Most SEOs treat link building like a chore. Kristiyan Yankov built a whole agency on it. He’s the founder of Above Apex, a link-building agency niched hard on SaaS — and in this conversation with host Jeremy Rivera he lays out one of the sharpest, most practical models we’ve heard for building links (and brand mentions) in the AI era.

Kristiyan freelanced since high school, went through “generalist hell,” and niched down after Alex Hormozi’s “one avatar, one ICP, one service” clicked. Now he runs SaaS link campaigns full-time — and he’s refreshingly blunt about what actually works.

In this episode

  • Why SaaS is a richer link-building field than local — 5–10 viable strategies vs. a narrow local playbook
  • The real bottleneck isn’t knowledge, it’s bandwidth — why teams need a dedicated partner they don’t have to micromanage
  • Two pricing models: per-link vs. fixed, month-to-month (and why no lock-in drives lifetime value)
  • How to actually evaluate a link opportunity — 5–10 metrics, not just DR: “if it makes sense to me, it makes sense to Google”
  • The two best SaaS strategies: listicles/roundups (40%+ carry traffic and feed AI Overviews) and reverse expert-quote outreach (they’ve earned BBC links this way)
  • Anchor velocity, Penguin, and why spammy links get disregarded, not penalized (his read of the Google leak)
  • Timeline to impact (~30–60 days for well-run sites), the SMB sandbox, and the best DIY strategy for bootstrapped founders: three listicle “buckets”
  • The big-picture take: AI search is an extension of the fundamentals, not a replacement — and more than half of AI citations trace back to UGC platforms

Chapters

  • (00:00) Meet Kristiyan Yankov — from “generalist hell” to SaaS link building
  • (02:56) Why SaaS is a richer link-building field than local
  • (07:07) The #1 hurdle: bandwidth (and the case for a dedicated partner)
  • (08:37) Pricing — per-link vs. fixed, month-to-month, no lock-in
  • (12:34) Has AI/LLM demand made link-building budgets an easier sell?
  • (17:03) How to evaluate a link: “Google isn’t more stupid than me”
  • (19:59) Is Bing / alternate-engine link behavior worth chasing?
  • (22:31) The top two SaaS strategies: listicles & expert quotes
  • (27:03) Anchor velocity, Penguin & spam devaluation
  • (30:54) Timeline — when link building shows measurable impact
  • (32:12) Advice for SMBs & the sandbox effect
  • (35:15) The best DIY strategy: three listicle buckets
  • (37:08) Where to find Kristiyan

Notable quotes

“You shouldn’t trust anyone. You should verify — especially in our industry.” — Kristiyan Yankov“If I look at a link building opportunity and it makes sense to me, it would be the same for Google — because Google is definitely not more stupid than me.” — Kristiyan Yankov“The fundamentals aren’t going to disappear. When the hype is over, my team can still provide everything we do today.” — Kristiyan Yankov

Resources & links

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