Paid links from directory listing and business listing sites are good or bad according to Penguin 2.1 update?
-
Hi Friends,
Recently on October 4<sup>th</sup>, 2013, a new spam filtering algorithm got live named Penguin 21. / Penguin 5.
The update goes after sites that may have purchased paid links.
I would like to know is it safe, if we submit website details with links in paid directories, eg: https://ecom.yahoo.com/dir/submit/intro/ (yahoo directory) and quality business listing sites provided the categories are related to our website.
Our competitor sites having the backlinks from those kind of directories and they are performing (ranking) well in major search engines.
May I know how Google treat these kinds of links according to this recent algorithm update?
-
Thanks for your reply.
I have one more doubt. If I am going to get links from say 10-20 links from paid web directories/ business listing sites which is of high PR (pr 5 and above) and quality sites, will it affect my website ranking?
eg: http://www.rddesignlondon.co.uk/best-paid-directories-for-seo/
-
This is a complicated question because there's a sliding scale of directories out there. On a scale of 1 to 10, with one being 'getting you penalized' and 10 being 'increasing your rankings', I would put the Yahoo directory (the $299/yr one) at an 8 or so.
The yahoo directory is a rare example of a directory that is of value despite it being paid but for the most part I would steer clear of paid inclusion directories unless they have a true logical value, i.e. customers going to the directory to legitimately find a web site or business.
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
-
Contest to generate link building ideas?
Basically, I am looking for new ideas for inbound link generation - WHITE-HAT (merit based links) for the car insurance vertical. E.g. Creating infographics, and promoting them to blogs/news sites. To clarify, the other site is only linking to me because I have something they like about my site, and choose to link to it (so things like guest blogging and directories do not work here, at least in the conventional sense). There are tons of seo blogs that give advice on how to get links, but either: 1. I have already tried, or hired someone, to do them. Those that I hire are specialists (I have hired lots of reputable companies that most people know here, but they always slow down after a few months/years in terms of link volume; 2. Many of the popular methods just don't work in my niche: Take for example one of the more recent ones: skyscraper" method. I really dont think it works in my niche. It only works in niches where "information based content" is vary valuable, like SEO, not car insurance. It is also hard to scale this. 3. The link topics sometimes get too far off-topic. E.g. Links from travel websites is probably not going to work; even car topics can be off-topic wen they get too gimmicky. So my idea is to start a contest here where I basically award the best link building idea $1000, $5000, or whatever amount that would get enough people participating. These ideas have to be relatively proven, and scalable. If it helps to know my background, I am very seasoned at SEO. What do you think of this idea? How can I improve it? Has this been done before (I am not talking about a general SEO contest).
Industry News | | onlinefun0 -
How does nudity on a site affect search results?
One of my clients sells lingerie and with it being lingerie there are a fair few photos of bottoms and some exposed breasts. Gosh. Anyway I know how this affects Adwords campaigns - Google classifies the site as 'adult' and your ads don't show anywhere. I also know how it affects image searches. However how does it affect text seaches?? Are rankings demoted because of nudity? I've worked with a clothing site with some nudity on it before and this didn't affect it, but would love to hear from anyone with specific experience of thisThanks
Industry News | | neenor0 -
How are Composite Door Shop number 1 for "composite doors"?!!
I have a client who competes with Composite Door Shop for "composite doors" and when doing a back link profile analysis it makes me wonder if Google is cramping down on EMD's (I know they have, I'm just frustrated!!) and how on earth they are number 1!! http://stereogum.com/49561/new_u2_video_get_on_your_boots/video/ and http://www.seo-writer.com/writers/index.php/2008/08/29/ghost-writers-need-to-eat-too/, both comments in blogs are their highest authority links!! Frustrating doesn't even cover it!! Is anyone else see that competitors have terrible back links?
Industry News | | KarlBantleman0 -
What would an SEO be paid with these skills?
Hello, What would an SEO with these skills be paid (per hour in a larger company in a lower income state): 9 years in the field of SEO
Industry News | | BobGW
Beginning and moderate link building skills
Excellent on-site optimization skills
Moderate Google Analytic skills
Complete HTML skills
Good to advanced CSS
Some PHP
5 years experience as a small business web designer
6 years experience working with eCommerce SEO
beginning to somewhat moderate Social media skills
beginning to moderate PPC, mainly Adwords
A foundation for local SEO
All the platforms that go with the above, like Wordpress, MS Office, Adobe Creative Suite, etc. etc.0 -
SEO Risks for redirecting sites
Hey Everyone, I've tried searching for this question, but am not exactly sure what keywords to search for so I'm probably missing the resources if they already exist... My client has had duplicated sites for years, and after multiple penalizations of those sites I was finally able to convince him to consolidate them into a "mega-site". Currently, he has a main domain, a geo-subdomain for each office location under the main domain, and a geo-domain for each office location. We plan on redirecting each geo-domain to the corresponding geo-subdomain. So, the final result will be one main domain, and a sub-domain for each office location. I'm looking for any information regarding tracking SEO data after the redirects are in place, how to guard against potential drops in SERPs, what's the smartest strategy to implement, etc... My client is very sensitive to his sites' SEO data, so if anyone has any SEO-related advice regarding redirecting sites it would be greatly appreciated! Thank you!
Industry News | | Level2Designs0 -
Subdomains seen as one site
Earlier this month Google announced that sub-domains are now
Industry News | | AlanMosley
be treated as one site. At first I thought this was good news as I like to use
sub-domains for separation of categories and the like. But what about links
from one sub-domain to the other, they uised to be external links now they are
internal links. If you don’t have many external links, I would say that the
cross sub-domain links would have been important, if you have a lot of external
links then the flow of link juice would be of more benefit. I think overall its
is a good thing. Does anyone have any opinions about this or know of any writings
on the subject since this announcement? http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2011/08/reorganizing-internal-vs-external.html0 -
Do "big" SEO companies remove links after termination of service?
Or worded differently: Has anyone heard of "big" SEO companies removing links after termination of service? I have a client who isn't particularly happy with the SEO he's getting from a big Aussie SEO firm, and he wants to terminate, however they've built thousands of links for him and he's a little concerned they might all get pulled. Has anyone heard of this happening, or; Do you think this is a legitimate concern? I think its physically possible to remove backlinks like this because it seems the SEO firm in question is building links by using other client's websites. I also wonder if they might have large content farm style sites where they place links for clients which might be quite easy to take down. Please discuss!
Industry News | | CheapGames990 -
Rebranding Sites
Our company just went through a rebranding and this includes the web sites. We have a new website (same domain) hosted on a new sever. We implemented 301's for outdated domain names and urls. The content has been overhauled to be simpler and we are building this from ground up with SEO in mind.I have canonical tags, being mindful of follow and no follow, with out trying to page sculpt) and ensuring the urls are descriptive and free of auto generated cms trash. To prepare for the launch, I captured all the analytics and adword campaigns before the switch. and began making lists of where we need to change the name around the web. We were performing pretty well, on SERPS before hand and now we want to try to keep the momentum speeding up with a cleaner newer site. Does anyone have any more suggestions on what more I should be doing to start off on the right foot.
Industry News | | KJ-Rodgers0