link building - how often to add links.. [Archive]

PhilipDunn

09-05-2011, 12:35 PM

09-05-2011, 01:28 PM

I've heard and read that Google wants to see inbound links accumulate in a 'natural' way. I have assumed this means that you don't want to add lots of links in a short amount of time. I don't want any penalties from Google, and not get credit for added links, so how many links is appropriate to add, say in a one month period?

Philip

Interesting question. I think it's been touched on a few times at WPW and if I recall correctly, the consensus was that it depends. You could get 100 backlinks in a month's time from one method, and another method might net you 1000 or even more. Having said that I'd suggest it would depend on where those IBL's are coming from. Test the different methods out by monitoring positioning along with specific keywords as those incoming links are accounted for by G or Yahoo or whatever SE's you like to monitory for positioning. Make sure you don't see any anomalies in significant negative positioning changes, and you should be Ok. :)

kbarrett

09-05-2011, 01:33 PM

I agree that there's no single answer to this question - my own experience is that it depends on the website in question.

I think one factor to consider here is the age and history of the site. A brand new site that suddenly gains thousands of links in a matter of days may well be penalised because it has no history and that sort of activity may trigger a Google penalty. But an older site that gains thousands of links per month may be able to sustain that sudden hit.

Similarly, some websites are clearly more likely to gain links than others. A website about cleaning services in London (to use a random example) that suddenly gains hundreds of links in a week might be in trouble, simply because that's not the sort of site that the search engines might expect to see gaining links at that rate.

I guess it all comes down to what's natural for a particular site, within a particular location and sector.

PhilipDunn

09-05-2011, 02:09 PM

Well I hadn't considered all these factors - thanks for broadening my understanding. I've been adding 30 - 40 a month for a Movers site. Initially I saw a nice spike in serps, but it seems to have leveled out even though I am still adding links. I think the initial links may have had more PR.

09-05-2011, 04:05 PM

A brand new site that suddenly gains thousands of links in a matter of days may well be penalised because it has no history and that sort of activity may trigger a Google penalty.

So a new business is launched and they also launch a new website and to create a little buzz, they distribute a press release which may result in a very large number of IBL's from very popular media/journalists sites on the internet. You are saying that this new site will get penalized? I'd like to see proof of that because this sort of marketing promotion happens every day, many hundreds of times without sites being penalized.

kbarrett

09-06-2011, 10:54 AM

Is it inevitable that they will be penalised? No. But is it the case that a website exhibiting that type of behaviour is more likely to find itself sandboxed? I would suggest yes.

I don't think that most small businesses, in particular, have the advantage of creating a big online buzz that results in numerous links from high quality sources. More often than not, we're talking about companies suddenly gaining large quantities of low quality links at launch.

09-06-2011, 12:28 PM

But is it the case that a website exhibiting that type of behaviour is more likely to find itself sandboxed? I would suggest yes.

kbarret, I'd like to know where you are finding this info as we've yet to see any negative ranking from link-building. If you are talking about buying links, or getting links from bad neighbourhoods, that is an entirely different scenario. And I also think the "sandbox" myth has been debunked.

I don't think that most small businesses, in particular, have the advantage of creating a big online buzz that results in numerous links from high quality sources.

There are plenty businesses including small one-person shops, medium and of course large businesses that can create this type of buzz and it doesn't cost an arm-and-a-leg either.

PhilipDunn

09-06-2011, 12:35 PM

09-06-2011, 12:56 PM

I've been adding about 30 - 40 inbound links a month to the site I am referring to and I did just notice a hit/loss of about two pages per keyword in google serps. The only affected keywords are the keywords that I have been using as anchor text in the links. Might bounce back of course, as it just happened in the last couple of days...

There is volatility that comes with positioning and ranking even when you do nothing to a site. It may be competing sites that facilitate movement to some sites, algorithm tweaks or some other external effects. For example, one particular site gets an ongoing trickle of links in each month - when they are indexed by G, is another story. And that site generally improves slowly in terms of positioning. But a couple of spikes, both positive and negative have been experienced from G, and other SE's over the last several months. But the positioning of those particular keywords eventually rebound. Similarly another site has been getting a more significant number of backlinks and is improving considerably as we go, without any ill effect.

PhilipDunn

09-06-2011, 01:02 PM

trade-show-oracle

09-06-2011, 01:22 PM

I doubt anyone knows for sure, and it must depend on how old your site is and how popular it already is. That said, I'd just the key to how many links is how random the links are, for I'd guess truely "natural" links are random. I'd say if all your links are from the same source or are for the same topic, you wouldn't want too many, but if they are from varying sources for varying topics, you can have a lot more.
And probably if the links truly are natural (and thus random) (i.e. you wrote something incredible and every blogger in the world is linking to it using their own words), then you can have as many as you want.

keyon

09-06-2011, 01:42 PM

I don't have any data to confirm or rebuke anything that has been mentioned so far, but my gut feeling is that websites seeing trouble from link building are probably creating IBLs at a rate far beyond what most of us small-site owners would consider "too many, too fast." I guess I've seen this happen before, where people get completely stymied in their marketing and promotion because they've read that Google might "penalize" them if they cross the line. I'm not sure where that line is, exactly, but I suspect that most of the small sites that worry about these kinds of things probably couldn't raise a red flag with Google even if they tried. I could be wrong.

deepsand

09-06-2011, 04:47 PM

Is it inevitable that they will be penalised? No. But is it the case that a website exhibiting that type of behaviour is more likely to find itself sandboxed? I would suggest yes.
What "sandbox?" Offending and/or dubious links are simply discounted by Google.

claybutler

09-06-2011, 06:34 PM

I would add as many quality inbound links as possible. One, I don't see evidence of getting penalized, otherwise every viral event would loose rank rather than gain it, which is what ALWAYS happens. Two, even if you were to get "penalized" in some unspecified way you will most definitely bounce back stronger than ever once the "penalty" time has passed. Good links are so hard to get I would never turn them down.

Sweet Tooth #3

09-06-2011, 07:50 PM

I do expect a rebound, it was just interesting that it was the same keywords that I am working with in the link program. I do find though, every time I have a spike in ranking, there is some kind of check that comes later. Usually the loss is just a fraction of the gain..

This is 100% normal. If I jump 10 spots, I'll usually lose 2 or so about a week later. 40 links a month isn't very many. Every time I publish a post, it gets 100 immediately, even before it's indexed and I've only seen positive results. Now that's unnatural.

And don't worry too much about PR. Links from PR 0 pages are still effective as long as they contain your anchor text. If they're from a relevant website, even better. What works for me is link diversity and relevance. I'll even take a no follow link.

And if 1 of your pages does disappear for awhile, don't automatically blame your link building.

deepsand

09-06-2011, 08:03 PM

Links from PR 0 pages are still effective as long as they contain your anchor text. If they're from a relevant website, even better.
With regards to PR itself, any link that does not bear "nofollow" contributes, even those with TBPR of 0 and Not Ranked, as actual PR value is always non-zero.

Sweet Tooth #3

09-06-2011, 09:28 PM

With regards to PR itself, any link that does not bear "nofollow" contributes, even those with TBPR of 0 and Not Ranked, as actual PR value is always non-zero.

Very true. I'm just surprised how many people will turn up their nose to a link just because it's not "above PR 4" or "above PR 1." I only have a couple links from PR>1 pages.

deepsand

09-07-2011, 02:37 AM

Very true. I'm just surprised how many people will turn up their nose to a link just because it's not "above PR 4" or "above PR 1." I only have a couple links from PR>1 pages.
In my experience, the reason owes to one or more of the following false beliefs:

PageRank is affected by qualitative characteristics of the source page;
Toolbar PageRank is an accurate and well understood mapping of actual PageRank;
PageRank is the sole contributing factor to a Link Profile;
PageRank is the overwhelmingly most effective driver of SERP rank.

forummaster

09-07-2011, 06:28 AM

I think you will not penalized by googe if you use at least 5 keywords per site for inbound links.

claybutler

09-07-2011, 07:30 AM

I think you will not penalized by googe if you use at least 5 keywords per site for inbound links.

Wow, you just made that up didn't you? Have you ever optimized a site? I just optimized three sites last month doing just that and it worked like a charm. Using the same keyphrases is the way you gain relevance for those keywords.

Miklos

09-08-2011, 05:12 PM

It depends very much about the age of a site. If the website is new, you must have a lower number of links per day. Usually I suggest you for the first days 3-4 root domains / day.

claybutler

09-08-2011, 05:19 PM

It depends very much about the age of a site. If the website is new, you must have a lower number of links per day. Usually I suggest you for the first days 3-4 root domains / day.

On what grounds? I want to see the evidence.

09-08-2011, 08:55 PM

Both links and backlinks are quite similar

but backlinks helps more in seo

The title of the thread and related posts are about link building, hence, building a link profile, which inevitably means building backlinks. A link on one web page to another part of that site is an internal link. A link from site A to site B is an outgoing link (from the perspective of site A). A link from site B to site A would be an inbound link (from the perspective of site A). Do you still think a link and backlink are "quite similar"?

PhilipDunn

09-21-2011, 01:56 PM

I didn't realize this thread was still going on...

UPDATE:

The reason my client's site crashed, is because he hired another SEO to take over. Without telling me, he uploaded a new site and immediately lost 1-3 pages on every keyword, now some are down 5 pages.

He has over twenty keyword embedded inbound links on the home page - back to the home page. Seems like this could be a culprit in the crash.

This SEO advertises he's done a million dollars in research and that he has developed software that's cracked the Google's Algorithm - lol.

weegillis

09-21-2011, 02:21 PM

PhilipDunn

09-21-2011, 02:25 PM

thanks - good advice..

PhilipDunn

11-06-2011, 09:23 AM

well after two months of crashed rankings, the client has hired me back.
It was really a surprise to see an seo company put 75 links on the home page - back to the home page. And even a greater surprise to see that because of it Yahoo and Bing serps dramatically shot up. But in Google, they lost 2-6 pages in serps...

weegillis

11-06-2011, 12:55 PM

well after two months of crashed rankings, the client has hired me back.

That's good news. Glad to see your 'new'/old client has begun to see the light of day.

... It was really a surprise to see an seo company put 75 links on the home page - back to the home page. And even a greater surprise to see that because of it Yahoo and Bing serps dramatically shot up. But in Google, they lost 2-6 pages in serps...

So what's good for the goose is not necessarily good for the gander. Anytime a new 'system' emerges we can always be sure one of the algo's will not play nice. There is no way to know when or whether all the bases are covered.

Best of luck pulling the site back up.

PhilipDunn

11-06-2011, 01:17 PM

thanks Weeg,

When i saw over half the links on the home page had the same destination i knew there would be trouble. I just really didn't think Yahoo and Bing would be vulnerable to that kind of manipulation.

deepsand

11-06-2011, 05:23 PM

I just really didn't think Yahoo and Bing would be vulnerable to that kind of manipulation.
May be purely coincidental.

PhilipDunn

11-06-2011, 05:34 PM

I did watch this guy add and remove links from the home page over the last two months. He completely changed things around several times, so he was constantly raising and lowering in both Google and Yahoo/Bing. When he would remove links, he'd rise in Google. When he would add them back, he'd crash Google and rise in Yahoo.
You wouldn't normally get to see something like this as no one else would play around with someone's rankings. In the end, he added about 50 outbound links to relevant sites, crashed Google again and the client said enough...

deepsand

11-06-2011, 06:02 PM

Ever see an old western movie on TV, where the spokes on the wheels gave the appearance of turning backwards relative to the direction the stage coach was moving? (Difference between scan and display rates gives rise to the illusion.)

Here, too, there's more going on than meets the eye. A simple change in link counts alone cannot explain the apparent and opposite changes on different SEs.

PhilipDunn

11-06-2011, 06:26 PM

i was thinking they were killing half their Page Rank by having half the links (sometimes 50-75) on the home page going to the same destination. Years back, I once crashed my own site's rankings by adding about 10 OBL's to an internal page. I immediately removed them and the prior ranking returned..

I am also curious about what effect so many changes to the site would have. Seems like there might be flags in the algorithm to pick up such manipulation...

deepsand

11-06-2011, 06:38 PM

The PR of any page is virtually unchanged by OBLs. Any increase experienced by the target page(s) results in an infinitesimally small decrease in the PR of every other page participating in the PR matrix.

PhilipDunn

11-06-2011, 06:50 PM

I do understand that the Page Rank for the home page is unaffected. But doesn't this scenario affect the Page Rank of the internal pages? If half the links on the home page are to one internal destination, then half the Page Rank that could be given to internal pages is lost - yes?
I've just noticed on several occasions a loss in ranking when a lot of OBL's are added. It could be that internal pages lowered in serp's as a result in the loss...

deepsand

11-06-2011, 10:23 PM

Not quite sure what is meant by "If half the links on the home page are to one internal destination, then half the Page Rank that could be given to internal pages is lost - yes?"; but, if you refer to the PR of duplicate links - those pointing to the same target page from the same source page - then yes, the PR of all but one such is discarded.

However, even if a given page has but a single OBL, the effect on the target page's PR is so vanishingly small that for it to alter the SERPs would require that it and the pages it competes with be otherwise virtually identically evaluated by the SERP algorithm, such that equally trivial differences in other SERP factors would also serve to trigger observable movements in the SERPs.

PhilipDunn

11-07-2011, 10:16 AM

yes Deep, that is what I am saying. Multiple links from the source page (Home) going to the same internal page, often even with the same anchor text.

So it would seem that this specific situation would be harming the site and its ranking - approximately 50 internal links on the home page that would not be passing PR to the rest of the site. And technically some of that PR, however minuscule as you suggest, would have been able to come back to the home page via the 'Home' button in the navigation on internal pages...

thanks for your input..

deepsand

11-07-2011, 10:21 PM

So it would seem that this specific situation would be harming the site and its ranking - approximately 50 internal links on the home page that would not be passing PR to the rest of the site. And technically some of that PR, however minuscule as you suggest, would have been able to come back to the home page via the 'Home' button in the navigation on internal pages.
PR is not markedly increased by loops from Page A to Page B to Page A, etal.. All those internal links chasing each others' tails are a pittance compared to a single IBL from an external source.

And, as I above noted, "even if a given page has but a single OBL, the effect on the target page's PR is so vanishingly small that for it to alter the SERPs would require that it and the pages it competes with be otherwise virtually identically evaluated by the SERP algorithm, such that equally trivial differences in other SERP factors would also serve to trigger observable movements in the SERPs."

PhilipDunn

11-08-2011, 10:01 AM

i guess i am just trying to figure out why i have seen crashes over the years that appear to be related to adding lots of OBL's. I've never seen it related to adding IBL's.

rainman

11-08-2011, 12:51 PM

I have seen this when adding bulk OBL's to quickly.

deepsand

11-08-2011, 09:13 PM

i guess i am just trying to figure out why i have seen crashes over the years that appear to be related to adding lots of OBL's. I've never seen it related to adding IBL's.
Assuming that you speak of off-site links, perhaps Google hasn't liked who you've been linking to at times.

PhilipDunn

11-09-2011, 09:53 AM

I've never seen it related to adding IBL's.

Unless there were many IBL's that went to the same destination page.

deepsand

11-09-2011, 11:23 PM

Unless there were many IBL's that went to the same destination page.
:confused:

IBL's don't "go to a destination" page; they "come from a source" page.

PhilipDunn

11-10-2011, 09:54 AM

to catch you up Humbot, we are talking about a different seo that attempted to use a technique to manipulate serps. At one time, he placed multiple links on a home page that went to the same internal page. It 'seemed' to work for yahoo and bing, but Google crashed....i watched as the links were placed there, removed, changed, replaced again, etc. There were crashes and spikes in serps that appeared to be related to that manipulation, but not everyone thinks that is what caused the changes..

ok, Deep. Then there was an internal page that had multiple links from one source page (home)

deepsand

11-10-2011, 11:54 PM

ok, Deep. Then there was an internal page that had multiple links from one source page (home)
Of no material effect other than an inconsequential waste of PR.

PhilipDunn

11-11-2011, 03:27 AM

I took over this seo unfriendly cms site about 2 1/2 years ago, kicking it along while telling the client I needed a better site to make him more competitive. I did however deliver an extra 300 visitors a month. When the new seo provided a nice new Wordpress site, I absolutely expected him to be able to out rank me. Instead there was a crash, averaging 2-6 pages per keyword phrase. At the end of 2 months, he was even disappeared from the search results for the most competitive keywords...
And the only thing I can see being the issue was an over use of unnecessary IBL's and OBL's. That and probably a dilution of keyword density based on trying to attain too many keyword phrases for the PR of the site.

deepsand

11-11-2011, 03:57 AM

And the only thing I can see being the issue was an over use of unnecessary IBL's and OBL's.
There's no such thing as "too many IBLs." Too many OBLs to "bad neighborhoods" could be problematic.

That and probably a dilution of keyword density based on trying to attain too many keyword phrases for the PR of the site.
Keywords are immaterial to PR.

PhilipDunn

11-11-2011, 04:10 AM

I will just go with the assumption that potentially spammy OBL's were used. There were too many on the site for me to visit them all...

thanks,,

deepsand

01-06-2012, 02:00 AM

Deepsand - Your note about keywords being immaterial to PR. I am surprised by this, please explain
Asked and answered countless times.

PageRank (http://lmgtfy.com/?q=http%3A%2F%2Fen.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FPageRank %23Computation).

keyon

01-06-2012, 01:37 PM

Asked and answered countless times.
I think some of the threads in this forum (regarding page rank) kind of end up going in circles -- all because people use the term "page rank" when they really mean "position" in the serps. It's an easy mistake. There are so many odd variations of the terminology floating around on the Web -- like "serp page rank" and "rank for keywords" -- it's no wonder people get "page rank" and "serps position" confused.

PhilipDunn

01-06-2012, 01:43 PM

Couldn't Larry Page have foreseen this???

keyon

01-06-2012, 01:59 PM

Couldn't Larry Page have foreseen this???
Well, I don't know if blame Google for the misunderstanding, necessarily. I do know that a lot of computer-genius-types tend not to have the best grasp of English language -- and how to use it effectively. :-)

01-06-2012, 04:26 PM

I think some of the threads in this forum (regarding page rank) kind of end up going in circles -- all because people use the term "page rank" when they really mean "position" in the serps. It's an easy mistake. There are so many odd variations of the terminology floating around on the Web -- like "serp page rank" and "rank for keywords" -- it's no wonder people get "page rank" and "serps position" confused.

It would be so much easier for that special group of posters if they just read the threads from the beginning - or just read a few of the sticky's. They have been told this by the mods countless times, but come back the next day and make the same silly posts. Sigh... :(

deepsand

01-06-2012, 09:47 PM

It would be so much easier for that special group of posters if they just read the threads from the beginning - or just read a few of the sticky's.
But, then they wouldn't get post count. ;)

The facts are that there are those who are lazy and those who just want to post at all costs.

The latter is particularly well exemplified by one who, despite having been repeated told by others that he is wrong, continues to pontificate re. PR, while elsewhere asking the meaning of "PR." :rolleyes:

deepsand

01-08-2012, 11:58 PM

Very many of such are just keyboard monkeys paid to throw crap at the wall, secure in the knowledge that some of it will stick.

Monika

01-12-2012, 03:06 AM

In my opinion in case of newly designed web sites you have to start link building gradually, if you suddenly create too many back-links then your site can go in sand box. After making reliability on search engine you can create many back-links. One thing keep in mind is to avoid buying back-links.

SteveGerencser

01-12-2012, 03:14 AM