The broken-link build, step by step: 6% placement rate at p50

The broken-link build, step by step: 6% placement rate at p50
Broken-link outreach converts at a 6% median vs 2% for plain guest-post asks — n=180 campaigns. The lift comes from giving before asking, but only if your replacement is genuinely better.

— Pick a resource page ranking top 20 for a target term
— Crawl its outbound links with a status checker, isolate 404s and 301-chains
— Confirm the dead target had real content via Wayback (skip if it was thin)
— Build or identify your equivalent page that covers the same intent
— Email the page owner: name the exact broken anchor, paste the line it sits in, offer yours
— Follow up once at day 4, then drop

Reply rate climbs from 7% to 19% when you quote the exact broken anchor text rather than saying 'a link on your page is broken.'

Sample: 180 broken-link campaigns, 2023-2024.
Quote the dead anchor verbatim in line one; specificity is the whole conversion.