How to Build Backlinks in 2025: 7 Options, Ranked by Cost & Effort
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Backlinks play a critical role in improving your website’s reputation in Google’s eyes. They help boost individual articles in the search engine results pages (SERPs) and contribute to your site’s overall domain authority. This, in turn, impacts how quickly you can rank for new keywords. In simple terms: more backlinks = faster rankings.
Hold Up, Do I Even Need Backlinks?
Do you need to invest in backlinks? The answer depends on your domain rating (DR). Here’s a breakdown of how backlinks typically affect your site based on its DR:
Under 35: You can still achieve Top 3 rankings for very low-competition keywords, but it may take several months after each new article you publish before you see results. Keywords with higher difficulty ratings (even as low as 10) may be out of reach. You should definitely consider investing in backlinks.
35 to 70: Backlinks are less critical, as you can do well with high-quality content alone. But if you’re competing in a very tough niche, you may still need to invest in backlinks.
Above 70: Efforts to improve your DR further likely won’t yield much additional benefit. At this level, backlink-building to the home page isn’t essential, but individual pieces of content can still benefit from backlinks.
Every Business Benefits from Backlinks
Unfortunately, building backlinks is hard.
It’s one of the toughest aspects of SEO because Google strictly enforces rules against inorganic practices, like paying for links. If Google determines you’re engaging in link schemes, it could blacklist your site. The exception? Paying to be part of reputable organizations or directories that exist offline, like chambers of commerce, is generally acceptable.
7 Backlink Building Strategies
So, how can you build backlinks effectively in 2025? Here are seven strategies to consider, ranked by effort, cost, and effectiveness.
1. Earn Organic Backlinks via Skyscraper Content
The Skyscraper Content method for creating backlinks involves creating the best content on the internet for your niche and hoping others naturally link to it.
Effort: None beyond your existing content creation process.
Cost: $0 (assuming you’re already investing in high-quality content).
Effectiveness: Low.
While this strategy may yield 1–3 backlinks annually for a young B2B website, it’s not a reliable method for building significant backlinks.
2. Join Chambers of Commerce or Industry Associations
One simple way to get reliable backlinks from high domain authority sites is to join industry organizations or chambers of commerce that host online business directories. You usually have to pay an annual fee, but you’ll get your site listed on a trustworthy website.
Effort: Low.
Cost: Medium ($1,000/year if you join 3–4 organizations).
Effectiveness: Medium.
This tactic can help new websites establish credibility but won’t provide the hundreds of backlinks needed for a high DR.
3. Find Guest Blogging Opportunities
Guest blogging means writing blogs for other websites in order to gain a backlink, as well as exposure to that website’s audience. While once a popular strategy, many businesses are now hesitant to accept guest posts, even from trusted partners.
Effort: High (finding opportunities and writing the posts).
Cost: Low to medium (depending on whether you outsource content creation).
Effectiveness: Low.
This tactic has largely fallen out of favor in 2025.
4. Conduct Blog Outreach via Freelancers or Agencies
Similar to lining up guest blogging opportunities for yourself, another strategy is to hire professionals to find and negotiate opportunities for publishers to add your link to their existing content or to write short blog posts expressly for the purpose of linking to your content.
Effort: Low (if you outsource it to freelancers or agencies).
Cost: High (starting at $1,000/month for 2–3 new links).
Effectiveness: Medium.
This link-building tactic can help elevate a specific blog post from page 2 to the first page of search results. However, publishers sometimes remove links without warning.
5. Publish Link Bait
Despite the slightly spammy-sounding name, publishing link bait is actually one of the most effective ways to earn backlinks. Publishing link bait means creating original reports, surveys, or free tools using proprietary or third-party data, and publishing the results as a report, blog post, tool, or press release to attract citations from other websites.
Effort: High (requires significant time for data collection and content creation).
Cost: $0–$15K+ (depending on whether you already have internal data to use or if you have to conduct a new survey/study).
Effectiveness: High.
This tactic can generate backlinks from both industry peers and news organizations. For example, the project management software producer Wrike ran a survey using SurveyMonkey’s paid survey-takers about swearing in the workplace that was extremely successful.
6. Run Earned Media/Digital PR Campaigns
SEO doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and this link-building tactic is a great reminder of that. A very effective technique for earning backlinks is to partner with a PR agency to create and distribute newsworthy data-driven reports to thousands of reputable publishers. Digital PR agencies should have a network of at least 3,000 reputable publishers, including outlets like the Chicago Tribune and SFGate.
Effort: Medium (you’ll need to collaborate closely with the agency).
Cost: High ($10K+).
Effectiveness: High.
This is one of the most effective strategies, often yielding 200–1,000 backlinks from a single campaign. And it doesn’t matter if your company doesn’t have any data that would be considered newsworthy. Agencies often use publicly available data and combine it creatively to generate attention-grabbing lists or reports that have some kind of tangential connection to your industry niche, such as "Top Sports for ACL Tears" or "Most Popular Dating Apps."
7. Invest in Traditional PR
Again, SEO efforts can greatly benefit from other marketing tactics. Traditional PR efforts, like writing press releases about genuinely newsworthy events at your company and submitting them to local news outlets or industry publications, can be a good source of backlinks.
Effort: Medium (but it’s worth doing to boost brand awareness).
Cost: None (unless you hire a PR agency to write the release).
Effectiveness: Medium.
To be effective, your press release must genuinely interest reporters, which means you need to wait for a significant trigger to send one out—such as a major award win, funding announcement, or significant company milestone.
Match Your Backlink Building Strategy to Your Budget
Building backlinks is essential for improving your website’s visibility and authority, but not every strategy will work for every business. If your site is just starting out, focus on lower-cost, high-value tactics like joining directories and creating outstanding content. For larger budgets, consider link bait or earned media campaigns to accelerate your backlink growth.
The right backlink strategy depends on your goals, budget, and niche—but investing in backlinks is one of the best ways to boost your domain rating and SEO results. If you’re looking for a partner to help you improve your SEO, take a look at my SEO strategy services, or schedule a free consultation.
