Question about linking

I recently read that reciprocal linking and/or linking to low PR sites will get you penalized in the search engines. Is this true or false?

IMO, heavy reciprocal linking "is" a scheme designed to manipulate search engine placement. Since this type of manipulation "is" against most, if not all, search engine's TOS I could easily see a penalty resulting.

With that said, what is considered "heavy"? I believe only the SE's know that answer.

As for being penalized for linking to low PR sites... I'll assume you mean low PR pages since pages have PageRank and not "sites". With that out of the way, I can't see the Search Engine's penalizing a page just because it links to a low PR page. However, if the low PR page has low PR because of a "Penalty" then that is a different story.

Hmmm... okay, that makes sense.

Even if the search engines don't penalize for reciprocal linking, IMO a webmaster would be better served "building content" than investing time in a "reciprocal linking" campaign.

I see this question quite often and recently I read an article that might shine some light on how Google determines who or what to penalize.

Below is a exerp from an article about Google potentially penalizing a site for a sudden influx of new pages:

Quote:

According to a Google engineer at the WMW conference, Google does not specifically filter for any one particular thing like that. Instead the algorithm looks at other similar situations and determines if the action is good or bad. For example, if a 2-page site suddenly adds 10,000 pages, there may in fact be a legitimate reason for it to do so. But the algorithm will first make the assumption that the action is "suspicious" and will then look at a large sample of other 2-page sites that have suddenly added 10,000 pages. If the majority of those sites were considered spammy, then your site will get lumped into the same spammy category. Of course, if the majority of those sites were deemed to be legitimate, then your site would likewise be deemed legitimate. Basically, he admitted that there may in fact be absolutely nothing wrong with your site, but it may be filtered or penalized if it fits the profile of other sites that have been marked as spammy.

I can this same model being applied to other decisions.

Now that makes sense to me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jackie

I recently read that reciprocal linking and/or linking to low PR sites will get you penalized in the search engines. Is this true or false?

There are a lot of speculations and rumors, but IMO, reciprocal linking is one of the safest and effective SEO techniques.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ohcnetwork

There are a lot of speculations and rumors, but IMO, reciprocal linking is one of the safest and effective SEO techniques.

IMO, "well chosen and well placed" reciprocal links are very important as they are known to be part of the search engines current algorithms.

In SEO, you have to take into account two attributes which affect the "link's" importance to your rankings:

1. Page Popularity (How many visitors to your the liked site)
2. Page Relevancy (Is the site that links to you have content that compliments yours).

So, if you're site sells CDs and you link to trucker site that has 1000 hits per day, that may not give you the same results if you link to a site that has 500 hits a day, but is a site that sells Jewel cases. (I apologize for the rough numbers

)

Best,

Ritchie

	#1
Jackie	Question about linking I recently read that reciprocal linking and/or linking to low PR sites will get you penalized in the search engines. Is this true or false?

	#2
Sensei	Re: Question about linking IMO, heavy reciprocal linking "is" a scheme designed to manipulate search engine placement. Since this type of manipulation "is" against most, if not all, search engine's TOS I could easily see a penalty resulting. With that said, what is considered "heavy"? I believe only the SE's know that answer. As for being penalized for linking to low PR sites... I'll assume you mean low PR pages since pages have PageRank and not "sites". With that out of the way, I can't see the Search Engine's penalizing a page just because it links to a low PR page. However, if the low PR page has low PR because of a "Penalty" then that is a different story.

	#3
Jackie	Re: Question about linking Hmmm... okay, that makes sense.

	#4
SEO-LAD	Re: Question about linking Even if the search engines don't penalize for reciprocal linking, IMO a webmaster would be better served "building content" than investing time in a "reciprocal linking" campaign.

	#6
Jolly Roger	Re: Question about linking Now that makes sense to me.

	#9
cs_obd	Re: Question about linking In SEO, you have to take into account two attributes which affect the "link's" importance to your rankings: 1. Page Popularity (How many visitors to your the liked site) 2. Page Relevancy (Is the site that links to you have content that compliments yours). So, if you're site sells CDs and you link to trucker site that has 1000 hits per day, that may not give you the same results if you link to a site that has 500 hits a day, but is a site that sells Jewel cases. (I apologize for the rough numbers ) Best, Ritchie

Question about linking

Internet Marketing