Back links off the back of a paid sponsorship deal
-
Hey Mozzers,
I am in need of a bit of advice please?
I work for a Gyms chain in the UK and we are sponsoring a major sporting event next month.
As part of the deal we get a dedicated webpage and backlink from their high authority website.
We do not have a logo and multiple backlinks in the footer on every page of their website, so to my knowledge Google will not necessarily regard this as a paid backlink right?
Is there anything in the algorithm that is able to distinguish between the aforementioned backlink and a natural one?
Just wondering if our domain is linking to receive the equity or not?
Regards
Ben
-
Hi Ben,
Sponsoring events is a great link building tactic. As the link will come as a side-effect of the sponsorship rather than from direct payment, Google will not penalise you for this. Imagine the reverse - companies would be far less likely to sponsor events, support charities etc if Google were to start penalising them.
Here are a few posts you can look to for reassurance:
http://moz.com/blog/5-link-building-tactics-to-improve-your-local-rankings
http://www.wordtracker.com/blog/33-seo-experts-share-their-most-effective-link-building-strategies
http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/how-to/2064922/131-legitimate-link-building-strategies -
We will be supplying the content for our dedicated page on their webpage so will be completely unique and relevant to our domain's subject.
Thanks for your reply.
Ben
-
I'd be more concerned about duplicate content, actually. I've seen may instances like this where the event website simply grabs content off your website and links back to you with no regard for duplicates. That's the only thing I see the algorithm picking up. I wouldn't be concerned it would be tagged as a paid link from your description, especially since the link isn't what you are paying for, it's the sponsorship. You can see numerous examples of this when you look at sponsor profiles on all kinds of websites - even SEO conferences The link is a benefit for sure, but not the primary thing you are paying for.
This article from Search Engine Watch gets pretty detailed on what Matt Cutts considers a paid link: http://searchenginewatch.com/sew/news/2332787/matt-cutts-shares-4-ways-google-evaluates-paid-links#
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
-
Inbound link is follow link but we put no follow link back - is it beneficial for rankings?
Dear Moz Community, We are operating in a niche market, where there are not so many content marketing options. What we are left with are link exchanging with relevant sites that are on the same topic but to not directly compete with us. Now we know that if we link back to site A and site a links back to us - for google this is not a very good link. But, some of the sites we are exchanging links with, do not know the term follow vs no follow links. My question - if your link is to site A is a no follow link but they give us a follow link - does it mean thats a better option than a follow vs follow. Thanks for help!
Link Building | | advertisingcloud0 -
Spammy Links in MOZ but when I go to the external link I can't find a link to us
I was going to try to contact webmasters to see if they would remove some of our spammy links. I see alot of them in MOZ but when you go to the site our anchor text is not there. Is this good? How often does MOZ refresh external links. Please see: http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/anchors?site=www.totalvac.com None of the links for the anchor text <a class="clickable title link-pivot" title="See top linking pages that use this anchor text." data-text="vacuum cleaner parts vacuum parts vacuum bags vacuum cleaner bags" data-id="46391436859">vacuum cleaner parts vacuum part...</a> in MOZ exist? We got hit extremely hard by Penguin in May
Link Building | | totalvac0 -
I am getting links on people's wordpress blogs but are not showing up on the just discovered tool. Is it true that wordpress links are no-follow links that do give off any link-juice?
A blogger told me that "wordpress.com does not allow blogs to show advertisements or use links to sites that sell merchandise of any kind" is this true? Am i wasting my outreach time trying to get links from wordpress operated blogs?
Link Building | | odegi0 -
My website has no links to it at all :(
I paid good money for a company to build me a website, I just put my domain into open site explorer and I have no links at all, how do I get links to other domains etc ? Thanks for any help -James
Link Building | | Stoz0 -
"Activating" Links - Do External Links Have to Be Clicked On to Really Have Value?
I heard an SEO talk about the concept of "activating" a link - meaning that if an external link to your site exists, but google doesn't detect that it has gotten any actual clicks, they will significantly discount or ignore the value of the link. Obviously between Chrome, toolbars, and GA, google does have a lot of ways to detect whether a link has gotten clicks. What is the SEOmoz take on this issue?
Link Building | | kbrake0 -
Link Location: In main page or inner "Link" page?
My question is what´s best of Link Building: have it in main page or in internal Link Pages. I have the problem that have to reduce the number of outgoing links in my mainpage to rank better, but do not want to miss any linkjuice. How Linking in Main Page or Internal Pages affects SERP for your website? And should they be Follow or not Follow? Thanks in advance Maria Jesus
Link Building | | goperformancelabs0 -
Link values
I have an interesting question, it's more to see other peoples opinions than looking for an exact answer, as I know noone can give that. If you had a good link on harvard.edu.. how many very low quality links on low DA domains that are full of junk, would you need to match the harvard link... if all other factors were equal. I'm gonna go for 500.. I've had great results with a few high DA/trust links. I'm not looking for anyone to give me a definative answer, just curious as to the views of other SEOs 😄
Link Building | | PeterM220