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Google on Reciprocal Linking |
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Written by Joel Lesser
December 20, 2006
Earned versus Non-earned Links
> Big ruckus going on over at Web Master
> World (WMW) about reciprocal linking...
- Moderator Comment, LED Digest 2311
After you read through the ruckus at WebmasterWorld, it's important for
all website operators to remember that the only official Google
policies are those published under its corporate banner. Everything
else you read on the web is opinion. Even those blogs published by
Google employees include disclaimers that will point you to Google.com
for official policy.
In regard to linking, the Google Webmaster and Quality Guidelines have
not changed (although they did update them recently), saying in part:
"Don't participate in link schemes designed to increase your
site's ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers
or "bad neighborhoods" on the web, as your own ranking may be affected
adversely by those links ... Keep in mind that our algorithms can
distinguish natural links from unnatural links. Natural links to your
site develop as part of the dynamic nature of the web when other sites
find your content valuable and think it would be helpful for their
visitors. Unnatural links to your site are placed there specifically to
make your site look more popular to search engines."
If anyone can find anything in the above OFFICIAL Google policy
that defines reciprocal links between two sites with content valuable
to each other's visitors as "unnatural", I'd sure like them to point it
out to us blind people who can't see it.
The original post from the rep from Google did not say all reciprocal links are bad. The original post referred twice to "non-earned" links. It's safe to assume "non-earned" means no editorial
discretion took place to earn that link. Editorial discretion means
that you or another human who represents your website has reviewed and
approved or rejected all link exchange requests with human eyes, making
linking decisions based on what benefits the end user, not the search
engines.
There is a big difference between what is defined as a non-earned reciprocal link and a reciprocal link earned with editorial discretion.
Here's a perfect example... Just this past week, a large news organization called Gannett who owns USAToday linked to one of our aviation sites (ATCMonitor.com) from a huge report. That's a huge link endorsement. We linked back to them from our forum so that our own users could read the entire report. Technically, this is a RECIPROCAL LINK. Some might argue that we should remove our link to their site so it's a one way link. That's bad advice because removing the link to the report would not benefit our end user's experience.
We don't make linking decisions here based on how we think it might affect our page rank, link popularity, or other criteria. We link when it benefits the end user.
What Google is -- rightly -- penalizing are bad linking practices, webmasters who obtain links (sometimes irrelevant) in high volume using full duplex software's or services that make links without editorial discretion. And the people who are crying and whining about it are primarily con artists who have been getting rich off promoting bad linking practices and phony search engine-spamming schemes and, of course, the webmasters who have been misled into
buying into those schemes.
Continue to link and be linked to when it benefits your end users. If you use software to manage link exchange, make sure the software is EDITOR BASED so you have full editorial control over what links are published and which link exchanges are rejected. Do not worry about a link that is reciprocated when it benefits your end users experience, or helps them to learn more about your own product or service.
Linking is what makes the web a web. Google is rightly working on is how to discern good link exchange from abusive link exchange. Don't let this scare you away from exchanging links with quality websites when it benefits the end user.
Best Regards,
Joel Lesser, President/CEO
LinksManager.com
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