Business Directories and Spammy Link Profile
-
Hi,
have been reading a lot about submissions to directories and posting spamming blogs and forums and how they're a bad idea, saw a great post on it by Rand in a white board Friday lecture, the only thing is I've been analysing a company and that appears to be what makes up its entire link profile, all the links point to their home page with their primary phrase as the anchor text.
Just wondered how a company with some 4k links the majority being follows, hasn't been penalised for what are a really bad set of back links.
Should add that this is an insurance company, they're no light weights in their industry but certainly not one of the big boys.
Thanks, Lee
-
is funny you say that, was analysing a site the other day and they had lots of links from graphical blog post, think they came from abode illustrator tutorials, commenting has been blocked now but those links were generating a lot of authority, low 70's.
Which raises an important point thats something worth considering, commenting on pages that are likely to mature in respect of PA, what might only get a little authority now might in say 3-4 years yield something worth having,
Good points thanks a lot.
-
I think considering the history and particularly the issues surrounding low quality directories, most of which who were banned are back and listed, it shows a lack of commitment by Google to stamp out this kind of low quality linking, which is plainly done to artificially inflate rankings.
Concerning the Panda update I just think this is a response by Google to fire-fight the popularity of social media. Interesting that Panda and Google+ were both introduced relatively close together.
And I guess you can understand that, I get most of my business from social sites, Facebook being my main source of work and so that's reflected in how much time is spent socialising there. More time being social less time Googling!
Thanks for your comment.
-
Agreed Opt,
I took a look at their competition (the big boys) their links profiles were spectacular lots of heavy weigh authority sites, National Press, Stock Market (75-90 PA) . I guess it all boils down to who they're employing to do their seo, hire low grade and the results will reflect that quality.
Still somewhat hesitant to adopt this kind of link building strategy myself, I have made blog comments but they've been genuine and lengthy responses to posts in my industry.
thanks appreciate your comment
-
I see this absolutely in the graphic and logo design industry. Newer sites spamming the web with directory/forum/article spam links are getting to the first page and bumping off MUCH older sites that just post good content on their websites and do not actively go after spam link building!
Very unfortunate! But it is definitely working!!!
-
Despite what a lot of people say I still feel that link building in this sense works as long as you are strict with it. If they are making sure the directories have a good authority, they have a mix of followed v no-followed and build in some sort of organic manner (consistent drip of links).
I think a lot of concern is that the search engines are working out which links are manufactured in this manner and will soon heavily devalue them, but in the here and now it works to some extent.
I guess the other thing to consider is the competition - if it is this type of link building v no link building I guess this would win...
-
Hi Lee,
I know how you feel. I feel the same when I see this happening quite often unfortunately.
What I think it is: they got their spammy backlinks before Panda update and haven't been caught. As yet.
I do hope that Google keeps improving it's algorithms and one day we won't see such cases. Or I'm just being an optimist...
Regards,
Alex
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
-
What To Focus On SEO / Link Building for this campaign to rank again..
Hi All; I recently joined Moz and I am really starting to learn a lot here. I am still finding it difficult to figure out what to focus on the most to improve my rankings (although I do have some page 1 ranks) I have one strong competitor who has a SOLID spot in the top 5 of google for the past few years for the keyword I would like to be ranked for again. (as they have always been a competitor of mine either 1 spot above or 1 spot below). then i fell off google in January and finally made it back to page 1. But their links are thousands higher than mine. What parts of my SEO Link Building should I focus on the MOST to improve my ranking to move up a few spots? Followed links vs No Followed Links Followed Linking Root Domains vs NoFollowed Linking Root Domain Any help would so greatly be appreciated; also please explain why you would focus on that part of my campaign so I can better understand as well. Thanks again
Competitive Research | | Circa
(there are 3 images total) t4klvWZ,I9R9BsC,fbDoF3L#20 -
Internal/External link ratio
I have a client who ranked #3 for a very important and highly competitive keyword phrase. Using the 'Compare Pages' tool in open site explorer I could see that we were far better optimized than the two websites that were out ranking my client. Our PA was higher, the MozRank was higher, more internal and external links (and the external are all high quality) more linking C blocks etc.. etc... not just the page but the website, in general, was better optimized. The one thing I did notice was that although we had more internal and external links, our ratio was far heavier to the external side than the ratio of either competitor. So, at a loss of what else to do, I went through the website and beefed up the internal links to the specific page in question. I didn't over do it, just moved up from about 6% to about 12% (one competitor was at about 20% while the other was about 65%). Six days later we are number two rather than number three. Coincidence? Should I beef it up even more? Has anyone ever come across anything like this? Thank you for your comments in advance.
Competitive Research | | Vizergy0 -
Are aboutus.org links good?
Greetings Mozzers, I've posted several clients on aboutus.org sometime ago and it doesn't look like it is showing up on OSE. Its been well over 5 weeks. I have looked on their profile and none of the links are rel="nofollow" is there another thing I can check that would take all the juice away from them? Or does someone know if this is a good place to use? Thanks for any advice and clarification!
Competitive Research | | MonsterWeb280 -
Page Linking Root Domains and Root Domain Linking Root Domains?
hi, i want to know if Page Linking Root Domains is less and Root Domain Linking Root Domains is higher in number, at that time your keyword is highly competitive or less competitive? for example if a keyword having this information:- Page Authority is:-83 Page Linking Root Domains:- 295 Domain Authority is :- 94 Root Domain Linking Root Domains:- 42,399 which point is more important to consider? if you want to bring your keyword on the first page of the Google ?
Competitive Research | | parallelseo0 -
Links in the independent.co.uk
So I was doing some research in OSE and come across links in different articles on the independent.co.uk. There are more than three but I have included three below. Do a find for "blinds" on the articles. What I find interesting is that each article has a different author. Which probably rules out a friend doing a favour. As far as I can see, of all the many different types of advertising programmes the Independent has, this is not one of them. Which begs the question, how are they getting these links? http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/ashcroft--belize-the-only-thing-he-respects-is-dollars-1811725.html http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/house-and-home/gardening/shooting-stars-a-new-book-by-anna-pavord-pays-homage-to-the-glorious-bulb-1785219.html http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/reviews/outbreak-1939-imperial-war-museum-london-1776002.html What do you think?
Competitive Research | | KevinHenney980 -
Link Landscape Definition
Will someone give me a good definition of "Link Landscape", or a great article on it.
Competitive Research | | Trupanion0 -
Looking Up C-Block Links
I have been trying to find the tool that provides the campaign data the linking C-block data. Does anyone know which tool it is? Or is that just part of the campaigns?
Competitive Research | | purch0 -
How does a site get to no 3 in Google with no KW in their links?!!
Hello everyone, my first post - ahhh I'm investigating a niche and there is a site that should have no right being there in my view. It's no. 3 Google UK for 'company formation' with a small site with 65 weak links from only 7 domains and hosted in the US. But more importantly, the Open Site Explorer says there is not 1 link with that term in its anchor text. This I find crazy and makes me suspicious. But before I go back to my client saying "oh they must be black hat" I would like your expert views. I'm not sure whether to tut or congratulate them and for the first time I'm not sure what reasons to give for their amazing performance! What's your views?
Competitive Research | | GOYMedia480