If you're new to the internet marketing business like me, you're bound to have read about search engine optimization (SEO) to boost your pagerank.

And of course you've come across the term backlinks and just how fundamental they are to your SEO strategies in getting your page recognised by the big G.

What's the next thing you do? Why you start backlinking of course. You try every way possible to get those backlinks. You leave comments on blogs and posts... you submit your website to directories.... you submit articles to prestigious article directories.

In fact you get so caught up in it that you start losing sleep over it. And in my case, you start neglecting your wife and forget to brush your teeth. And boy do you pay dearly for that. The mrs starts complaining and before you know it you're sleeping on the couch tonight.

Whether you like it or not, there comes a point when you realize that getting backlinks the old fashioned way eats up too much of your energy and time.

There's a much better alternative to that though. And that's to buy backlinks. Yup, there're a whole lot of companies out there who build backlinks and then deliver these backlinks right to your doorstep (or in this case right to your webpage).

Of course you don't just go out there and buy just any package that comes along. Here are 10 things to consider when you buy backlinks.

1. Budget

It's very easy to get carried away when investing in your website. But you must have a budget and stick to it, otherwise you'll be making losses more than profits

2. Quality Vs Quantity

Always remember this .... one good backlink from a reputable website (websites with a high Google pagerank e.g. Hubpages) is worth more than hundreds of little backlinks from obscure, unknown, low pagerank websites. And that's a fact.

3.  Buy backlinks related to what your business is doing

If you sell cars and you buy backlinks from medical websites, that's probably not going to help your business much is it?

4. Buy backlinks from a reputable company

It's every consumer's right to know exactly what they're buying. If a company offers you 2000 PR5 backlinks, then ask them to prove it before you make any purchase.

5. Buy deep links

Deep links point to specific pages on your website. Backlinks are more effective when they point to exact places on your website e.g. the page which has the most keywords, rather than your general homepage

6. Buy backlinks in logical amounts

Don't go buying packages which offer like .... 100,000 backlinks. Google will definitely pick up on this and mark them down as illegal. Which brings me to my next point ....

7. Spread out your backlinks targets if you buy big packages

Meaning to say that if you get backlink packages that go into thousands, spread out your website targets. Don't just focus all your backlinks on your main website. Spread them out between your Web 2.0 sites, your social bookmark sites, your social networking pages and the like.

8. Most importantly, use your head when buying backlinks

If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. It's always good to do research when spending your money. Make sure you know what you're getting before you part with your dollar.

So keep a level head, weigh out your options, find the best deal and buy backlinks with confidence. I did, and it gave me tremendous results.