D'oh! Stupid error!

Hello everyone.

Recently, i posted on Britannica's online reference to gain backlinks.
I used my SERP and i thought everything was going well.
I google my SERP the next day and i see that Britannica's rank 1 for that serp!
Did i mess up or am i just supposed to beat it.

I'm quite a noob at SEO so i'm still learning.

Also, is an actor on iMDB impossible to beat in terms of SEO rankings?

thanks
- smileplease