How Topdog builds links in 2026

Few areas of search engine optimization are as misunderstood as links. Everyone knows they matter, but few people talk honestly about how they actually work in Sweden and Scandinavia, or about what’s really worth the effort. Here’s how we approach it at Topdog.

Start with the site, not the links

One of the first things we tell almost every client is this: don’t start with the links. Links still carry value in 2026, but they matter less than they did five years ago. Today, Google factors in more and more signals, and user experience counts for more every year. A link should reinforce a site that’s already good. It shouldn’t cover for one that isn’t.

Left to us, tech, content and user experience come first. Links follow. In other words, link building is part of a considered link strategy, not the starting point.

Why we prefer backlinks that last

We believe in links that come about because you’ve earned them. They come from a brand people recognise, from getting mentioned, and from publishing content other people want to cite. Brand links and content links of that kind hold up over time, and they build value well beyond Google.

Relationships are a surprisingly underused source of links. You already have ties to suppliers, partners and customers, and plenty of them could link to you. Another route is content built specifically to attract backlinks.

We should be honest about the downside. This kind of link building takes time and money. Which is precisely why paid links have a place too.

Buying backlinks: the seasoning, not the main course

Sometimes you need to buy links to speed up rankings and conversions. We see them as seasoning rather than the main course. We place them on established sites with real traffic, never link farms, and we follow Swedish marketing law. That means every paid link carries an advertising label. There’s a degree of risk in that, because a labelled link counts for less, and we handle it by keeping the volume low.

There’s a structural problem in Sweden and Scandinavia too. Only around a thousand sites actually sell links, so in practice everyone’s buying from the same pool. The more you scale up paid backlinks, the more obvious it becomes, and the riskier it gets. That’s why we never rely on buying alone. We combine it with outreach and content of our own.

Outreach, process and content

First things first: we don’t run a link network of our own. Plenty of Swedish agencies rent out or sell links from the networks they control themselves. We don’t, because shortcuts like that rarely hold up.

Instead we work on three fronts. The first is outreach: we contact sites and generate links for you. The second is process. We set up scalable routines so you can keep building links yourselves, and on some client projects we’ve built 40 to 50 per cent of the entire link profile that way, often from media sites where links are otherwise hard to come by. The third is content that pulls in links and mentions. Digital PR built on linkable data is one of our most proven methods.

A note before you press play: our videos are in Swedish. Turn on subtitles in the player, pick your language from the list, and YouTube will translate them for you. There’s a full transcript of this video in English at the bottom of this page.

What AI is doing to link building

Here’s a prediction. The next phase in link building has less and less to do with the classic backlink. We think a growing number of companies will want to buy their way onto lists: the best brands, the best products, roundups, or expert verdicts where someone simply declares themselves the best. For AI tools, that’s the sort of mention that carries weight when they assemble their answers. Lists are becoming the new links.

Go into it with your eyes open, though. There are legal traps. Buying a place on a ‘best of’ list, or calling yourself the best with nothing to back it up, can breach Swedish marketing law, both the rules on misleading marketing and the requirement that ads be identifiable as ads. Positioning yourself properly for this shift really comes down to optimising for AI search.

Want to learn more about links in 2026?

The video below is the best walkthrough we have of how links actually work in Sweden. Christian takes you through most of what you need to know. It was recorded in 2020, but the underlying mechanics haven’t changed, so it holds up just as well today. It’s in Swedish, so switch subtitles on and choose your language before you start.

Why it’s worth an hour of your time:

• You’ll understand the four factors SEO actually rests on, and where links fit in
• You’ll learn the rules, both Google’s guidelines and Swedish law, so you can steer clear of unnecessary risk
• You’ll recognise the three ways companies acquire links in Sweden, and spot the dangerous ones
• You’ll see real examples of link building with data and digital PR
• You’ll get answers to the most common questions, from affiliates to multilingual sites

Links in context

Christian starts by placing links in the bigger picture. SEO rests on four factors: content, tech, links and user experience. The point is that experience matters more year on year, while links matter slightly less. Less, but far from nothing.

The rules: Google guidelines and Swedish law

Two sets of rules govern all link work. Google’s guidelines say you mustn’t manipulate link equity. That rules out paying for links and swapping them, and guest blogging is off limits too. Swedish marketing law requires you to label paid articles as advertising. If you have to compromise somewhere, bend Google’s rules, not the law.

The three ways companies acquire links in Sweden

Christian runs through how it really works. There are paid links from the networks agencies control themselves, in Google’s view the worst and riskiest type of all. There’s outreach and influencer marketing, more effective, but you have to label it as advertising. And there’s branding, where links appear on their own. The example is ICA, Sweden’s largest grocery chain, with roughly 13,000 linking sites and not a single purchase.

Risks and Google’s ideal

You’ll also see what happens when it goes wrong, from link filters to penalties, and what Google actually wants: editorial links, the ones someone adds of their own accord, as a source.

How we do it ourselves

Finally, Topdog’s own method. Start with relationships, and particularly with suppliers. Use digital PR to turn data into a linkable asset. We did exactly that with a list of Sweden’s most expensive keywords: one of them, ‘begravning Göteborg’ (funeral, Gothenburg), was picked up by Kvällsposten, SvD and DN, three of the country’s biggest news titles. Then turn mentions into links. The video closes with a Q&A covering everything from affiliates to multilingual sites.

Transcript of the first video, on how Topdog builds links

How do we approach link building?

Or rather, how would we like to approach it? This video makes the case for a particular kind of link building service, one I hope will interest you if you’re running search engine optimization in-house.

Topdog has no link network of its own

Link building in Sweden normally works much the same way across Swedish SEO agencies: they have a link network, and you rent or buy links from it. We don’t sell products like that. We don’t have a network in the first place. The other common product is outreach, where we contact bloggers and media companies and pay them to generate backlinks for you. But there’s one thing we can do that few other SEO companies can. We can build processes inside your organisation so you or your colleagues can build links yourselves.

Topdog can build a scalable process for you

We can base those processes on all sorts of things. Perhaps you’re a well-known brand that gets mentioned in a lot of places. If so, there are plenty of people to contact and ask them to turn the mention into a link. We set up efficient, scalable processes so you and your own team can keep building links over time. We’ve used this in our own client projects and built 40 to 50 per cent of an entire link profile this way, often via media sites where links are otherwise hard to come by.

Content that earns its links

We also build processes around content: material that generates links and mentions, and those mentions then become links in turn. We use this method ourselves, creating content we know will attract backlinks once it gets attention. If these processes sound interesting, get in touch with Christian Rudolf on +46 70 814 08 33.