Any way to tell if a link has been devalued?

[diogenes]

I have some listings in lawyer directories some of which have very hig PR , links, traffic, etc. For example, www.nolo.com,  I know that Google has more or less recently devalued a lot of directory links. I would assume that a monster site like nolo would not be one of those, but does anyone know any way to tell?

Paul

[PeterAlexLeigh]

There are two quick methods I use to check if a site's ranking has been devalued or penalised;

1. Compare the Page rank of the site in question with MozRank. If MozRank is 1.5+ points different, then the site may have been penalised by google and lost some of it's PR.

2. Pick a sentence from the site of 5-6 words and search for this sentence in google enclosed in quotes. If you find the the site is ranking on the first page, then it probably hasn't been penalised or devalued heavily.

I also use gut instinct for a lot of links and usually that's good measure - If a site look spammy, then it probably will to google. As for nolo.com, it looks like a pretty decent site to me, so I would be surprised if it's links have been devalued.

[SparkplugDigital]

One way you could test if a link is passing juice is to set up a page that targets a long tail phrase (maybe 3-4 words) and check the ranking. Then get a link on the site to point to the page and see if the rank jumps higher. If there is a significant jump in rankings (like from #30 to #3 for example) it would suggest that the link still passes juice.