO landscape, one thing that hasn’t changed is the value high-quality backlinks add to your website’s authority. Experts rank link building as one of the most important factors impacting your search engine rankings.
However, not all business or website owners have the team or link building expertise to build high-quality links, which is why 65% of businesses outsource link building campaigns to a reputable agency.
Outsourcing link building services allows you to work with link builders specializing in building links at scale, helping you gain an edge over competitors.
In this guide, we’ll walk you through the key steps to outsource your SEO link building process to a trusted marketing agency.
What is Outsourced Link Building?
Outsourced link building refers to hiring an external link building agency or freelancer to build links for your website, rather than doing it with an in-house team.
The main distinction between outsourced and in-house link building services is:
- Outsourced link building services: You pay an external link building company or agency to build links from other websites to boost your domain authority. These link builders or SEO agencies easily scale up link acquisition through their established relationships in the industry to help you get more links and achieve a greater SEO impact.
- In-house link builder services: You leverage your existing in-house team or hire new link builders to build high-quality backlinks to your content. Running your own link building campaigns from scratch shifts your focus from other core business activities.
When is the Right Time to Outsource Link Building?
Outsourcing link building services to an agency is a strategic decision, so the right timing is crucial for maximizing its benefits. Here are key indicators that signal when you should outsource link building:
1. You have implemented all essential search engine optimization strategies for your site
Ensure that your website is 100% prepared for link building.
- Understand the difference between on page vs off page SEO and first optimize your website for on-page SEO factors like meta tags, a mobile-friendly design, and fast loading speed.
- Ensure all web pages are indexed properly and you have a successful SEO strategy in place.
- Run a blog and publish high-quality, link-worthy content regularly. Remove or update any thin content on your website.
- Identify and fix any broken links on your website. Ensure all relevant pages are connected with internal links.
Once your website is technically sound, it’s time to generate links that can boost the health of your link profile and improve your domain authority.
2. You lack a big in-house team that can focus on link building
Building and managing an in-house team to take care of all link building activities demands significant time and resources. Outsourcing the service to a reliable link building partner frees up these resources, allowing you to focus on your core business activities.
3. You want to scale your link building efforts
A lack of resources can make acquiring more quality backlinks harder. However, having a link building agency focus on just building the right backlinks for your website can be a quick way to scale. It can help you get more links, better referral traffic, and a higher visibility on search engine results pages.
4. You’ve got a budget to invest in outsourcing link building packages
Reinvesting part of your revenue into SEO, specifically link building outsourcing, will lead to higher organic search visibility, more traffic, and ultimately, higher revenue.
How to Outsource Your SEO Link Building Efforts
Let’s see the step-by-step process of outsourcing link building for your business.
Step 1: Understand what link quality is and why it matters
Links can be high-quality or low-quality depending on the relevance and authority of the website they come from and the contextual relevance of anchor texts. Any spammy links built using unethical link schemes or link farms and PBNs aren’t good for your SEO strategy. Whereas, high-quality do-follow links from relevant sites pass valuable link juice to your site, increasing its search visibility.
The main risks of using low-quality link building techniques are:
- Negative SEO ranking impacts
- Manual or algorithmic penalties from search engines
- Loss of trust and credibility
- Decline in organic traffic and visibility
It’s critical to avoid tactics like buying links or building bulk links to avoid these consequences. However, both types of links might look the same to you if you are new to SEO. So how will you differentiate it?
Let’s understand with the help of an example.
If you see a positive correlation between links acquired from a particular website and your keyword rankings and traffic, those are likely high-quality links.
One of our new clients (a SaaS company) witnessed a 40% drop in organic traffic after engaging with a low-cost link building partner online. We helped them regain their traffic and increase their page and domain authority by 150% within six months.
Step 2: Set a budget for your link building services package
How much does it cost to build links in-house?
The average salary of a link builder in the U.S. costs about $66,331/year, according to Glassdoor.
You also need to hire content writers ($60K+ yearly) and invest in link building tools and tech ($3K+ yearly). If you establish an in-house link-building team and they generate about 10-15 backlinks each month, it would cost you about $400-$750 for every link.
You can outsource link building services to build higher-quality links at scale at about 40% less cost. Many link building agencies offer custom packages with link placement on high DR sites. You can also check out the success stories of their past clients.
Here are some tips to decide on the budget:
- Your budget should be based on the scale of your operations, the competitiveness of your industry, and the quality of links you need.
- Research the average cost per high-quality link in your industry. A balanced budget would consider a mix of medium to high-quality links.
- The average monthly allocation for outsourcing link building is around $10,000, with affordable packages starting at $5,000 per month. It could be a good starting point, depending on your specific industry dynamics and competition levels.
Step 3: Choose the right link building agency or freelancer
When outsourcing link building, you have two main options – hiring individual freelancers or partnering with a link building agency. Both routes have their own pros and cons.
The pros and cons of working with freelancers
- Cost-effective: Freelancers typically charge less per hour or project compared to link building agencies.
- Flexibility: It’s easy to switch between different freelancers as you are not locked into any long-term contracts.
- Specialized skills: Freelancers often specialize in specific skills like link building outreach, content creation, and link placements. You can cherry-pick skills as needed.
- Lack of accountability: Low-cost freelancers may lack accountability, occasionally miss deadlines, or deliver low-quality links. You may need to closely monitor their link building strategy and acquired backlinks.
- Limited scalability: It takes time to find, vet, and manage multiple freelancers, making it hard to scale your link building efforts beyond a point.
- Risk of spammy tactics: Some freelancers may use black hat tactics without your knowledge, harming your website’s reputation.
The pros and cons of working with a link building agency
- Established processes: Agencies invest in link building tools, strategies, teams, and project management practices. More organized and efficient.
- Accountability: You have a single point of contact and agencies are more keen on maintaining their reputation, delivering quality do-follow links only.
- Scalability: Their dedicated teams allow easy scaling up of link building projects. You just need to communicate how many links you want they to build each month or quarter from sites of different DA/DR.
- Industry knowledge: The collective expertise of professionals working in an agency can help you leverage the latest trends, tools, and approaches in the link building process.
Source - Higher costs: Agencies charge more for their overhead and team but you’ll get better ROI in the long run than you would have when working with a freelance link builder.
- Less flexibility: You may be locked into fixed fee or monthly contracts with an SEO or marketing agency. Switching agencies can be challenging.
How to choose between a freelancer and an agency for outsourcing link building
- Consider your budget, scale needs, and growth plans. Agencies work for larger scales and budgets.
- Vet capabilities and experience thoroughly, especially in your specific industry.
- Start with smaller test projects first before committing to any long-term partnerships with the link building agency or freelancer.
- Weigh cost vs. expertise tradeoffs carefully based on your needs and constraints.
Step 4: Select the right agency with expertise in quality link building services
As a SaaS business, you should partner with an agency with a proven track record in SaaS link building. Ensure they understand your market and can align with your business goals.
- Thoroughly vet potential link building agencies. Review their client testimonials, case studies, and the results they’ve achieved for similar businesses. For example, over 150 businesses trust our link building strategies
- Schedule an initial consultation with 3-5 potential agencies. Discuss your specific business goals, target audience, competitive landscape, and link building campaign expectations.
- Decide on a payment model. Common methods include paying per link, monthly retainers on defined deliverables, or performance-based pricing tied to defined KPIs.
- Set clear expectations upfront regarding reporting and results tracking. Insist on regular, detailed reporting on links acquired, including the quality, relevance, source, and anchor text used.
Step 5: Define key performance indicators (KPIs) when you outsource link building service
When outsourcing link building, it’s important to define key metrics to track the effectiveness of the campaign. Here are the main KPIs to monitor:
- Number of backlinks acquired
- Website traffic growth
- Improvement in search rankings of URLs they’ve built backlinks for
- Higher Domain Rating (DR)
- A greater number of referral domains
- Increase in leads and conversions
Step 6: Monitor the process of outsourced link building service
Create a list of resources you want to build links for, including:
- Homepage
- Top landing pages
- Conversion-optimized blog posts
Ensure the agency is building links from websites you approve of. Ask them to get approvals on the links placed (and the anchor text used).
Ask the agency to deliver monthly/quarterly reports about the link-building metrics (discussed above) you care about most. This will help you track the ROI of your link building campaign.
Ready to Outsource Link Building to Experts?
Outsourcing link building can be a game-changer for SaaS companies and digital marketing agencies. With a strategic approach, appropriate budgeting, and the right outsourcing partner, your business can achieve significant growth in online visibility and customer acquisition.
We specialize in custom link building strategies for SaaS businesses. Connect with us to outsource link building to a reputable agency that guarantees results.
