Here’s a scene that plays out all the time. A business owner hires an agency for link building. The first monthly report arrives: 15 links built, a colorful chart, a few domain authority numbers. It looks great.

Three months later, rankings haven’t moved. Someone finally clicks through the links. Half are on sites that publish articles about casino bonuses, crypto and best vacuum cleaners in the same week.

Nobody lied, exactly. The agency delivered 15 links. The owner just never asked what kind.

If you’re figuring out how to choose a link building agency, the whole job comes down to asking better questions than the average buyer does. Below are the 12 I’d ask, what a good answer sounds like, and what should make you walk away.

Before the questions: know what you’re shopping for

Agencies sell link building three ways: per link, on a monthly retainer, or as a project. Prices vary a lot depending on which you pick and what kind of link you’re buying.

A few current benchmarks, from different sources, so treat them as rough guides:

  • BuzzStream’s 2026 pricing data puts digital PR links at 1,250–1,500 each, and link insertions at around $179 on average.
  • Managed retainers commonly run $3,000 to $15,000 a month, according to several pricing guides. One survey summary puts the average digital PR retainer at about $5,458 a month.
  • One pricing guide says anything under about $100 per dofollow contextual link usually signals a network or link farm.

Also worth knowing: in Credo’s survey of SEO agencies, 62.66% said they don’t offer link building at all. If your SEO agency “includes” it, ask who’s doing it.

The 12 questions

1. “Walk me through exactly how you earn links.”

Start here. Ask for the real process, not the pitch.

Good answer: Specific tactics such as digital PR, original research, broken link building, expert quotes, and relationship-based outreach, plus an honest explanation of what they won’t do.

Bad answer: “Proprietary methods.” One guide notes that answers describing earned media, content outreach and relationship-based acquisition are better than vague references to “link building.”

2. “Can I see five recent live placements in my industry?”

Not a screenshot. Live URLs you can open.

Click each one. Does the site look like a real publication with real readers? Is the page relevant? Does the link sit naturally in the text? A few minutes of looking tells you more than any case study PDF.

3. “Do you own any of the sites you place links on?”

This one makes agencies uncomfortable, which is why it matters. A guide on agency red flags lists refusal to disclose link sources, reliance on private blog networks, and self-owned placement networks as instant disqualifiers.

If they say “we have a network of publishers,” ask whether those are independent sites or ones they control.

4. “Are any placements paid, and how do you handle disclosure?”

Many agencies buy placements and don’t tell you. Google’s policy allows paid links only when qualified with rel=”sponsored” or rel=”nofollow”; buying links for ranking purposes is a named violation.

Good answer: A direct one. “Some placements involve sponsorship fees; here’s how we label them.” Or “We don’t buy links at all.”

Bad answer: “Everyone does it” or “Google can’t tell.” Authority Hacker’s survey found 74% of SEO professionals pay for links in some way, but that’s not the same as it being safe.

5. “What do you guarantee?”

The right answer is “not rankings.”

Search rankings can’t be guaranteed by an outside agency. One UK agency’s guidance says that if an agency guarantees anything, they shouldn’t be trusted. Two more guides list guaranteed rankings and extremely low prices as warning signs.

What a reasonable agency can promise: a number of placements, quality standards, timelines, and replacement of lost links. Not outcomes Google controls.

6. “What exactly does the price include?”

Ask for sample monthly deliverables and check whether reporting and calls are included. One buying guide warns that those can sometimes be extras that bring surcharges.

Also ask: is it per link, retainer or project? For retainers, what’s the target number of links? For digital PR, remember how unpredictable it is. A UK study cited by one research site found the average campaign earned links from 42 unique domains, but 5% of campaigns earned none at all.

7. “Who actually does the work?”

Is it their own team, or do they subcontract to a white-label vendor? Both can be fine. You just want to know. Ask who your day-to-day contact is, and who writes the pitches.

8. “How do you vet sites, and do I get to approve them?”

You want specific criteria. Real organic traffic to the specific page, topical relevance, a clean outbound-link profile, and content that looks written for readers.

One vendor, as an example, publishes standards like always approving the page first and sites with 1,000+ monthly organic visits. You don’t have to use that exact vendor, but it shows what “specific” sounds like. If an agency can’t tell you their minimums, they probably don’t have any.

9. “What happens if a link is removed, nofollowed or never indexed?”

Links disappear. Sites get redesigned, articles get updated, editors change their minds.

Good answer: A written replacement policy with a time window. For example, replaced at no cost if removed within a set number of months.

Bad answer: Silence, or “that’s out of our control.”

10. “What would the first 90 days look like?”

I like this question because it exposes improvisers. Someone with a real process can describe month one (audit, targets, content ideas), month two (outreach, first placements), and month three (measurement, adjustments). One agency guide calls this a key question for separating agencies with a process from those that improvise.

11. “Can I see a sample report?”

Ask to see an anonymized report from a current client before you sign. Good reports include new referring domains, the actual URLs, anchor text, target pages, and traffic or ranking movement connected to business goals, not just a count of links.

Look for tools like Google Search Console, GA4 and Looker Studio dashboards. If the report is just a spreadsheet of domain authority numbers, push back.

12. “What does the contract look like?”

Check the contract length, notice period, and what you own at the end. Ask whether there’s a minimum commitment and what the exit terms are. Avoid being locked into 12 months before you’ve seen one real placement.

A simple process to follow

Step 1: Shortlist three agencies. One guide suggests talking to three different companies and asking each the same questions, so you can compare answers later.

Step 2: Send your questions in writing. Email gives you a record, and evasive answers are easier to spot on paper.

Step 3: Check their live examples yourself. Use Ahrefs or Semrush to look at the referring page’s traffic. If a site claims a high domain rating but gets almost no visitors, that’s a warning sign. Look at what the site ranks for, too.

Step 4: Start with a pilot. One buying guide suggests a small pilot batch before committing to a full retainer, regardless of how established the agency looks. I’d agree. Three to five placements will tell you a lot.

Step 5: Verify after delivery. Open every link. Confirm it’s live, indexed, and in a real article. Then wait. Check Search Console and rankings over the next two to three months.

Step 6: Decide with evidence. Expand if the pilot was clean. Walk away if it wasn’t.

Mistakes I’d help you avoid

Hiring on price alone. Cheap is the easiest to sell and the hardest to undo.

Falling for domain authority. DA and DR are easy to inflate. Traffic and relevance are harder to fake.

Expecting fast results. Even good link building takes months. If your agency says “top of Google in 30 days,” that’s the red flag.

Never checking the work. Reports are marketing too. Open the links.

Ignoring AI search. Links aren’t the only goal anymore. As I covered earlier in this series, AI tools tend to cite earned editorial mentions far more than paid placements, so ask agencies how their work gets you mentioned in credible places, not just linked.

Not planning the exit. Know how to leave before you sign.

Final thoughts

The best sign of a good agency isn’t a polished pitch. It’s how they react when you ask hard questions. The good ones answer quickly, show proof, and sometimes tell you “we’re not the right fit.” The shaky ones get vague or defensive.

If you only remember one thing from this list, remember this: ask to see the live links, and open every one of them. It takes ten minutes and it’s the single best way to protect your budget.

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