How Many Backlinks Do You Need To Rank? (a Technical Guide)
You run a small or micro business and your competitors are HUGEEE companies, with big headcounts and unlimited marketing budgets. You take a look at
If so, you might be in the same position I was years ago. I started a website, spent an entire year redesigning it, and guess what… nothing happened.
Imagine investing so much time and effort into a website for a full year, only to end up with zero sales.
Yes, a beautifully designed website alone isn’t enough. It’s like having a gorgeous storefront with no customers walking in. You are missing out on hundreds of hungry potential buyers.
Topics on their site has no search demand
Their website has no backlinks
Keyword research and on page SEO can be easily done by any other SEO agency… they are the basics of SEO.
There’s no debate around this:
| Target Keyword | Search Volume | Search Intent | Rankings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Beauty Academy Singapore | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 |
| Beauty School Singapore | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 |
| Beauty Course Singapore | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 |
| Target Keyword | Search Volume | Search Intent | Rankings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Debt Recovery Lawyer Singapore | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 on Google.com.sg |
I’ll be straight: I’m an entrepreneur who learned SEO the hard way because I needed customers.
My first attempt at SEO? Complete failure. At 22, I thought I was the next Steve Jobs. Spent an entire year writing blog articles. Got zero traffic. Zero customers. Had to pack up and go back to university.
Five years later, I bootstrapped a dating advice business with $6000 in the bank. No venture capital. No external funding. Just me figuring out white hat link building and paid advertising from scratch.
I grew MarcusNeo.Com to 20000+ global readers and over $100000 in revenue as a one man show. Did everything myself: website development, SEO, Facebook ads, copywriting, customer research, offshore team management. In the trenches, as an operator.
That site got acquired by an American company in 2021. Everything I learned about lead generation came from building that business.
Corporate, SME or bootstrapped. I’ve done it all. That’s why when I consult on SEO now, I don’t just think about rankings. I think about what actually generates revenue.
In our recent case study with Contigo Law LLC, a civil litigation firm, we executed a paid lead generation campaign. As an unintended bonus, we got them ranking page one on Google.com.sg for “debt recovery lawyer Singapore”.
That’s what happens when the digital marketer you hire understands the full picture: technical SEO, conversion optimization, brand positioning, and your business model.
I always tell people: one good marketer can entirely change your business and change your life. I hope to be that one good marketer for you.
When we build digital assets here, we take an end to end approach. We consider everything from technical SEO (when building landing pages) to your brand positioning, product, and offer. Because ranking is useless if it doesn’t make you money.
These days, I enjoy looking at SEO from a web development perspective. I’m playing around with frontend tech solutions and enjoy reading into human psychology and behavior. I also hold a certificate in solution focused brief therapy.
Formal credentials: BSc in Business Management from University of London. Google Tag Manager certified. Advanced GA4 Certification by Marketing Interactive.
| Target Keyword | Search Volume | Search Intent | Rankings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Law Firm Marketing | 320 | Commercial | Local SEO ranked, Google Maps Pack |
| Marketing Agency for Lawyers | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 on Search Results & Google Maps Pack |
| Legal Marketing Agency | 10-100 | Commercial | Page 1 on Search Results & Google Maps Pack |
| Metric | Result |
|---|---|
| SEO Traffic Growth | 0 to 20k monthly visitors globally |
| SEO Commercial Keywords | Page one ranked #1 for “dating coach Singapore” on Google.com.sg |
| Backlinks Built | 1200+ Quality Backlinks from 200+ Relevant Sites |
| ROI | More than $100000 generated from $10k in SEO spend and $15k in paid advertising spend |
Plug and play templates that drive results vs theoretical PDFs that collect dust
| Our SEO Consulting | Other SEO Consultants | |
|---|---|---|
| Consulting Workflow | ✓Holistic audit across technical SEO, content, and backlinks. We give you a Master Google Sheet with prioritized fixes in the right order. We identify meta issues, duplicate content, canonical problems, indexability issues, and broken links with clear fix instructions. | ✗Generic Google Analytics reports and Ahrefs site audit reports you could run yourself. Same cookie cutter recommendations. The old boring H1, H2 tags, meta description, on-page SEO advice. |
| Keyword Mapping Strategy | ✓We identify high commercial intent keywords that actually bring in clients and revenue. Map them to your content and show you the content gaps. Show you which pages to optimize and what content to create. | ✗They recommend keywords with zero search volume or commercial intent just to fill up the report. Useless recommendations that waste your team's time. |
| Content Briefs and Strategy | ✓We show you what to write and how to structure it. Get content briefs and AI prompts you can hand straight to your content team to push out user-first unique content today. Target high intent keywords while highlighting your brand's USP. | ✗Vague suggestions like "create more content" with no specifics on what keywords to target or how to differentiate from competitors. |
| Link Building Frameworks | ✓From competitor research and Skyscraper prospecting to outreach workflows, we've got you covered. Google Sheet formulas, master sheet dumps from Ahrefs and Majestic, plus workflows to identify relevant metrics like trust flow and backlink quality. We tell you which pages need links, how to prioritize link targets, and how to evaluate the true cost of a link. | ✗Either no link building advice at all, or generic "get more backlinks" recommendations with zero actionable strategy. |
| Implementation Support | ✓Your team executes with our templates and we guide you when you get stuck. We actually help you implement, not just theorize. | ✗They hand you the report and vanish. Good luck figuring out what any of it means or how to actually execute. |
| What You Actually Get | ✓Tested and ready to execute templates your team can use immediately. Plug and play Google Sheets with link building frameworks. Site audit master sheet: everything consolidated from crawl data to GSC CTR to GA4 engagement metrics. AI workflows that vet quality and quantity of links. | ✗You get PDFs full of jargon that sit in your downloads folder forever. No practical execution plan, no templates, just vague advice. |
Five Steps to Identify What Actually Moves Your Rankings
We start by getting your tracking set up properly—most website owners don't even have this installed correctly!
Before we start fixing things, let's figure out where you're at right now.
Time to dig deep with Screaming Frog, Ahrefs and Majestic SEO to see what's really going on.
Reports are useless. Instead get a Master Google Sheet loaded with actions you can hand straight to your team or developer.
You can take the strategy and run with it yourself, or we can do the heavy lifting for you.
We give you the roadmap based on the gaps we identified and show you exactly what to fix. Your team does the work, and we're here to guide you when you get stuck.
Best for: Businesses with an internal marketing team or developer who can execute the strategy.
Our team handles everything: fix the technical stuff, build quality backlinks, create the content. You just focus on running your business.
Best for: Businesses willing to invest in SEO for at least 6-8 months. Our sprint methodology includes technical SEO fixes, content SEO and link building. Custom pricing based on scope.
Hiring SEO services in Singapore can range from SGD 200 to SGD 10,000 per month. That depends on the scope of the project and quality of links you’re driving. Good quality links are priced at at least SGD 250 per link. Not those $10 Fiverr type links.
This depends on the stage of business you are at. Our opinion that SEO is only worth it when paid channels are already getting you clients and your company has enough cash flow to invest in good SEO for the long term.
When comparing costs, an in-house SEO specialist in Singapore typically commands a salary of SGD 4000 to SGD 8000 per month, plus benefits, equipment, and training costs. In contrast, an agency may offer more flexible costs.
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