Agency retainer link building — package the desk, not a fake quota

Most agencies already sold the links. The retainer says “authority,” “content plus outreach,” or a number that looked fine in the proposal. Production is the part that breaks: you do not want an outreach pod on payroll, and you do not want the client to learn a second vendor’s name. Packaging links inside the retainer means the client sees your brand on the delivery sheet and never sees our invoice.

The SKUs you put inside that retainer are the same SKUs on the public site: guest posts and niche edits. Wikipedia, adult, CBD, crypto, and directories stay Enquire Now — still white-labelable on the PDF, still quoted. Casino uses the iGaming table, not English GP $125. There is no secret agency menu. If a partner programme is 30% above the public card, you are paying for a logo swap.

This guide is the packaging problem. The fulfilment product is white-label link building. The rate card is pricing. Guest-post resale tactics sit on white-label guest posts for agencies. In-house overflow without a logo swap is outsource outreach, not this page.

Promise the DR band, the mechanic, and the replacement rule. Do not promise fifty live URLs by Friday or a #1. Quality is not infinite same-week capacity. If the brief cannot be filled cleanly, an honest desk says so. A retainer that sells “10 DR70s a month” will train the client to count rows instead of opening URLs. That is how you inherit a marketplace fight.

Itemising our cost on their bill trains them to shop vendors. Bundling is usually cleaner: DR40+ $250 placements inside an “authority” line so the client never sees a per-link invoice. Some shops pass DR20+ through at $125 and charge for strategy on the retainer. Both are legitimate. We do not police your retail price. We do not appear on invoices you send.

English guest posts: $125 / $175 / $250 (most popular) / $275 / $450. English niche edits: $99 / $140 / $160 / $220 / $280, quote-only. International GP $175–$495. Typical TAT about two weeks, 20-day maximum on standard DR work. If the live link drops, we replace it — still white-label. That is what you can honestly resell.

SKU 2R60XR is the Basic Backlink Package: from $1,500 a month for a scoped monthly fulfilment desk. You send the month’s URLs, exclusions, and DR mix. We run outreach, QC, placement, and a live-URL report. Replacements stay on us. It is the retainer-shaped door when you are tired of raising a PO for every post.

It is not a 50-link quota. It is not a cheaper pile of guest posts. It is not a lock-in that survives a month you have no work. Scope the month in writing or you will argue about volume. If you only need two packaged English guest posts, order those bands instead. If you need a bench that stays warm, 2R60XR is the SKU.

The monthly package is never attached to a single-link DR card. Do not tell a client that $1,500 equals six DR70s. Tell them it equals a desk that works the brief you already sold. Quote White-label and Agency on the form if the month is mixed or specialised. Order 2R60XR when the scope is already boring.

The artefact your AM forwards should list live URL, target URL, anchor, followed or sponsored, status, DR and traffic as reported, and the date it went live. Your masthead. No Worldwide Backlinks logo, URL, or “powered by” line on the client PDF. Internally we keep the raw URLs so replacements are still our problem.

We never talk to your client. Not on email, not on Slack, not on a “quick intro call” unless you put us on that call. NDA on request for client names, destination URLs, and report files. We will not sign a document that contradicts the public rate card or that hides live URLs from you. Confidentiality is whose logo is on the PDF. It is not a trap that stops you from QC’ing the work.

Ahrefs and Semrush figures are metrics on that sheet, not a claim those companies are clients. DataForSEO is the in-house QC tool used before a host is approved — a scan, not an invented score. If you need colours or a logo on the first order, send them at onboard. We do not host a sample-reports portal your client could Google back to us.

Because the rate card is public, your margin is yours. Some agencies pass cost through and charge for strategy. Some bury placements inside a monthly line. We do not publish a client-count or “agencies we power” figure to make the markup look safer. We do not take a cut of your retail. You keep 100% of what you charge.

Do not promise 48-hour delivery, money-back on rankings, or a named journalist we have not quoted. Those are not things we sell, so they cannot be things you honestly resell. Promise what this site promises: manual placements, reported indexing, replacements, and the DR band you ordered.

Digital PR, HARO/Connectively, and Wikipedia can sit inside a retainer only as quoted add-ons. They are not English GP $125 and they are not 2R60XR filler. If a client asked for a newsroom hit, say so on the White-label brief. If they asked for ten blog posts, stay on the guest-post table.

Stay per-link when the retainer’s link line is small, seasonal, or still being scoped. A first order of a handful of DR40+ English guest posts at $250 tells you more than a 12-month MSA. There is no monthly minimum on the public tables on purpose. If a vendor needs a retainer before they will show you a live URL, they are financing their prospecting with your cash.

Stay per-link when the client is a hard niche. Adult, CBD, and crypto are Enquire Now. Casino is a different table. Stuffing those into a $1,500 “basic” month is how you miss TAT and then invent a farm. Quote the vertical. Do not hide it inside a retainer SKU.

Move to 2R60XR when the book already has a predictable monthly brief and you want one door instead of five checkout links. You can still add ad-hoc English guest posts on top. The monthly desk is capacity. It is not a ceiling on the rate card.

Write down the mechanic, the DR mix, the geos, and the replacement rule. Write down what is out of scope: rankings, same-day DR50+, named journalists, Wikipedia forever-live, ChatGPT mentions. If the proposal is silent, the QBR will invent a promise you cannot keep.

Languages belong in the scope. Native writers cover 15+ languages. A Japanese money page does not get “internationalised” by leftover English blogs. Use the international rows when the host language is not English. Australia, UK, and USA English briefs still need the right hosts — language is not geo.

Worldwide Backlinks was founded in 2022 in Richmond, Victoria — Building 1, 658 Church Street, 3121 — after buying messy inventory from other vendors and then having to explain it to clients. Teams in Australia, Singapore, and the Philippines. 10,000+ backlinks, 100% manual. We will sign the NDA. We will not put our name on your PDF. Quote White-label, or order the monthly package if the month is already scoped.