Forum Ping Back Links
-
Hi all,
This will probably be a fairly simple question, however I'm unsure of the correct terminology to get a good answer via search.
Some of my competitors have links in the comment section of highly respected websites, example of one occurrence on the mighty Wired:
http://www.wired.com/bodyhack/2007/07/good-green/
Since Panda and Penguin I know Google has attempted to disregard any sort of link juice from such comment/forum spam - is this the case with comment links in sites such as Wired, as above?
I'd like to hear that such comment spam actually harms the ranking of competitor sites..is there any truth to this also?
I want to avoid all sorts of spammy approaches to SEO such as this - I've always been an ethical marketer, and would rather not stoop to these levels...but if they work and there is no chance of ranking penalisation..
Thanks for your time, dudes!
-
Not sure - i actually didn't see any comments on that post. But I agree it is a gray area and I too would love to hear if anyone else has any thoughts.
-
Thanks for your response Joel.
Its always been a grey area for me. Some forums seem to only exist for links, which I clearly try to disregard, but I wonder why such a high profile website would allow this in a comment section. Oversight on the behalf of the webmasters perhaps?
-
I would think that if you make a comment that is relevant to the conversation and it is appropriate to include a relevant link to your site will provide some value Questions that arrise on blog comments and forums might even provide the inspiration for new content on your site that you can include a link to.
"Drive-by" link bombing is not cool though and Google is right to crack donw.
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
-
Link Building / Link Removal
Hey, I'm in the process of learning SEO, or attempting to, for my company and am chipping away at the process ever so slowly! How can I tell if a site that links to my company's site, www.1099pro.com, has a negative effect on my page/domain authority? Also, if a page doesn't show up in the search rankings at all for it's keywords when it really should (i.e it has the exact keywords and page/domain authority far surpasses even the top results) how can I tell if Google has removed the page from its listing and why? Thanks SEO Gurus
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Stew2220 -
Benefits of having outbound links
Are there any strengths (benefits) in having outbound links within the site regarding SEO? If linking to reputable sites, would that help increase our SEO strength or does that only work if they links back to us?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | WebRiverGroup1 -
How to ignore spam links to page?
Hey Moz pals, So for some reason someone is building thousands of links to my websites (all spam), likely someone doing negative seo on my site. Anyway, all these links are pointing to 1 sub url on my domain. That url didn't have anything on it so I deleted the page so now it comes up with a 404. Is there a way to reject any link that ever gets built to that old page? I don't want all this spam to hurt my website. What do you suggest?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | WongNs0 -
Negative SEO impacting client rankings - How to combat negative linking?
I have a client which have been losing rankings for the key term "sell gold" in Google AU. However, while doing some investigating I realized that we have been receiving links from bad neighborhoods such as porn, bogus .edu sites as well as some pharmaceutical sites. We have identified this as negative SEO and have moved forward to disavow the links in Google. However, I would like to know what other measures can be taken to combat this type of negative SEO linking? Any suggestions would be appreciated!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | dancape0 -
Why would links that were deleted by me 3 months ago still show up in reports?
I inadvertently created a mini link farm some time back by linking all of my parked domains (2000 plus) to some of my live websites (I was green and didn't think linking between the same owner sites / domains was an issue). These websites were doing well until Penguin and although I did not get any 'bad link' advices from Google I figure I was hit by Penguin. So about 3 or 4 months ago I painstakingly deleted ALL links from all of those domains that I still own (only 500 or so - the others were allowed to lapse). None of those domains have any links linking out at all but old links from those domains are still showing up in WMT and in SEOmoz and every other link tracking report I have run. So why would these links still be reported? How long do old links stay in the internet archives? This may sound like a strange question but do links 'remain with a domain for a given period of time regardless'? Are links archived before being 'thrown out' of the web. I know Google keeps archives of data that has expired, been deleted, website closed etc, etc for about 3 years or so (?). In an effort to correct a situation I have spent countless hours manually deleting thousands of links but they won't go away. Looking for some insight here please. cheers, Mike
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | shags380 -
Does PR 7, PR 8, PR 9 links help really?
HI GUYS, I have been offered a few link opportunities on websites that have a PR 7, 8 & 9 but will it help my rankings because the website it not related whatsoever to what my website is about.. My website is about insurance and these high PR websites are not related to insurance.. Does it really matter??? Any guidance much apprciate please guys... Thanks Gareth
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | GAZ090 -
What to do when majority of results have shady links?
So I am doing my back link research for the hosting industry and I am running across two different types of link schemes that make it hard to compete with straight white hat techniques. I am determined to keep our efforts white hat to retain long term value, but at the same time I am constantly tempted to slowly add links in the more grey ways. So here are some of the common practices I see a lot of (e.g. 8 of the top 10 sites for top terms use these). Link Buying/Article Links - You know this one well, their link profile has a 10:1 ratio of keyword links compared to brand name links, and the majority of those keyword links are on nonsensical blogs, or on related "tech" sites but obviously labeled as paid links. - I don't like this much, and have even reported some of these. "Hosted by" - So the majority of hosting companies out there have pre-built collections of templates for wordpress, joomla, and other CMS systems, and they have taken the extra step of putting "Server Hosting by XXXXXX" in the footer of those templates. This leads to thousands of small sites being hosted with the keyword backlinks. While I understand this, at the same time I would hope they wouldn't get credit for links all coming back from IPs that they own. While they aren't creating these sites they know the majority of users won't change the template (or know how to). Lastly there are some "Link to us and get discounts" programs going on with customers as well. So, seeing the linking setup this way, would you try to report each instance you see to Google? If so do you think they would really change anything considering how rampant it is among the results? Lets hear some opinions! In the mean time I am going to go work on my awesome content, press releases, and cross-company promotional campaigns ;).
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | SL_SEM0 -
Problems with link spam from spam blogs to competitor sites
A competitor of ours is having a great deal of success with links from spam blogs (such as: publicexperience.com or sexylizard.org) it is proving to be a nightmare. Google does not detect these (the competitor has been doing well now for over a year) and my boss is starting to think if you can’t beat them, join them. Frankly, he is right – we have built some great links but it is nigh on impossible to beat 400+ highly targeted spam links in a niche market. My question is, has anyone had success in getting this sort of stuff brought to the attention of Google and banned (I actually listed them all in a message in webmaster tools and sent them over to Google over a year ago!). This is frustrating, I do not want to join in this kind of rubbish but it is hard to put a convincing argument against it when our competitor has used the technique successfully for over a year without any penalty. Ideas? Thoughts? All help appreciated
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | RodneyRiley0