Hi

Apologies if this has been covered already, had a quick look but couldn't find anything.

Recently, I have been doing a lot of link building. I have been doing this by submitting to directories under the relevant categories and recipricol linking with relevant sites. Trying very hard to keep everything 'relevant'.

I have came across a lot of sites offering 'link exchange'. I have also noticed a lot of sites that rank well, some not so well that recipricol link with sites such as this. I am aware of Free For All link exchange programs where you join for a fee and everyone links to each other. For the record, I don't want to do this.

As i'm not sure about the rules for posting URL's, if you search "free link exchange", you will see the sites I mean. Alot of these sites have a high PR value and also rank well in Google....

Does that mean they are not doing anything wrong? Or have Google just not got around to 'filtering' them out yet?

My biggest concern is that one new client already has a few 'free link exchange' sites linking to them and although it doesn't appear so, I am a little worried that they could be harmful.


Thanks

KP

Hi KPickenJr

If I were you, instead of searching for "free link exchange" I would search for search terms related to my web site content and try to get links from sites that show up for these keywords.

Hi SuperZu

Thanks for the reply.

I should have said this in my first post but I have not been searching for this with the intention of taking the sites up on their offer. Infact, I came up with the search term "free link exchange" after coming across one of the sites, therefore I only used this example because I didn't want to 'name and shame' the sites. The search terms just shows you the kind of sites I am refering to.

My question is;

Why does Google appear to 'like' those sites e.g high PR value, the sites actually rank well etc

And, could these sites linking to my clients site damage it in any way? I know there is debate as to whether off page factors can effect a site negatively, but from reading threads in this forum, I reckon it has pretty much been concluded that low profile websites CAN be effected negatively from 'bad' inbound links. The site I am talking about has 2 or 3 of these free link exchange websites linking to it...

Gues another question would be - why do they seem to get away with it?

According to Google guidelines ranking takes into account more than 100 factors to determine the relevance of each result so it would be difficult to determine the actual triggering reason why these sites rank well. It is of course possible that they use black-hat techniques to rank well that haven't been detected by Matt Cutts' spam-o-meter yet ;) .

Although Google itself says that there's almost nothing a competitor can do to harm your ranking (such as link to you from a link farm) in the facts&fiction section of the guidelines, I do think that taking part in large scale link schemes is something you should avoid because in some weird way I think it does actually affect ranking.

My motto is: if I'm not sure about a site or its methods, I don't exchange links with them. In my experience (7+ years of successful seo) it is much better to just "grow" links naturally by having great and unique content.

Thanks again for the reply.

I agree with your points regarding link farms and understand that Google probably just haven't caught them yet. I just find it strange as they are blatantly offering link exchange, I can't see anything secretive about what they are doing - they are shameless, actually. The content and techniques they would want to hide are right there, on the sites being advertised and optimised for - surely even a 'robot' can figure that out? ;)


In my experience (7+ years of successful seo) it is much better to just "grow" links naturally by having great and unique content.

I also like this theory and would love to be able to do this. However, I optimise for the Travel industry and you need a significant amount of inbound links to rank for even mildly competitive terms. Therefore, if I were to 'sit and wait' for links, I wouldn't get anywhere as all/most of my competitors are constantly getting more links....

To add to my frustration, I have a Ski site that I am working on. In my opinion the content on it is unmatched yet it doesn't rank for anything other than the company name. The site had been live for about a year before I started working on it and the guy who owns the company prides himself in good content (for the users sake) yet - no/hardly any links.... Plus, the site was stuck in the supplemental index, which I have managed to overcome through directory submissions.

Thanks

KP

KP,

As it happens I work for the travel industry too! We should get together at SES London for drinks, more geek talk & brainstorming about optimizing for keywords with 100,000,000 + results in google :D

I know natural link building is a long wait for results but I think that in the long run it is worth it. Before starting at my current job I was optimizing the web site for a hotel in Rome and I managed to get them in the top ten for the 5 most important and searched keywords, and we also managed to stay there over time. It is the only sane way to go.

Maybe the ski site owner has another seo working on the site before you that did something he or she shouldn't, something you would'nt be immediately aware of like doorway pages on another domain or lots of pages with duplicater content or something similar. The fact that it was stuck in supplemental results must have meant that google thought the site pages were very similar to some other site (or worse: sites).

I am not sure If I will be attending the one in London yet, but if I am I will be sure to take you up on your offer :)

I've been pushing for the one in Miami :D lol, if you don't ask - you don't get!

I know natural link building is a long wait for results but I think that in the long run it is worth it.

How do you handle customers when doing it like this? A large portion of my time is spent explaining to customers that SEO is on-going, takes time etc, even although this is all explained to them at the beginning...

My clients are really travel agencies. To give an example, I created top ten destination pages for the very first client I had. The pages contained information on the destination as well as up to date offers. They ranked within the first 2-3 pages of Google straight away.

Currently, if you take the same search terms e.g "holidays to gran canaria" - you get no where without lots of inbound links. I would go as far as to say that time spent on content is better spent on links, until you actually rank well. At this point, work on content in order to rank for 'long tail' terms e.g "holidays to gran canaria from glasgow" etc etc.

I think that you will get links 'naturally' once you have achieved decent visibility, either on the results pages (where everyone can see you) or through lots of directory listings - which is really just link building... Otherwise, I would say 'good luck with the content :rolleyes: ' - or in my case, good luck explaining to customers that they won't see anything for 9 months :eek:

lol - apologies if i'm rambling on.

Thanks

KP

You can always refer them to other clients that are willing to give positive feedback of your work or refer to the google section about SEO that says that no SEO can guarantee #1 rankings etc. :cool:

There is a free non-profit Link Exchange at www.quicktrader.com.au however this is directed to websites with Australian content.

James

Why does Google appear to 'like' those sites e.g high PR value, the sites actually rank well etc
Toolbar PR doesn't really mean anything at this point, so I wouldn't make a big deal out of what you're seeing. It's quite possible that the number is simply a reflection of how many links the sites have (regardless of the quality of those links).

Gues another question would be - why do they seem to get away with it?
I haven't done the Google search you suggested and so I haven't seen the exact sites you're referring to. But ... if all they're doing is promoting link exchanges, what are they really getting away with? (If they're doing something underhanded, that's perhaps a different story.)

There's nothing inherently wrong with trading links, so it's not a practice a search engine would ban. What they would do -- and generally speaking, what G is doing -- is make those arrangements useless in terms of helping you rank. So the sites in question can continue to offer link trades all they want, but there's really no point in doing it.

Plus, the site was stuck in the supplemental index, which I have managed to overcome through directory submissions.
Sounds like you're headed in the right direction, then.

When you mention the site being live for a year and not ranking, are you only referring to G? That wouldn't be unusual, so don't give up. And don't forget about the other search engines. Diversify for success.

How do you handle customers when doing it like this? A large portion of my time is spent explaining to customers that SEO is on-going, takes time etc, even although this is all explained to them at the beginning...
Marketing online now is more like marketing offline than ever before. If the client wants immediate exposure, s/he pretty much has to take the advertising route. It's the same way in the 'real world' -- you don't get a rush of people walking in the front door right away, but if you advertise smartly and get an effective message in front of potential customers, you can get the quick exposure you want.

And what about other marketing ideas -- press releases, article placement, contests, etc.?

HTH.