If you’re comparing Digital PR and link building, you’re probably trying to work out which one will help your business grow. The confusing part is that both can earn backlinks, so the services can look similar even when they’re being judged on different results.
A PR team might consider a campaign successful because your company appeared in publications your customers read. But if you were expecting backlinks and those articles don’t include any, you may not feel you received what you paid for.
Before choosing either service, I would want to understand what you’re hoping to achieve, because getting your business mentioned and getting a link to a particular page aren’t always the same job.
You can earn coverage without gaining a backlink
Let’s say you work for a software company, and your team publishes a comparison that helps customers understand a problem they’re facing. A trade publication uses your findings, mentions your company and links to the research, so you gain both relevant coverage and a backlink.
Now, let’s say the editor removes the link but keeps your explanation and company name. Your business still gets relevant coverage, even though you haven’t gained the backlink you were hoping for.
I would still see value in that mention if the publication reaches your potential customers, because it gives them a chance to learn about your business. But if the service you bought included a commitment to deliver backlinks, an unlinked mention doesn’t fulfil that commitment.
The coverage can have value without being the result you agreed to pay for.
The backlink might point to your study, not your service page
A journalist might link to your study because it supports their story, even though your service page is the one you want to rank. So the campaign could earn you a backlink, but it would point to the study rather than your service page.
Your study can still show readers that you understand their problem, which may encourage them to look at the services you offer. But they’re finding your service through the study, rather than following a link directly to your service page.
That means I would not treat those backlinks as the same result or assume that a link to your study will automatically help your service page rank higher.
If your main reason for buying link building is to support a particular page, the destination needs to be part of the conversation. Otherwise, you could receive genuine backlinks while still being disappointed that none point to the page you had in mind.
A bigger publication doesn’t always mean a better audience
If you sell software to a specific industry, an article in a national publication could introduce your company to plenty of people who will never need your product. A smaller industry publication might reach fewer readers, but more of them could be involved in choosing software like yours.
I would be interested in that smaller publication even if its domain score was lower, because the audience has a clearer connection to what you sell.
That doesn’t tell us which backlink would have more influence on rankings. It explains why I wouldn’t use a domain score alone to decide which placement is more useful to your business.
The same applies to the number of links. A report showing ten backlinks doesn’t tell you whether those articles reached suitable customers, explained your expertise or linked to a relevant page. You need that context before deciding whether the work was worthwhile.
Calling it Digital PR doesn’t make it earned coverage
There’s also a difference between a publisher choosing to use your contribution and being paid to place it.
If you pay for an article, calling it Digital PR doesn’t turn it into independent editorial coverage. Google’s link spam policy includes buying links that pass ranking credit among its examples, so the way a placement is obtained and treated still needs to be clear.
You should know whether you’re buying advertising, paying for outreach or commissioning research that a publisher may choose to cover. Those arrangements involve different expectations, even if the proposal uses the same service name.
So which one would I choose?
If your priority is earning backlinks to specific pages, I would start by discussing those pages and why another website would have a reason to reference them.
If you want potential customers to become more familiar with your business and its expertise, Digital PR may be useful even when some coverage doesn’t include a link.
You can want both. A useful study could earn references while also introducing your company to people who haven’t heard of it before. But the proposal and reporting should distinguish those results, so you can see what the campaign actually delivered.
For me, the decision comes back to what you need the work to achieve. Once that is clear, it becomes much easier to judge whether Digital PR, link building or a combination of the two makes sense for your business.
Related Digital PR guides
How much does Digital PR cost in Australia? Start with the scope · How to measure Digital PR results beyond backlinks · When is a small business ready for Digital PR?
