A client came to us last month after leaving another agency. They’d been paying for link-building for two years. Good results — top-three rankings for their main commercial terms. Solid traffic. Then they ended the contract.
Within six weeks, every ranking they’d gained was gone. Not declining — gone. Back to page three, in some cases page four.
They called the old agency to ask what happened. The answer, once they got past the sales pitch to re-sign, was simple: the links had been removed. The agency owned the sites. When the contract ended, the links came down.
Two years of fees. Zero residual value. That isn’t link-building. That’s link-rental.
The distinction
Two very different things get sold under the label “link-building” in the Swedish market right now.
The first is what I’d call owned links. The agency does the outreach, negotiates the placement, and gets your site mentioned on an independently operated website — a real publication, a niche blog, a trade directory. The agency facilitated the placement but doesn’t control the publishing site. When your relationship with the agency ends, the link stays. You own the equity.
The second is rented links. The agency places your link on a site that the agency itself owns, operates, or controls through a network. The link exists because of the business relationship. When the relationship ends, the link is removed — or worse, the entire network gets flagged by Google and every site linked from it loses value simultaneously.
Both approaches can produce rankings in the short term. Only one produces lasting value.
How to spot a rental operation
It isn’t always obvious. Agencies that run link networks aren’t going to announce it. But there are reliable indicators.
The source list is withheld. If you ask your agency for a complete list of every site where they’ve placed a link for you, and they refuse or stall, that’s a signal. Agencies that build owned links have no reason to hide the list — the placements are on third-party sites they don’t control. Agencies that run networks hide the list because it would reveal that the same twenty domains appear across every client’s portfolio.
The contract retains link ownership. Read the fine print. If there’s language about the agency retaining “ownership of link assets” or “proprietary network access,” you’re renting. Owned links don’t need ownership clauses because the agency never owned them in the first place.
Pricing is monthly recurring, not per placement. Owned link-building has a cost structure tied to the work: research, outreach, negotiation, content creation. That work is done once per placement. A monthly fee for “link maintenance” or “network access” is a subscription to someone else’s infrastructure, not a fee for work performed.
Results correlate with payments, not with algorithm changes. If your rankings improve steadily while paying and collapse immediately when you stop — independent of any Google update — the signal is clear. Your rankings weren’t earned by the quality of the links. They were sustained by the continued existence of the links on sites that can be switched off.
Why agencies build networks
The incentive structure makes sense if you look at it from the agency side. Running a link network creates predictable recurring revenue. Clients are locked in because leaving means losing rankings. There’s no need to do the hard, time-consuming work of earning real editorial placements on sites the agency doesn’t control.
It’s efficient and profitable for the agency. It’s a terrible deal for the client.
Why you should care
Three reasons.
First, cost. Rented links are cheaper per month than owned placements are per unit. But the total cost over time is higher because you never stop paying. An owned link placed at a cost of 3,000 SEK delivers value for years. A rented link at 500 SEK per month costs 6,000 SEK over the same period and delivers zero value the day you cancel.
Second, risk. Google isn’t stupid. Link networks get detected. When that happens, every site in the network gets penalized — including yours. You’re not just renting links; you’re renting shared risk with every other client in the network. One careless member, one over-optimized anchor text profile, and the whole structure collapses.
Third, residual value. When you hire a web developer, you own the code they write. When you hire a designer, you own the assets they create. When you hire an agency to build links, you should own the links they build. If the agency’s business model requires you not to own the output, they’re solving for their cash flow, not your growth.
The five-question test
Before signing with any SEO agency that offers link-building, ask these questions:
- Can I get a complete list of every site where you’ve placed or will place links for my domain?
- If I end our contract, do the links remain in place?
- Do you own or operate any of the sites where my links will be placed?
- Is your fee structured per placement or as a monthly subscription?
- What happens to my rankings if I stop paying you?
An agency that builds owned links will answer these without hesitation. An agency that runs a rental network will hedge, deflect, or reframe the question.
What we do differently
At BBO, every link placement is disclosed. The client gets a full source list — every domain, every URL, every anchor text. We charge per placement plus hourly work for the outreach and content. When the engagement ends, the client walks away with a complete inventory of links they own.
We earn our fees from the work, not from access to infrastructure. That means clients can leave any time and keep everything we built for them. Some people in the industry think that’s bad business because it doesn’t create lock-in. I think it’s exactly good business — clients who stay because they want to are worth more than clients who stay because they have to.
If you’re evaluating agencies right now, run the five-question test. The answers will tell you more about the agency’s business model than any pitch deck will.
And if you’ve been renting links without knowing it — well, better to find out now than after you cancel.