Link Building That Works in 2026 (James Dooley Interviews Charles Floate)

James Dooley: Link building that actually works in 2026. Today I’m joined by Charles Floate, who a lot of people know for black hat SEO strategies and parasite SEO strategies. But while that’s what many people associate him with, Charles also builds a lot of genuinely strong brands. He uses his deep understanding of how search engines work and how SERPs can be manipulated, but he also builds legitimate brands that make serious money. When it comes to link building specifically, a lot of people still chase dofollow links on high DR websites. But is that still what works in 2026? Or has the game changed? People are talking more about branded mentions, consensus signals, and trying to get visibility inside LLMs, AI Overviews, and tools like ChatGPT. So let’s jump straight in. Charles, what link building strategies are working for you right now in 2026? Charles Floate: For Google specifically, the number one tactic right now is consensus-based link building. Google has a link graph, and just like it analyzes documents, it also analyzes relationships between domains. It groups domains into topical clusters. Some domains are considered highly authoritative within a specific topic cluster, and others are not. The goal is to get as many of the domains within that cluster to link to you as possible. That reinforces trust signals, expertise, and authoritativeness. That’s essentially what E-E-A-T really is. One thing I always remind people is that E-E-A-T is roughly 99% off-page. Google looks for signals from websites it already trusts to confirm your expertise in a topic. James Dooley: That’s interesting because over the last couple of years people spoke less and less about link building. But in the last few months it feels like it has become more important than ever. It’s no longer just about a single high DR dofollow link. It’s about building consensus across multiple domains. You need multiple referring domains talking about who you are, what you do, your entity attributes, your awards, testimonials, reviews, case studies — all of that being corroborated across the web. Would you agree that link building and third-party mentions have actually become more important because of AI? Charles Floate: One thousand percent. I’ve spoken to a lot of Fortune 500 CMOs and COOs recently who, for the first time in years, are suddenly interested in link building and SEO again. In the past, SEO was often sidelined in boardroom marketing discussions. When budgets were cut, SEO was often the first thing to go. But now we’re seeing companies spending more on SEO, AI SEO, digital PR, link building, and brand mentions than on many other marketing channels. In certain industries, ads are becoming more expensive or more restricted. So companies are shifting budgets toward organic strategies. James Dooley: I think a big reason for that is how AI affects the customer journey. When someone sees an ad now, they often go straight to AI tools to check credibility. They ask questions like: “Is this company trustworthy?” “Are these products legit?” “Are they worth it?” AI tools can instantly return answers like “mixed reviews” or “good reputation.” That massively impacts conversion rates. Previously, people might research competitors at the end of the buying journey. But now AI evaluates brand reputation at the start. So instead of just generating leads, you now need AI to recommend you as the best option. AI has effectively become a 24/7 recommendation engine. That’s why third-party corroboration and consensus building have become so important. Charles Floate: Exactly. And the ROI can be incredible. Organic traffic is becoming more valuable as ad costs increase. And SEO campaigns can generate traffic and AI recommendations for years from work you do today. That kind of long-term ROI is hard to match with other marketing channels. James Dooley: Let’s break down some specific link building tactics and you can give a quick yes or no on whether they work in 2026. First — digital PR and newspaper links. Charles Floate: Yes, 100%. The problem is that many agencies focus on irrelevant campaigns. For example, a tech website might run a PR campaign about “Halloween costumes for dogs.” Sure, it might get links from newspapers, but it doesn’t reinforce topical authority. I’d rather have fewer but more relevant links that strengthen the entity signals around the brand. James Dooley: That’s something we’ve been doing internally too. Our link building strategies now mirror our topical maps. We build semantic content clusters and reinforce them with off-site mentions.

Next question: guest posts.

Charles Floate: Guest posts work incredibly well if they’re done properly. The problem is that many people post low-quality AI articles and move on. Instead, you should use guest post content to reinforce entity signals, co-occurrence, and keyword rankings. If done properly, a guest post can provide long-term value. Most people are leaving huge amounts of value on the table. James Dooley: Exactly. For us it’s less about DR and dofollow now. It’s about confidence, clarity, and rankings. If the content confidently reinforces the entity and ranks itself, it contributes to consensus.

Next one: niche edits.

Charles Floate: Niche edits are still extremely powerful. But people often fail to do proper due diligence. You should analyze the page, the traffic, the keywords, the link profile, and the site’s historical data. Spending 10–15 extra minutes evaluating a link opportunity can dramatically increase the impact. When done correctly, niche edits can be more powerful than ever because root domain authority carries so much weight. James Dooley: Especially when you can get your brand added to a trusted listicle that already ranks and is cited by AI models. But blindly buying dozens of irrelevant niche edits is basically worthless now. Next — press releases. Charles Floate: For link authority specifically, I’m not a huge fan. But they are very useful for entity stacking and reinforcing social profiles and citations. They help validate brand signals in the knowledge graph. As a ranking link tactic they’re weaker, but they’re still valuable for entity validation. James Dooley: What about automated links like blog comments, GSA, Money Robot, and similar tools? Charles Floate: I wouldn’t point those directly at a money site. They can still be useful for tiers, but I prefer contextual automated links through tools that generate higher quality content. With modern AI tools, you can generate much stronger contextual articles, which makes automated link tiers far more effective. James Dooley: What about PBNs? Charles Floate: PBNs are making a comeback. Google currently seems to be giving strong weight to root domain authority again. Homepage links from PBNs can be extremely powerful. The problem is public PBN marketplaces. Those often get burned because many clients use them poorly. Private, exclusive PBN networks still work extremely well. James Dooley: What about homepage rentals or sitewide sponsorship links? Charles Floate: They work very well in non-English search markets where semantic analysis is weaker. In English search they’re less effective unless used alongside other advanced techniques. James Dooley: What about aged domains? Charles Floate: They’re still working very well in international markets. Interestingly, topical relevance matters less than it used to. You could take an expired restaurant domain and rank it for something unrelated like casino terms. But they’ve become less effective in English search recently. James Dooley: And redirects — 301s or canonicals? Charles Floate: We use them quite a lot, especially in competitive niches where other black hat techniques are common. But if you try to use them in a very clean, high-authority SERP like insurance, they usually won’t work. Consensus still matters — Google expects to see the same patterns used by competitors. James Dooley: What about local SEO link strategies like citations, Google stacks, and cloud stacks? Charles Floate: I personally don’t do much local SEO, but I’ve seen those tactics work well. Local search has lower competition, so even basic links can make a big difference. They also help build consensus signals that feed into AI-driven map pack results. James Dooley: Alright, final question. Give us your quick summary for link building in 2026 — and feel free to mention PressWhiz. Charles Floate: PressWhiz is a rapidly growing link marketplace. We’ve built a search engine that lets users find guest posts and niche edits across a huge inventory of publishers. We currently have over 38,000 websites listed and we’re adding around 120 new publishers every day. Users can filter by category, keyword relevance, and domain metrics to find highly relevant link opportunities. You can upload your own content or have us write articles, and we also offer tier-2 link building and other services. James Dooley: Perfect. If you enjoyed this discussion on link building that works in 2026, check the links in the description for more episodes with Charles. We’ve also discussed Selection Rate Optimisation, AI SEO, and other advanced strategies. Charles, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Charles Floate: Thanks for having me.