How do I find and can I trust link building companies

[mark_baird]

I'm finding it hard to build quality links. I don't want to employ a link building company as I can't find anyone I can trust. I also don't know what is a realistic rate of pay for link building work.

[jesse-landry]

I wouldn't. I just flat-out wouldn't. I'd hire a marketing/SEO person to build content first.

[Francisco_Meza]

I think you should first have your customized link building strategy drawn out for you 1st. If the companies you seek cannot meet those standards, pass on them. Get them to give you all their work so you know they aren't messing around.

I had a person contact me last week and wanted me to help them with link build for $400/mo. I told him I can't pay anyone that little. At $400/mo, I would be forced to SPAM.

You can find several link building companies here in SEOMOZ.

One of the tools I use for linkbuilding is Buzzstream. Take a look at that company. It'll help streamline your outreach.

[GannettLocal_SEO]

One thing you could do is find a company that you think has a good campaign going, do an audit on the links to find out where those links are coming from and maybe figure out who is doing the links for them. But like Jesse said I would focus on building content first then you could find niche blogs/websites to post them on as a guest blog poster or something like that.

[acceleratormktg]

If it was me, I'd find a reputable marketing firm first, and then see if link building or offsite optimization is one of their marketing tactics of their overall marketing strategy. I wouldn't hire or use a company that solely build links. It might hurt you in the long run.

[FedeEinhorn]

Here's the link that Fracisco refers to (I guess): http://www.seomoz.org/article/recommended

[mark_baird]

Thanks for the feedback. You have all backed up my gut feeling of don't trust "link builders".

is it worth hiring a member of staff to do inhouse link planning and building?

[KarlBantleman]

Unless the member of staff has a good understanding of up to date SEO techniques I'd be careful. I wouldn't look at it as building links, look at it as finding relevant websites that will help you drive traffic to your website. Industry specific websites that will help you drive the traffic you are looking for.

Some link building companies focus too much on the number of links being built rather than the quality and relevance of the links. I'd find a list of competitors and do a link audit on them and see if your links can go on the same sites.

[firstconversion]

You need to define what a quality link is.

Just because you don't know enough to judge what is a high or low quality linkbuilder should not lead you to distrust linkbuilders, but to rightly distrust your own lack of knowledge in this area. Your first step should be to educate yourself on linkbuilding

What I would consider quality linkbuilding comes in at  £500 a link

[mark_baird]

The industry i work in is a bit old fashioned and i find it hard to get links from quality well ranked and relevant sites as there is not many around. For a Small business with a growing site £500 per link is just insane!

I understand the value of quality links but finding a relevant site above PR3 (I realize PR is not the be all and end all these days) is very uncommon in our industry. Our competitors have massively more links than us but in my opinion there links are a tad spammy. If my link profile looked like my biggest competitors i would be disavowing them asap.

I feel a quality link is,

• From a site that relevant to the topic of your site/page.
• From a high ranking site.
• In a prominent position as near the top of the page as possible.
• Surrounded by quality content about the page you are linking to.
• Preferably as close to the index page as possible, not 8 clicks down.
• The anchor text should vary from your other existing links.
• The page should not have a high number of external links on it.
• the page title should be relevant to your page and not be a links, forum or directory page.
• Preferably not on the same C block as other links to your site.
• The link should be likely to drive direct traffic as well as produce an SEO gain.

I'm sure i missed some things as I'm a site owner not an SEO specialist.

I was not judging "Good link builders" more the companies who claim to get you to the top of google in a month guys. Unfortunately I'm yet to find a good link builder. I keep finding the conmen and black hat guys. I think the good guys must cost too much for most small to medium businesses. As a retailer with an ecommerce site the current google methods seem to be geared to kick small businesses to the kerb. Ebay and amazon and now google shopping are wiping out businesses that are already hurting due to the economy.

I agree with goggles lust for quality sites i just feel it is sending big multinational sites so far ahead that it is almost impossible to get any momentum if you are a smaller business.

The thing i don't understand is why google seems to want so much content on ecommerce sites. Surely if real world shops are anything to go by shop layout, cleanliness, good displays, stock volume, price and service are what matter not how many leaflets and books you have on the products. in googles eyes you don't need to have the product and you can be double the price so long as you have a lot of info on the product none of that matters  it just seems odd to me as a retailer that they don't differentiate sites by type so each can be optimized for the particular purpose.

That being said its just the way of the world.

Rant over!