Every agency selling off-page SEO services promises high-quality backlinks, but what does “high-quality” mean in this context? What separates these companies from each other is the standard they apply before each link goes live, and whether you ever get to see it.
With Marketing Done Right, you won’t have to doubt the quality of your off-page SEO implementations. We publish our link-building standards, screen every referring domain against them, and show you what was placed and why. In doing so, you can skip the guesswork and rest assured that your online presence is in good hands.
What We Mean by High-Quality Backlinks
High-quality backlinks are links from trusted, relevant publishers. Before approaching a publisher, the domain must pass four checks. Otherwise, our team excludes them from our list.
- Monthly Organic Traffic: The referring domain must receive at least 2,000 of genuine organic search traffic, measured independently.
- Spam Score: The domain must sit at or below 10%.
- Trust Flow: The domain must reach a minimum Trust Flow of 20.
- Topical Relevance: The site’s subject matter and audience must overlap with yours.
Most providers emphasize the value of Domain Rating (DR), but this figure tells you very little on its own. For example, a domain with DR 70 but no organic traffic suggests it’s likely a link farm with good PR. In contrast, traffic is a metric that’s difficult to fake.
Furthermore, we usually turn down these prospects:
- Sites with no topical overlap with your business
- Sites whose outbound profile is mostly paid placements
- Expired domains that are rebuilt purely to sell links
- Publishers who sell links to whoever pays
Ready to see what your profile looks like against these standards? Talk to our off-page SEO team today.
Our Off-Page Optimization Services Beyond Link Building
Backlinking is a standard part of our off-page SEO strategy, but it isn’t the only one.
Editorial Link Acquisition
We only pitch content to publishers who tick all four checkboxes, which is why our placement volume is often lower than that of run-of-the-mill providers.
Digital PR and Unlinked Brand Mentions
A mention on a relevant website with high traffic has value even when it doesn’t hyperlink to your website because it builds an association between your brand and category. Our team usually pursues mentions first, the link second, and then follows up on unlinked mentions when needed.
Citations, Reviews, and Local Off-Site Signals
If you serve a local market, much of your off-site signals have little to do with editorial links. Rather, it comes from name-address-phone number (NAP) consistency across directories that list your business (e.g., chambers of commerce, Yelp) and from the volume and recency of your reviews.
We clean up conflicting listings, keep your local directory listings accurate, and build a repeatable process for generating customer reviews.
Backlink Cleanup
We pull your full profile, flag links from spam domains, expired-domain networks, and irrelevant directories, and then request removals from publishers who are willing to cooperate. For those who aren’t, we disavow them via the Google Search Console.
In doing so, new placements land on a profile that Google already trusts. This keeps you from spending your budget on outrunning links that are working against you.
What Links Does Google Flag as Spam?
Google sometimes flags certain backlinks as spam. Let’s go over their criteria and our off-page SEO techniques for addressing them.
The Link Types that Google Considers Spam
Google defines link spam as creating links to or from a site to manipulate search rankings. Its link spam policies flag the following scenarios, among others:
| What Google Flags as Link Spam | What We Place Instead |
| Paying a publisher for a followed link | Editorial placements earned on merit, or paid placements tagged rel=”sponsored” |
| Product-for-review and goods-for-links arrangements | Coverage pitched on the story, with no link conditions attached |
| Excessive reciprocal linking and partner pages | One-directional links from domains that pass all four of our checks |
| Automated link-building programs | Manual prospecting and outreach for each publisher |
| Advertorials passing ranking credit | Sponsored content correctly attributed, with credit blocked |
| Low-quality directory submissions | Verified local citations with consistent NAP data |
| Keyword-stuffed widget and forum links | Branded and naked-URL anchors kept dominant in the mix |
Google says sites in violation may rank lower in search results or not appear at all, with enforcement handled by automated systems backed by human review.
Regarding paid placements, Google permits them when they’re tagged rel=”sponsored” or rel=”nofollow”, which blocks the ranking credit.
What Happens When a Profile Is Already Contaminated
If your rankings have already dropped, our first step is a comprehensive backlink audit. We pull your profile from Google Search Console, flag toxic links, request removals where possible, and disavow the rest.
What You Receive from Marketing Done Right
When you work with our off-page SEO company, you can expect to get the following results on a regular cycle.
Monthly Link Report
This report lists every placement we made that month. With it, you’ll see the referring domain’s organic traffic and spam score at the time of placement, the anchor text used, and which page it points to.
We also report your anchor text distribution, keeping branded and naked-URL anchors dominant to avoid overoptimization.
Quarterly Backlink Audit
Every quarter, you get a full picture of referring domains gained and lost, anything flagged as toxic, and the current status of your disavow file. At the same time, we report changes in keyword positions on the pages we’re building toward.
Want to see the format before you commit? Talk to our off-page SEO team.
How Long Does Marketing Done Right’s Off-Page SEO Services Take? What Does It Cost?
In our experience, most sites see measurable ranking movement within six months, although more competitive verticals take longer. After all, links have to be crawled, indexed, and then trusted, which doesn’t happen in an instant.
The First 90 Days
Month one is where we audit and clean up your existing backlinks, while months two and three are where we begin your placements. On an inherited profile, the first month often produces no new links at all since our priority is cleaning up low-quality backlinks.
What Drives Costs
Working with an off-page SEO agency generally entails two costs:
- Placement Costs: This is the fee you pay to a third-party website or platform to publish content or secure a backlink.
- Management Fee: It’s what you pay for our link-building services, from planning to execution and ongoing optimization.
Your total cost fluctuates depending on how many placements you need each month, how competitive your vertical is, and whether digital PR is included in your scope.
Let’s build your brand’s authority online. Marketing Done Right’s off-page SEO services can clean up your site, build high-quality backlinks, and ensure your compliance with Google’s spam policies to help build your website’s trustworthiness and visibility in the digital space. Talk to our off-page SEO team today.
Off-Page SEO Services FAQ
It depends on how many placements you need each month, how competitive your vertical is, and whether digital PR is included in your scope. Specifically, you should consider two budgets: placement cost, which is what you pay to the third-party website to secure a backlink, and management fee, which you pay your agency.
Your timeline depends on various factors, but you can expect measurable ranking movement within six months. Remember, links need to be crawled, indexed, and then trusted, which takes time.
Yes, but only when the link passes ranking credit. Google’s spam policies specifically name exchanging money for links as spam, unless they’re tagged with rel=”sponsored” or rel=”nofollow”.
A high-quality backlink comes from a trusted website. Marketing Done Right checks four things before placing a link: the referring domain’s organic traffic, its spam score, its Trust Flow, and whether its audience overlaps with yours. A site that fails any of these criteria is rejected.
Yes. Google’s spam policy states that sites building manipulative links may rank lower in search results or not appear at all. You may disavow bad links, and you can often remove low-quality placements upon request, but recovery takes time. Your safest path is not acquiring them in the first place.
