Link building is acquiring hyperlinks from external websites that point back to your site. These inbound links (also called backlinks) act as votes of confidence in Google's algorithm. When authoritative sites link to you, search engines interpret that as a signal your content is valuable, which typically improves your rankings for relevant queries. Not all links carry equal weight. A link from a government site (.gc.ca in Canada), university, or established industry publication passes more authority than a link from a new blog with no traffic. Google evaluates links based on the linking site's own authority, relevance to your topic, anchor text used, and whether the link appears in main content versus a footer or sidebar. Link building methods range widely. Earning links through genuinely valuable content like original research or tools is the gold standard. Outreach where you pitch relevant content to journalists or bloggers works but requires volume and personalization. Guest posting on industry sites can work if done selectively and not spammed. Broken link building, digital PR, and strategic partnerships all have their place. What doesn't work anymore: buying links outright, participating in link schemes, or mass directory submissions. Google's algorithms detect these patterns and can penalize sites that rely on them. At Ottawa SEO, we've seen manual actions hit clients who inherited bad link profiles from previous agencies. The challenge is that link building is resource-intensive and slow. A solid campaign might secure 5-15 quality links per month depending on your industry and budget. For competitive Toronto or Montreal markets, you might need 50-200 referring domains before you see meaningful movement on commercial keywords. For local Ottawa businesses targeting neighborhood searches, sometimes 10-20 relevant local links make the difference. Think of link building as long-term relationship building. The sites linking to you today might link again next year. The worst approach is treating it as a one-time checklist item rather than an ongoing channel.