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Link Exchanges - Run Fast
By Mike Murray | December 13, 2007
Once in awhile, a client will ask us about link exchanges. A company with a sexy sales pitch promises the world and…
First of all, if you’ve never heard of the company making the pitch, you might want to check out their site. Usually a website speaks volumes, especially if you can’t find contact info, a Better Business Bureau logo, and client comments (with real names).
The person who recently pitched our client left their real phone number but no website address (another clue about being a goofball company). His name and number were enough to track him down (it was an amusing two-minute exercise). I’ll avoid the legal issues of showing his website. Suffice to say, it’s about three pages with a contact page that also goes to the About Me page with a funny, unprofessional sitting-at-my-desk-with-my-eyes jumping-out-of-my-face picture.
Back to links…
Link exchanges cry out: “We’re not relevant.” They also shout, “We only like link juice drops if there are any.” In other words, a page with a lot of links isn’t able to pass along a lot of link love.
Link exchanges are great if they’re relevant and discreet. If you find something valuable, link to it in your content. And if they like you, they may link back in a contextually sound way, not by adding you as listing No. 19 on a weird links collection page no one will visit and that lacks the power to make your favorite search term No. 1. on Google.
We’re always glad to help a client who is in doubt. Some sales pitches sound good, but smell bad when you give them any attention. Hopefully no one will hire the mystery man we came across.
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December 14th, 2007 at 7:10 pm
Not only that, Matt Cutts stated earlier this year that reciprocal linking has been diminished as a ranking factor for any web site and can harm a web sites rankings if the reciprocal linking is excessive. This hit home real hard in the real estate industry earlier in the year.
December 25th, 2007 at 11:46 am
Stop spreading misinformation. Matt Cutts has never stated that reciprocal linking has been diminished. Stop putting words in his mouth. Matt has stated very recently: “Trading links is natural and it’s natural to have reciprocal links.”
Google has stated in their guidelines to avoid “excessive reciprocal linking”. They are obviously referring to full duplex networks that force link exchange without editorial discretion. Google has never stated “do not link exchange”. Google obviously realizes websites link with each other when it is relevant. What is wrong with that? Nothing.