Does Buying Links Work?

If you’ve ever tried to find data on whether paid links “work,” you’ll know that it’s hard to come by. That’s why we’ve put together this study to provide some actual data on whether buying links makes a difference to SEO.

There are many reasons why studies like this are few and far between. For one thing, it’s difficult to isolate the data to measure the impact of specific links that have been gained (or purchased).

But more than that, there’s a well-known stigma around paying for links. And I think that’s the real reason why we haven’t seen many studies like this.

Of course, companies that sell links sometimes offer case studies that purport to show their links working, generally without revealing the identity of their customers. But those sort of (curiously anonymous) case studies are naturally a little biased.

On the other hand, it’s clear that SEO service providers tend to steer away from studies like this. Most SEO agencies will advise against buying links. But it’s an open secret that many agencies pay for links and pass them off as natural. Why do they do this? Because, so they say, “it works.”

This study goes beyond anecdotal evidence to offer a small data sample to answer the question: Does buying links actually work? I spent £5K on 40 “Quality” links. Here’s what I learnt…

Preface: Links in the Era of Brand SEO and AI Search

A study like this has been needed for years. It’s finally arriving at a time where we’re in the midst of significant change in the SEO world. For that reason, I want to briefly outline how this study relates to the topics of brand and AI search.

There is a growing acknowledgement in the world of SEO that having a strong brand is increasingly important for organic rankings.

As Louise Linehan wrote for Ahrefs’ blog, 2025 is “the year of the brand.” This follows the sort of findings that emerged during 2024, such as Tom Capper’s finding that Google’s HCU was fundamentally about brand demand, and Rand Fishkin’s big conclusion from the Google API leak that “brand matters more than anything else.”

Anecdotal evidence from thousands of SEOs seems to support this claim, and a growing number of studies are providing evidence to support it.

What are the implications of this in terms of paid links? The growing importance of brand suggests that getting a backlink from an obscure website that receives no clicks is not going to move the needle–even if its “DR” is 40+.

Increasingly, we are seeing that real coverage, real clicks, and real people typing a real brand name into their browser is what makes the biggest difference in SEO today.

Links and AI Search

So how do paid links relate to AI search?

It’s certainly true that there are hacks that can help brands to get featured in AI chatbots, like ChatGPT. Fery Kaszoni has shared at least one convincing example, which involves combining paid and natural links.

But while hacks might work in the short or even medium term, we know that AI chatbots, in the same way as Google Search, ultimately need to make sure they surface trustworthy brands. And that’s why, once again, having a legitimately strong brand is likely to come out as the enduring requirement for visibility in AI search.

Google’s Stance on the Declining Importance of Links

It would be remiss of me not to note that Google reps themselves have mentioned the declining importance of links in general.

Of course, anything Google reps say should be taken with a pinch of salt, but it’s worth being aware of Gary Illyes’ reaffirmation in 2024 that “over the years we’ve made links less important” (later tweeting “I definitely shouldn’t have said that”).

Ahrefs’ Patrick Stox investigated this claim, and the research showed that overall, the correlation between links and rankings is lower than it was in 2019. It’s worth noting that the research also showed that links also matter more in certain specific contexts, such as for local queries, informational content, and at higher search volumes.

Methodology: How I Conducted The Study

There are many difficulties with accurately measuring the impact of links on rankings. The number of variables at play are significant. For one thing, there’s the timeframe – opinion varies widely on how long it takes for a site’s overall visibility to benefit from a new link.

There are also factors including the impact of any given linking site (some are obviously better than others), and the impact depending on industry/niche, to name a couple. But rather than getting caught up in the challenges, I’m just going to tell you the methodology I used, you can judge for yourself whether you think it stands up.

In order to measure impact, I chose a single URL on each site, chose one target keyword for that URL, and measured the ranking movements of that keyword over a period of approximately 150 days.

The study used sites in various industries, and the target URLs, at the beginning of the study, were all ranking in positions between 11 and 20 (the aim was to get them to pop into the top ten positions). No changes were made to the content of the target pages during the course of the study.

As for the domains I purchased links from, these were all sites that I considered to be of a moderate to very good editorial standard. Naturally, that claim is quite subjective, and the quality between the sites did vary.

In most cases, these are websites that primarily publish genuine editorial content, and offer guest posts in a certain area of their site. Most of the links cost between £100 and £200. I purchased the links for each site at approximately 30 day intervals, and the focus of the study is on seven sites that received five links each over 150 days.

The Data

The below table outlines all the key metrics that were monitored. I want to draw attention to the first seven URLs in the list, which each received five links. At the bottom, are listed four more URLs, which only received one or two links each.

The table shows the site niche, page type, domain age, Ahref’s “keyword difficulty” (KD), how many links were gained, start and end domain rating (DR), and, most importantly, start and end rank. The final “Rank Change” column is the one that ultimately demonstrates any meaningful impact.

Niche	Page Type	Domain Age	KD	Links Added	Start DR	EndDR	DR Change	Start Rank	End Rank	Rank Change
Pets	Blog	7	1	5	13	15	2	16	11	5
Furniture	Product	26	6	5	25	26	1	20	39	19
Property	Blog	4	–	5	16	16	–	19	31	12
Music retail	Category	25	1	5	41	32	9	19	12	7
Architecture	Product	10	1	5	26	27	1	18	14	4
Education	Service	12	5	5	17	19	2	14	10	4
Finance	Homepage	12	3	5	38	36	2	11	4	7
Automotive	Product	3	36	2	16	17	1	20	55	35
Automotive	Homepage	13	70	1	35	37	2	15	19	4
Architecture	Blog	3	5	1	16	16	–	18	17	1
Marketing	Product	11	10	1	12	12	–	18	57	7

As this table shows, five out of seven sites that received five links saw ranking improvements by the end of the experiment. This seems to suggest an overall positive impact from buying quality links. However, the situation is more nuanced than this, as outlined below.

The below line chart depicts the fluctuating positions of the main seven sites in the study, over the 150 day period.

The chart tracks the search engine ranking position (lower is better, with 1 being the highest rank) across seven different niches at various milestones after initial link purchases. All sites begin between rank 10 and 20. The rankings show high volatility across most domains, particularly following the link purchases, with some experiencing significant temporary drops (rank increases) and others demonstrating periods of stability or gradual improvement (rank decreases).

Pets (Blue Line)

• Starts around rank 18.
• Experiences the most extreme fluctuations, dropping sharply to rank 40+ after the ‘Link 2 bought’ (60 Days) milestone.
• It recovers significantly, dipping below rank 20 around the ‘Link 3 bought’ (90 Days) mark, then stablises at a position around rank 11 in the final 120-150 day period, achieving the best final rank.

Furniture (Red Line)

• Starts around rank 20.
• Remains relatively stable in the 10-20 rank range for the first 90 days, with a slight decrease in rank following the first link purchase.
• Experiences a sharp decline (worse rank) to nearly rank 40 around the 150 Days mark, ending with one of the lowest final positions.

Property (Yellow Line)

• Starts around rank 19.
• Shows a gradual but consistent worsening of rank (increase in rank number) for the first 90 days, peaking near rank 30 at 30 days and 60 days.
• It recovers around the 90-120 day mark, dropping below rank 15, but then worsens again to a final position around rank 31 at 150 days.

Musical Instruments (Green Line)

• Starts around rank 19.
• Generally shows a positive trend in the first 90 days, achieving its best rank around rank 10 at the 60-day mark.
• It becomes more volatile afterward, eventually stabilizing around rank 12 in the final period.

Architecture (Orange Line)

• Starts around rank 18.
• Displays significant volatility, similar to ‘Pets’, particularly dropping to rank 40+ after the ‘Link 2 bought’ (60 Days) and again around the ‘120 Days’ mark.
• It ends with a moderate final rank around rank 14.

Education (Teal Line)

• Starts around rank 15.
• Exhibits a trend of gradual improvement and stabilization throughout the period, generally staying between rank 5 and 15.
• It ends with a stable position around rank 10.

Finance (Light Blue Line)

• Starts around rank 10-11.
• Maintains the best overall rank throughout the study, showing a steady initial decline (rank improvement) to rank 5 and stabilizing at this position for the majority of the 60-150 day period.

Key Observations

• The purchase of the second link (60 Days) appears to be a major inflection point, causing the worst temporary rank drops for ‘Pets’ and ‘Architecture’ (both hit rank 40).
• The domains ‘Pets’, ‘Education’ and ‘Finance’ achieved the best final ranking positions, though ‘Pets’ did so after a period of high risk and volatility.
• The domains ‘Property’ and ‘Furniture’ finished with the worst final rankings (near rank 31 and 39, respectively).

Conclusions

Since five out of seven sites that received five links saw improvements, I think this constitutes tentative evidence that buying several quality links, in certain circumstances, can help rankings. However, there are many caveats.

For one thing, at different points during the 150 day period, there were times when three or even four of the sites were sitting below their initial ranking – in other words, for a spell, it was looking as if link buying was overall having a negative impact on rankings.

For two of those seven sites, rankings were indeed lower, despite them gaining five links to a specific URL. Having closely watched these rankings over six months, I’m not confident that any of them will maintain their temporarily improved rankings by virtue of having five links.

Another key caveat concerns the definition of “quality.” I actively tried to gain links from sites that I felt met a certain, subjective standard. Others who buy links may have lower or higher standards, and lower or higher budgets, which I suspect could have a significant bearing on results.

This being said, I would also emphasise that the sites that I purchased links from were of a higher quality than would typically be found on a link-purchasing platform for the same price. These were mostly sites that I liaised with directly, so their fees were not inflated by third parties, nor were they overrun with low-quality guest post content.

If I were to have bought links of this quality via a third-party link link-selling platform, I estimate the cost would have been at least twice as much.

Another important point to note is that, with the 4 sites that received only one or two links, we can see that three of them saw ranking decreases rather than increases. Since they only received one or two links, it wouldn’t be fair to draw conclusions about causation. But it does appear that the few links they received didn’t help.

It is also important to remember that although no target URLs received direct changes, sites may have received natural links to other pages, or been influenced by sitewide changes, for example, site speed or Core Web Vitals.

Brands may have changed their ad spend, dropped an email campaign, or done any manner of other marketing activities that impacted overall brand awareness, and any of these could have impacted visibility – probably more than the links.

Data Source: The SEO Works

Download the data here.

Author – Michael Sandford

Michael is an Account Director at the SEO Works. With a background in publishing and content marketing, he helps clients create content that drives traffic, conversions, and growth.