Article Links
-
I write and publish artcles. Typically I publish them on a few top article sites like EZineArticles. The articles then get picked up by other sites, often numbering in the hundreds. All of the articles are published with a link back to our website using a keyword. Are there any SEO risks in this type of link proliferation?
-
Late to the part with this but I just can't see G penalising a site because it has too many links from articles with the same anchor text.
If that were the case we would see a lot of webmaters and SEOs arranging lots of those links to their competitors sites in order to de-rank them, thus leaving the way clear for their own sites.
-
Hey Everett,
Good answer - and it makes sense. Having once been banished to page four, I'm now being very careful about everything, especially over-optimized linking. Diversity is the way!
-
Jim the key to link building is diversity. It might still be worth doing a distribution now and then, but - like everyone below has said - your time is usually better spent in other ways, including putting high quality content onto your own website, doing exclusive guest posts on higher-quality sites, etc...
I would have endorsed someone's answer instead of posting my own, but have to disagree that there is no danger in building massive amounts of links using article distribution, as you describe. I have seen sites get hit with algorithmic penalties for having overoptimized anchor text in their links. So if you have thousands of such articles all pointing with the same, highly optimized text, and your link profile leans heavily toward these types of links from article distribution, you could trip a filter and end up with a penalty that sets you back anywhere from a few spots to a few pages - or even a +950 penalty if some of those links are suspected as being paid for.
Long story short: If you diversify and focus your efforts on the highest quality links you can get - you'll be fine.
-
Hey Mike, Thanks for the thought. I'm inclined to agree that there are better ways to improve search engine rankings, including adding content to my own site, writing on my blog, etc. So, in the end, I am left wondering if there is any value at all from investing time in writing articles.
-
Agree with Sean, time spent on writing for EZA would be better spent writing for your own blog or site. You can do some article marketing but don't obsess on it. If you outsource the writing then I would still keep it in moderation.
-
This is definitely the bottom of the barrel type link. You're not going to get penalized and it's not risky, but the time you spend working on an article that will go on a site like ezinearticles could be better spent on higher ROI link building. Plus, I read that ezine experienced a huge traffic drop with the most recent algo update and have talked about putting nofollow on article links.
-
I would say no. If this was a problem a lot of sites would get in trouble, too many for Google to go and mass penalise.
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
-
Internal linking
Hi, I currently have built my website with internal links to boost my category pages (the ones that are the most important with the most traffic). Is the way to go or nowadays or doesn't it matter what pages you boost. I beleive what I did is some sort of "page rank sculpting" but is it still useful ? or I should I link natural across my website even though some pages will get a boost and some won't ? The link that I have are at the bottom of my content (not in the footer) but at the bottom of the page next to each other ? does they count or is it really bad to have them that way ? I have a blog and I was wondering if when I link from my blog page for example about "Barolo" to my page about "Piedmont" if I should also link from my page about "Piedmont" to my Barolo page or if the link only has to go one way from my blog / Barolo page to my piedmont page to boost Piedmont. Thank you,
Link Building | | seoanalytics0 -
If someone were to link to our site on now on an old article (dating back 1-2 years) is that still beneficial if all other variables are good?
I'm trying to build up our external links and am finding lots of opportunities, some of which are on older articles dating back to 2014, 2013 etc. These pieces are relevant to our site and have high DA, I'm wondering if the post date of these articles matter? Thanks!
Link Building | | Postable0 -
Outgoing links
Hi Guy's, We have a website with no outgoing links (only Facebook). Is this a good way to score better in the SERPS? Or is it better to have some outgoing "relevant" links for a natural linkjuice? Thanks!
Link Building | | Happy-SEO1 -
Internal Links - How to Increase them, Categories not being considered as Internal Links
Hi All: As per my understanding, Internal Equity Passing Links is a metric defining PA. Now my website has around 65 internal links while few of my competitors have more than 180 links. I am unable to understand how to increase the internal links passing equity on my website, because I can see, more number of links on my website than my competitors but opensiteexplorer does not show that. I am really confused. Please help out if anyone knows something about this issue. Thanks in advance.
Link Building | | sidjain4you0 -
Outbound links
Hi there, i know inbound links are what hold the main value in terms of link building but if i have an inbound link from a big company such as ITV or BBC and they have put an article on their site linking back to mine, would it be beneficial if i made a comment on my site and then link back to their article or will this not really help? Sorry as you can tell im very new to seo! thanks anthony
Link Building | | anthonybriant0 -
Article Marketing
Hello, Our nearest ecommerce competitor has quite a few links from article directories like ezinearticles.com and similar sites. I know these sites are bottom of the barrel in SEO, but I've been thinking of writing a few 500 word articles and posting them on some of the strongest of these article directories. Maybe I'll stick to ezinearticles.com since I only like to get links from sites that are going to stick around. What do you think - which of these article directories going to be here for the long term? Mainly what I'm asking for here is a top 5 list of the best article directories, or perhaps a better article marketing strategy. I loved that whiteboard friday on Article Marketing. I'm going to watch that again. Thank you.
Link Building | | BobGW0 -
I am seeking a high quality sites to submit articles for free in order to get links. Can you recommend me on those sites?
I am seeking a high quality sites to submit articles for free in order to get links. Can you recommend me on those sites?
Link Building | | yoavm0 -
RSS links vs. contextual links
Which has more value? Passes more "link juice"? Auto generated rss links or contextual links?
Link Building | | nicole.healthline0