Link building has been dead for years, for those who failed to adapt to the ever-changing rules and increased requirements on skills, tools, details, and perseverance.
There has been much talking about links being a ranking factor. Many SEOs have only focused on content and On-Page SEO and neglected links saying: "We already know everything about links". But do they know everything about links?
Links are important since Google confirmed that links are the #1 ranking factor, alongside great content. Ranking without links is hard, and why would anyone try to rank without links in the first place? Google cares about links more than anything, and so should you.