Cost guide

How much does link building cost in 2026?

A monthly authority programme runs $500–$3K per month at the direct rate, and a single outreach sprint (a fixed scope at a fixed price, with an end date) is priced as one campaign below. Neither is priced per link: the contract binds the assets built and the pitches sent, because links are earned from coverage, and every figure becomes a written proposal within 48 hours.

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Direct rate, in ₹ or $ · Itemised proposal in 48 hrs

The range

What it costs,
at the direct rate.

Priced as a monthly digital PR and authority programme or a single outreach sprint, never as a link quota: the contract binds the assets built and the pitches sent, because a quota is how an invoice fills up with directories.

RetainerMonthly authority programme$500–$3Kper month
One-offOutreach sprint$750–$3Kone campaign, one-time

Indicative: every figure is refined into an itemised proposal within 48 hours.INR figures shown excl. GST.

Every option includes a Prism workspace for requests, approvals, tasks and the weekly review.

What moves the price

Why the range
is a range.

How hard your market is to get covered in

Earning a mention in regulated finance, healthcare or enterprise software means convincing journalists who are pitched constantly. Earning one in local home services means finding the few outlets that exist. The pitch-to-placement ratio in your market is the biggest driver, and we set it from the outlets that already cover your subject.

Biggest lever

Whether you already hold citable data

The asset is the reason anyone links. A company sitting on transaction data, survey results or an expert with a point of view has the asset half built. A company with none needs original research, and a paid survey panel or data study is a real cost we quote separately.

Asset lever

What kind of asset the angle needs

Expert commentary on a live story is hours. A data study with analysis and charts is days. An interactive tool or a designed report is a project. The programme builds one asset per cycle, and the kind the angle needs sets where the month sits in the range.

Production lever

Markets and languages

Outreach in English to one market is the base. Each additional market has its own outlets, its own journalists and its own news cycle, and outreach in another language needs a native pitcher. Multi-market programmes are scoped as their own lines.

Scope lever

The state of your current links

A profile full of bought directory links, expired domains or spam anchors may need a disavow file, the list of links you ask Google to ignore, before new coverage can count. Assessing that is part of the baseline; preparing the file is quoted on its own.

Hidden lever

Whether there is anything worth linking to

Coverage points at a page. If your product, pricing and category pages are thin, the earned link lands on the homepage and does less. Target-page readiness is checked in the baseline; where pages need rewriting first, that work is priced under content, not hidden here.

Often forgotten

The options

Which option
fits your case.

Each option below is one way to buy Link building. Read what it is and who it fits, then request the one that matches your case; the proposal itemises it.

Retainer

Monthly authority programme

$500–$3Kper month

What it is

Digital PR run continuously: a citable asset built each cycle, researched pitches to named journalists and desks that already cover your subject, reactive commentary while a story is live, and every placement reported with the story that earned it.

Who it fits

Businesses in a market where authority decides rankings and where the site already has pages worth pointing at. It does not fit a site with unresolved technical debt or thin money pages, which should fix those first, or a buyer who wants a link count in the contract, which we will not write.

Included

A campaign asset per cycle: data study, original analysis or expert commentary
Researched pitches to named journalists and desks that already cover your subject
Reactive commentary and expert quotes pitched while the story is live
Anchor and target-page plan so earned links point at pages that move revenue
Monthly report: outlet type, target page and the story behind each placement

Not included, quoted separately

Paid survey panels for original research
Interactive or designed assets
Outreach in languages other than English

Turnaround: Monthly, 3-month minimum; first asset in outreach within 30 days
Moves the number: Market difficulty: earning coverage in regulated finance and in local home services are very different jobs.

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One-off

Outreach sprint

$750–$3Kone campaign, one-time

What it is

One campaign start to finish: the authority baseline of what you hold, one asset built, one researched outreach wave tracked pitch by pitch, and a placement report showing what each link cost in effort and what earned it.

Who it fits

Buyers who want to see how earned coverage runs before committing monthly, and businesses with one strong story or dataset to tell. It does not compound the way a programme does, because relationships with journalists build over cycles, not weeks.

Included

Authority baseline: which links carry weight, which are dead, and which are risky enough to disown
One asset built for the campaign angle
One researched outreach wave, tracked pitch by pitch
Placement report with the story that earned each link

Not included, quoted separately

A second asset or outreach wave
Reactive PR between campaigns
Preparing the disavow file (the list of links you ask Google to ignore)

Turnaround: 6 to 8 weeks
Moves the number: Whether the asset needs original data or can be built from data you already hold.

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Cheaper or dearer

What moves a quote
down, or up.

Because the proposal itemises assets and outreach waves rather than links, each item below shows up as a line you can trade in or out.

Brings the quote down

Data you already hold that can become an asset without a survey panel
A subject that trade and regional outlets already cover regularly
An expert in your business willing to be quoted on a live story
Money pages that are already worth linking to
One market, in English

Pushes the quote up

A category where every journalist is pitched constantly
Original research from scratch, including paid survey panels
Interactive or designed assets rather than written ones
Several markets or languages, each with its own outreach wave
A link profile that needs a disavow file before anything else

What you get

What the fee
actually buys.

The fee buys assets, pitches and coverage, and a monthly account of all three. No link count is promised, because a quota is how an invoice fills up with directories; the work is.

A campaign asset per cycle

A data study, an original analysis or expert commentary, built to be cited, owned by you and published on your site.

Pitches you can read

Every pitch is tracked: who was contacted, on which desk, with which angle, and what came back. You see the outreach, not a summary of it.

Placements with their story

Each earned link is reported with the outlet type, the target page and the story that earned it, so you can judge quality yourself.

An anchor and target-page plan

Coverage is aimed at the pages that move revenue, with the anchor text planned so earned links strengthen the right subjects.

Reactive commentary

When a story in your subject breaks, an expert quote is pitched while it is live. This is often where the strongest placements come from.

A clean baseline

Before outreach starts, an audit of which links you hold carry weight, which are dead and which are risky enough to ask Google to ignore.

AgenciesAgency partners buy at the partner rates on agencies.pixelcrayons.com; volume terms are agreed under NDA.

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Questions

Frequently
asked.

Because a per-link price is how an invoice fills with directories, expired domains and paid placements that Google discounts or penalises. The contract binds what we can control: the assets built and the pitches sent. Placements are reported one by one with the story that earned them, so you can judge each link's quality rather than count them.

No number is promised, and any supplier who promises one is either buying them or inflating the count with placements that do not matter. What the fee buys is an asset per cycle, researched outreach to named journalists and reactive commentary on live stories. In markets where coverage is plentiful the count runs higher; in regulated categories a handful of strong placements is the better result.

Both. Each cycle includes one asset built for the angle, whether a data study, an analysis or expert commentary, and the outreach wave that pitches it. Paid survey panels for original research, interactive or designed assets and outreach in languages other than English are quoted separately, because each is a real cost that not every campaign needs.

It is a way to see the method once before committing monthly, not a discount on it. The sprint buys the baseline, one asset, one outreach wave and a placement report. What it cannot buy is the compounding: journalists who know you, a library of assets to point at and commentary on the stories that break between campaigns.

The baseline included in both options tells you whether you need one, by showing which links you hold carry weight, which are dead and which are risky. Preparing the file itself, the list of links you ask Google to ignore, is quoted on its own, because the effort depends on how many bad links there are and how they got there.

Yes, if your technical health and money pages are already in order. Earned coverage points at a page, and a thin or slow page wastes it. The baseline checks target-page readiness first; where pages need work, we say so in the proposal rather than pitch coverage that lands on a homepage and does little.

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Last updated 23 September 2026

What it costs,at the direct rate.

Why the rangeis a range.