Should I Do a Social Bookmarking Campaign and a Tier 2 Linking?
-
I don't see anything bad in manually creating links on different (about 50) social bookmarking services. Is this method labeled as White Hat?
I was wondering if it would be fine to create Tier 2 linking (probably blog comments) for indexing of the social bookmarking links?
Please share your thoughts on the topic.
-
The thing is though - these methods will not increase your rankings. Google has pretty much devalued any links that we have some form of control over (directories, forums, blog comments, social bookmarking sites - even guest posting).
-
I definitely don't plan this to be my only strategy.
I have successful websites ranking well for some pretty competetive keywords. Besides social media signals, established blog mentions etc. I thought this could give the website an additional bump to rank for some other competetive keywords.
-
If all you plan to do is drop your links in social bookmarking sites, you're probably just wasting your time. It's not likely that these links will be worth anything to search engines - even if they are followed links. The time you spend building these links could be spend developing great content, or working on other link-building opportunities that would be more worthwhile.
As far as blog comments go - if your goal is to get backlinks, it's not a good idea. These links are nofollowed and too many of them will look spammy to search engines. If you are commenting to engage with the content author, that's a different story. I often comment on other sites to engage with the content author and start a conversation. I sometimes choose to include my website as a reference, but I often choose to leave it out.
-
Zoran,
Looks like you picked up a copy of the 1996's Backpackers Guide to Linkbuilding. As Ricky said, that stuff's not worth much today. Basically, the more control you have over a link today, the less it is worth--with bookmarks being at the low end of the scale and editorial links from authoritative resources on the other end. Rather than spending your time at the low end, work on building out your social media profiles and figuring out who your audience is so you can publsh content for them and announce that content through your social channels.
-
Hey Zoran,
From my understanding social bookmarking on small and rarely used sites will have VERY little positive affect on search rankings. I like to follow Eric Ward's golden rule: ask yourself..would you want this link if Google did not exist?
Definitely think your time could be better utilized elsewhere!
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Is there a danger linking to and from one website too many times?
Basically my webdeveloper has suggested that instead of using a subfolder to create an English and Korean version of the site I should create two different websites and then link them both together to provide the page in English, or in Korean, which ever the case may be. My immediate reaction is that search engines may perceive this kind of linking to be manipulative, as you can imagine there will be a lot of links (One for every page). Do you think it is OK to create two webpages and link them together page by page? Or do you think that the site will get penalized by search engines for link farming or link exchanging. Regards, Tom
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | CoGri0 -
When to NOT USE the disavow link tool
Im not here to say this is concrete and should never do this, and please if you disagree with me then lets discuss. One of the biggest things out there today especially after the second wave of Penguin (2.0) is the fear striken web masters who run straight to the disavow tool after they have been hit with Penguin or noticed a drop shortly after. I had a friend who's site who never felt the effects of Penguin 1.0 and thought everything was peachy. Then P2.0 hit and his rankings dropped of the map. I got a call from him that night and he was desperately asking me for help to review his site and guess what might have happened. He then tells me the first thing he did was compile a list of websites back linking to him that might be the issue and create his disavow list and submitted it. I asked him "How long did you research these sites before you came the conclusion they were the problem?" He Said "About an hour" Then I asked him "Did you receive a message in your Google Webmaster Tools about unnatural linking?" He Said "No" I said "Then why are you disavowing anything?" He Said "Um.......I don't understand what you are saying?" In reading articles, forums and even here in the Moz Q/A I tend to think there is some misconceptions about the disavow tool from Google that do not seem to be clearly explained. Some of my findings with the tool and when to use it is purely based on logic IMO. Let me explain When to NOT use the tool If you spent an hour reviewing your back link profile and you are to eager to wait any longer to upload your list. Unless you have less than 20 root domains linking to you, you should spend a lot more than an hour reviewing your back link profile You DID NOT receive a message from GWT informing you that you had some "unnatural" links Ill explain later If you spend a very short amount of time reviewing your back link profile. Did not look at each individual site linking to you and every link that exists, then you might be using it WAY TO SOON. The last thing you want to do is disavow a link that actually might be helping you. Take the time to really look at each link and ask your self this question (Straight from the Google Guidelines) "A good rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've done to a website that competes with you, or to a Google employee" Studying your back link profile We all know when we have cheated. Im sure 99.9% of all of us can admit to it at one point. Most of the time I can find back links from sites and look right at the owner and ask him or her "You placed this back link didn't you?" I can see the guilt immediately in their eyes 🙂 Remember not ALL back links you generate are bad or wrong because you own the site. You need to ask yourself "Was this link necessary and does it apply to the topic at hand?", "Was it relevant?" and most important "Is this going to help other users?". These are some questions you can ask yourself before each link you place. You DID NOT receive a message about unnatural linking This is were I think the most confusing takes place (and please explain to me if I am wrong on this). If you did not receive a message in GWT about unnatural linking, then we can safely say that Google does not think you contain any "fishy" spammy links in which they have determined to be of a spammy nature. So if you did not receive any message yet your rankings dropped, then what could it be? Well it's still your back links that most likely did it, but its more likely the "value" of previous links that hold less or no value at all anymore. So obviously when this value drops, so does your rank. So what do I do? Build more quality links....and watch you rankings come back 🙂
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | cbielich1 -
Removing Unnatural Link Penalties
As soon as I began working in my current position at my current company I noticed my predecessor's tendency towards buying link packages from blackhat companies... I knew we were being penalized, and had to prove to him that we needed to halt those campaigns immediately and try our darndest to remove all poison links from the internet. I did convince him and began the process. There was 57% of our backlinks tied to the same anchor phrase with 836 domains linking to the same phrase, same page. Today there are 643 of those links remaining. So I have hit a large number of them, but not nearly enough. So now I am getting messages from Google announcing that our site has been hit with an unnatural link penalty. I haven't really seen the results of this yet in the keywords I am trying to rank for, but fear it will hurt very soon and know that I could be doing better in the meantime. I really don't know what to do next. I've tried the whole "contact the webmasters" technique and maybe have had 1/100 agree to remove our links. They all want money or don't respond.. Do I really need to use this Disavow tool?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | jesse-landry
I hear mixed things about it.. Anybody with experience here like to share their stories? Thanks for the moral support!0 -
Hidden links in badges using javascript?
I have been looking at a strategy used by a division of Tripadvisor called Flipkey. They specialize in vacation home rentals and have been zooming up in the rankings over the past few months. One of the main off-page tactics that they have been using is providing a badge to property managers to display on their site which links back. The issue I have is that it seem to me that they are hiding a link which has keyword specific anchor text by using javascript. The site I'm looking at offers vacation rentals in Tamarindo (Costa Rica). http://www.mariasabatorentals.com/ Scroll down and you'll see a Reviews badge which shows reviews and a link back to the managers profile on Flipkey. **However, **when you look at the source code for the badge, this is what I see: Find Tamarindo Vacation Rentals on FlipKey Notice that there is a link for "tamarindo vacation rentals" in the code which only appears when JS is turned off in the browser. I am relatively new to SEO so to me this looks like a black hat tactic. But because this is Tripadvisor, I have to think that that I am wrong. Is this tactic allowed by Google since the anchor text is highly relevant to the content? And can they justify this on the basis that they are servicing users with JS turned off? I would love to hear from folks in the Moz community on this. Certainly I don't want to implement a similar strategy only to find out later that Google will view it as cloaking. Sure seems to be driving results for Flipkey! Thanks all. For the record, the Moz community is awesome. (Can't wait to start contributing once I actually know what I'm doing!)
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mario330 -
Would you get link from this blog?
I have an opportunity to place a guest blog on a site. The site has the following metrics: DA/PA: 24/36 Inbound links: 3K+ from 16 root domains Here is what makes me uneasy: The number of links from the same domain, suggesting sitewide or footer links When I look at the backlinks, there are links from sites like http://best-american-law-firms.info/, or http://www.luvbuds.info/. They sare blogroll links that are likely paid for. Would you get a link from this blog?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | inhouseseo0 -
Do bad links "hurt" your ranking or just not add any value
Do bad links "hurt" your ranking or just not add any value. By this I mean, if you do have links from link farms and bad neighbourhoods, would it effectively pull you down in search engine rankings. Or is it more that it's just a waste of time to get these links, as it adds no value to your ranking. Are google saying avoid them because it will not have a positive effect, or avoid them becuase it will have a negative effect. I am under the opinion that it will not harm, but it will not help either. I think this because at the end of the day you are not 100% in control of your inbound links, any bad site could add you and if a competitor, god forbid, wanted to play some black hat games, couldn't they just add you to thousands of bad sites to pull your ranking down? Interested to hear your opinions on the matter, or any "facts" if they are out there.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | esendex0 -
Why are these sites so high with poor relevant links...
Hello, Keyword: TV Stands. I have been researching competitors for a client and we seem to be unable to understand why certains pages are ranking on page 1 of Google UK for keyword TV Stands. eg: http://www.furnitureinfashion.net/plasma-TV-stand.html (Google UK 8 - TV Stands) http://direct.tesco.com/q/N.1999542/Nr.99.aspx (Google UK 9 - TV Stands) The furniture in fashion has links from sites like: http://www.ummah.com/forum/ and http://www.muslimco.com/ which is totaly irrelevant to the site. Any ideas on other things as the tesco.com site does not have direct links to it. Cheers
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | JohnW-UK0