Whenever we are asked a question, “How is AI used in link building?” we generally take a pause and then answer. Since we don’t have the answer right off the bat, it’s impossible to have a universal answer, since each SEO practitioner has a different way or practice. What we believe is what we can say, and here is what we think.
Link builders like us mostly use AI for researching a website, reaching prospects, drafting outreach emails, and doing a basic backlink audit. Next is Google working in the background with its Penguin update.
No matter how many links you buy or do paid placements to attract links your way, if they don’t follow Google’s spam policy, the link juice will not be passed, and your page ranking will drop.
So we believe that a clear link-building strategy needs a kick from both sides: AI to improve efficiency and human intervention in link building. This guide explores both areas, but for more insights on AI link-building tools, it’s available here.
Learn how link builders use AI
Personalization
Link builders mostly use AI for personalisation. They use AI to target a website, find a reason to contact the publisher, and draft an outreach email. Most SEO practitioners today use Semrush’s App Centre to scrape Google News and Google Search in real time and analyze backlink data.
In addition, Semrush also has a link-building assistant that can work inside ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude. These tools can easily speed up outreach, but you should always review everything before sending it to the client.
Makes builders understand a tool
Link builders mostly use ChatGPT or Claude to understand a tool. For instance, let’s say that anew seo tool has been launched in the market and it has a steep learning curve. So link builders can ask ChatGPT how to operate the tool to their advantage. In addition. A report from Search Engine Land claims that ChatGPT is like a junior seo specialist. However, when you use ChatGPT as a daily driver, make sure you always do a cross-check since information can change.
Asset building
This is where AI tools shine like a diamond. You can easily use ChatGPT and Claude to create a free resource tool that can be helpful to the audience that you cater for. If you deal in seo then you could easily create a free SEO calculator that people in your domain can cite and reference. A study from Ahrefs suggested that people have used ChatGPT to make income tax calculators in minutes, which would take a developer help.
Repetitive tasks with scripts
With the help of AI tools, you could use them to automate the link-building process. A source from Ahrefs claims that ChatGPT has been used repeatedly to pull information when dealing with large prospects. For instance, you can use ChatGPT to extract contact information and social media handles of publishers and then use them for outreach. Instead of doing this process in a manual way, which is time-consuming, using tools like this can help you to speed up the process.
The AI agent
You use AI tools to create link-building agents that can take care of the basic seo work. These AI seo agents actually perform software work without telling you how to do it. To demonstrate, SEO agents can collect backlink data, organize prospects, analyse websites, and prepare a report that requires no manual input. This is helpful for agencies who manage a large client base at once.
Internal Linking
We think the greatest advantage of using AI SEO tools is making sure that you know which pages link to each other. Think of it for a second: it could analyze the existing pages, identify the topics that are closely related to each other, and suggest anchor text that would fit perfectly for each piece of content. In addition, it can also identify over-optimized anchor text and suggest linking opportunities that can be value-driven for the readers. Anyways, if you want to know about anchor text optimization, our guide is available.
Learn how Google detects unnatural links
Google also uses AI to identify spammy websites and any manipulative link-building practices. The AI that Google uses is known as Spam Brain. Spam Brain was identified in 2018, and it reported that since then it has been able to identify 6x more spam from 2019-2021.
For backlinks, Google uses the same engine but with different updates. When the December 2022 link spam update came into existence, it neutralized any backlink that looked unnatural or was spam. With the help of this AI, Google easily identified websites that acted as spam or were passing link juice just for manipulation. So once you have triggered Google penalties, you would lose all your reputation and page rank that you once took pride in.
What does this tell you?
It makes one thing evident: Quick SEO wins won’t work here. The spambrain has been designed to remove falsehood and manipulation. You can use AI tools for prospecting, grouping, organizing backlink data, and drafting outreach emails. What you can’t do is use AI or any tactics that would bypass Google’s AI detection. So it’s always advised that you can use AI to speed up the process, but depending on it for everything, like a universal choice, would be a bad move.
When you use link building tools for AI, take what it offers you, like a backlink checker, to identify toxic backlinks. These checkers would tell you about the links that you don’t want your website to get associated with. Use the knowledge, but do not discard every link that it shows since AI can show false triggers too. Thus, it’s advised that you check the link manually for yourself and do what works best for you.
Where AI gets compromised
Data invention
AI tools can provide data that may be convincing but may not be accurate. Ahref has reported that if you give AI tools complete access without any source, it may create made-up figures to fill any information gap.
For instance, we have used ChatGPT to show the backlink count of the competitors, and it showed us 6,000 referring domains. When we researched manually, the count was very different. This can lead to bad link-building decisions because the information is incorrect. If you want to correct this through AI, you can use the help of AI agents to verify data sources and use correctors such as API and MCP.
Judgement issue
AI can help identify potential websites, but it cannot detect if the links are worthy enough for backlinks. In a test, Search Engine Central found out that ChatGPT had real issues finding out the website quality and had real issues during link-building opportunities. Please note that various AI tools have been upgraded since then, so there might be an improvement in link-building opportunities, but the final output will always include a check of relevancy and organic visibility.
Human Approval
AI agents might be able to handle several tasks and make it automated too, but that does not mean it should decide for you. For instance, you can use the AI agents to help you prepare a prospect list, but that does not mean it is the final list. It gives you a list of 100 websites, but it’s up to you to see which ones should be taken into account and which ones should be left out. Deciding which content to publish and which link-building techniques will still need human approval
How to get started right
According to Ahrefs ’ sources, you should streamline the entire task with AI but choose to automate certain sections; for instance, you could tell the AI to research a website and find ways to contact the publisher while you draft the final outreach email. In addition, you could use the AI tools to create linkable assets like a calculator or free software that people in your industry can use. Furthermore, you can use them to strengthen your website pages by identifying interlinking opportunities and anchor text
In closure
If you are wondering how AI is used in link building, that’s how it is used. Firstly, they are used by link builders to make workflows faster, and others are used by Google SpamBrain to identify and detect manipulative backlinks or spammy websites that exist for quick seo wins.
So the best approach is to use AI to improve efficiency while keeping human intervention for checking link quality and making strategic decisions. Always do your own research before trusting AI blindly.
