I used to think the answer was “hundreds,” but now I know it’s really about the right links, not more links, i recently ranked a brand-new affiliate site for a long-tail keyword (12,400 monthly searches) with only 8 backlinks, but they were from high-quality blogs and tightly related to the niche.
Here’s what I focused on:
- Great on-page SEO (keyword clustering, internal linking)
- Publishing 10 strong articles out the gate
- Securing 2–3 guest posts, 1 HARO mention, and a few niche directory links
That was enough to hit the first page in 3 months, of course, if you’re trying to rank for “best credit card” or “buy crypto,” you’ll need dozens or even hundreds of links, plus age, authority, and topical relevance, but for 90% of niches, 10–30 high-quality, diverse links can take you pretty far, especially with solid content and technical SEO.
