Surveying the threads here, it doesn't seem as though there's much that's new when it comes to thoughts on link building. I keep seeing things like social media use, commenting, guest blogging, article writing. Good grief.
When I built the links to a site I operated for several years before selling it, I spent thousands of hours researching the backlinks of competitors, the backlinks of sites linking to them, and the backlinks of all types of associated sites. The link mining was endless. The goal was to come up with email lists to eventually solicit and to send them a personalized email. I figure I got at most a 3 percent return rate. Today, because there are so many BS artists soliciting links for dogcrap sites, the return rate has to be a fraction of that. Which means that the effort required for true link building these days must be extraordinary. That is, if you are trying to get real links from real sites that stand the test of time. I don't even know if I would attempt it today because it is a mind-numbingly slow process and hard on the fingers and neck.
I would be curious to hear if anyone actually does it the old fashioned way any longer? Do you do it yourself, of have you been successful at finding someone (you can trust) to do this as a contract worker (or in any agency) at a cost that doesn't break the bank?
Part of the reason for my question is that someone had approached me about buying a site of mine and said that if they acquired it, they would put 5 figures into linkbuilding for several months. To my mind, that's at least 10k for three months. And I would assume that's not going to be guest blogging, commenting, or other nonsense, but what do I know?
