Securing a link from a major regional publisher such as the Houston Chronicle is high-value for SEO and brand visibility. We present two realistic approaches: the regular (paid or earned) route with typical costs and effort, and an alternative using expired domains plus a 301 redirect. The article states facts, cites authoritative sources, and outlines practical steps.
Traditional Routes and Typical Cost
There are three common traditional ways to obtain a link on HoustonChronicle.com:
- Earned editorial coverage. Pitching reporters, offering newsworthy material, or submitting op-eds can result in an editorial link. The Chronicle provides submission and advertising information on its media pages (Houston Chronicle media kit).
- Native / sponsored content. Publishers sell branded content or sponsored packages; comparable regional native campaigns commonly run in the low-to-mid thousands of dollars, depending on placement and amplification.
- PR campaigns or paying agencies. Hiring a PR firm to generate coverage or pitch the paper carries ongoing costs: retainers typically range from a few thousand dollars per month upward, while individual distribution or outreach fees start in the hundreds.
Typical summary cost estimates: earned editorial involves time/agency fees (from $0 to $10,000 depending on effort); sponsored/native content commonly ranges from $3,000 to $12,000+; PR outreach via agencies can run from $2,000 to $20,000+ per month depending on scope.
Why Those Prices Exist
Major publishers sell attention and workflow: editorial vetting, homepage placement, newsletter inclusion, and reporting. Media kits summarize inventory and pricing for advertisers and sponsors, which explains the non-trivial cost when guaranteed placement or amplification is required (Houston Chronicle advertising).
Expired Domain + 301 Redirect: How It Works
An alternative approach is to acquire a relevant expired domain that already has inbound links from authoritative sites and then implement a 301 redirect so link equity flows to your destination URL. The basic workflow consists of three steps:
- Find candidate domains. Use backlink tools to find expired domains with healthy backlink profiles (metrics such as Ahrefs Domain Rating, Majestic Trust Flow, Moz Domain Authority are common starting points). See Ahrefs’ explanation of Domain Rating (DR), Majestic’s Trust Flow, and Moz’s Domain Authority.
- Vet for quality and risk. Inspect Wayback Machine snapshots to verify historical content and check for spam or manual actions. The Wayback Machine is available at web.archive.org.
- Acquire and implement a 301. After purchase, configure server-level 301 redirects from the expired domain (or specific pages) to the target URL. Google’s documentation on permanent server-side redirects clarifies recommended practices (Google Search Central: 301 Redirects).
Effectiveness, Limits and Risks
If an expired domain previously received a link from houstonchronicle.com, a correctly implemented 301 may cause that linking page’s signal to flow to your site, producing referral traffic and potential link equity. The magnitude depends on the original link context, anchor text, topical relevance, and whether search engines treat the redirect as a valid 1:1 replacement.
Google’s public guidance and statements from search team members emphasize nuance. For example, a reporting of John Mueller’s comment reads: “I wouldn’t see it as ‘full credit or not’, but rather – as mentioned in our docs – it’s a good practice for any move to update the important old links to point at the right new pages.” This captures that relevance and intent matter (SERoundTable citing John Mueller).
There are documented policy and editorial considerations. Manipulative patterns—mass buying of expired domains solely to hoard links—can attract scrutiny. Always run spam and manual-action checks, and confirm the linking page still exists and contains the outbound link before acquisition.
Practical Steps to Execute
- Use tools such as Ahrefs, Majestic, and Moz to list candidate expired domains with referring domains and authority metrics. Prioritize domains that show a historical link from houstonchronicle.com.
- Check Wayback Machine snapshots and cached pages to inspect original content and why the Chronicle linked to that domain.
- Run spam/manual-action checks and review the backlink anchor profile; discard domains with heavy spam anchors or clear paid-link signals.
- After purchase, implement server-level 301s and monitor Google Search Console plus analytics for indexing and referral traffic changes. Follow Google’s site-move and redirect guidance (Google Search Central: Site moves).
Final Considerations
Traditional methods to secure a Houston Chronicle backlink—native advertising packages or PR outreach—are proven and often costly. The expired-domain + 301 approach can be a lower-cost alternative when executed carefully: it reduces one-time placement fees and can deliver referral equity if the expired domain carried the specific link you want. Trade-offs include technical, editorial, and policy risk which require careful vetting.
This is where we come in: we research, vet, acquire and set up the 301 for a flat fee of $150 per domain (domain registration/acquisition costs are separate). Our process includes domain-history checks, backlink verification, Wayback inspection, spam/manual-action screening, and server-level 301 configuration. For a company comparing a $6k native package to a targeted expired-domain test, our service offers a cost-efficient way to test link-equity transfer before committing large media budgets.
