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Is Reciprocal Linking Bad?

What used to be the common way of helping your community find your peers is now outlawed — reciprocal linking is now a violation against the Google Webmaster Guidelines.

Webmasters are outraged over the recent change in Google’s policy, now specifically targetting what they refer to as “Link Schemes”:

Examples of link schemes can include:

  • Links intended to manipulate PageRank
  • Links to web spammers or bad neighborhoods on the web
  • Excessive reciprocal links or excessive link exchanging (“Link to me and I’ll link to you.”)
  • Buying or selling links

Item #1, #2, and #4 have long been questioned as ethical behavior when it comes to using the hyperlink, all of them somehow gaining the reputation from webmasters and publishers who now largely consider them as inappropriate ways of link building. #1 though is always an after–effect of a hyperlink, be it positive or negative in an SEO context, unless when used with the rel="nofollow" attribute which is typically ignored by search engines. On the other hand, #3 is a different discussion altogether.

Changing the Web’s Nature

Google’s action is significantly questionable since it is posed to alter the way the world wide web behaves, something that already existed even before the birth of the search giant. In a way, it tries to take away our freedom to link meaningfully; your blogroll of friends who most likely are also linking to you is now a possible violation that could get you banned from the Google index!

Google’s Matt Cutts acknowledges the ramifications of their policy update, even suggesting that webmasters may do as they please, continue reciprocal linking and all, just as Google can have their way with regards to their index and the search results they produce. Though all of these actions are indeed meant to produce better results for their users, it is also irresponsible to pass the burden of weeding out unethical linking to the publishers themselves. In their effort to completely remove spam sites from their index, they are effectively asking for a change in behavior from the majority of users and publishers. It’s like regulating and telling us how to use an icepick since it can also be used to do bad things. So maybe my example was a little off, but you get my drift.

Information Monopoly

I think it’s now time for us to realize that Google has some sort of “information monopoly,” based on the fact that it is the preferred tool people use to find anything they need, now both online and even offline. It has too much power at its hands that no publisher or webmaster would dare Google’s ire, since a great deal of sites rely heavily on search engine traffic, in most cases, Google. To be fair, the search giant isn’t to blame since none of its competitors have provided compelling technology to suggest a trend that moves toward a democratized search market. At the end of the day, almost everyone will still be using Google for almost everything they do.

With this in mind, all the more do we need a more understanding Google, we need it to practice its “don’t be evil” mantra pro–actively without adversely affecting those who always try to play fair.

Nurturing Responsible Publishers & Webmasters

Taken in a positive context, though Google’s move may appear over–zealous, their actions should help nurture a more responsible breed of publishers and webmasters. By suggesting that we do as we please, they may be daring us to behave within the bounds of what we think is right, with or without reciprocal linking or the other schemes they cited. By doing so, they can adjust accordingly and learn what parameters to give weight on and what to disregard, to produce the most appropriate search results and discard what shouldn’t be there. However, the process may not be straightforward, it is likely that many of us publishers may be affected in the short–term. And the bad ones weeded out in the long run.

It’s gonna be rough, but what choice do we really have? In the end, both users, publishers, and webmasters will benefit from all this. Hopefully.

Written by Markku Seguerra, rebelpixel.com.

Originally posted on August 19, 2007 @ 2:55 pm

Mahalo, Does The Calacanis Gang Stand A Search Chance?

Mahalo, arguably the most sexy Mediawiki design out there, is a new vertical search engine. A humanly edited search engine.
When online mediahype boy Calacanis set out to start a new search engine, this was the result of an old personal feud with SEO.

Months later Mahalo has seen the daylight and after some weeks, I must admit that Mahalo could impress. But does the service really stand a chance or is this another A-list hyped platform?
As Google fan, I must admit that last years I have always found what I was looking for and who will tell me what the best result is. Other than that best result a purely subjective factor is.
Who delivers me the best search result? Social platforms such as del.icio.us where I can see how many times geeks have bookmarked certain sites and not other ones. Or is the best result that blog entry written by a guy who has only 300 page views every month?

So far I see two major problems with Mahalo, and in analyzing I obviously kept in mind that Mahalo still in alpha stage is. If an operational, public site really alpha can be, unless alpha the label is to apply when your wiki hasn’t enough of entries yet.

Humanly edited

The top argument to use a humanly edited search engine is at the same time its weakest factor. Human editors make the results slow, slow in update rate. Who guarantees me that Mahalo will be able to keep up with the ever changing internet content and deliver up to date results.
Together with human editors comes bias. And bias can influence search results, especially when I look for commercial results. Just have a look at the results for wedding rings. Who guarantees me that the top 2 results, shops really are the best results? And how could I make it in to the top 7 if I had a wedding ring shop? Offer Calacanis some dollars or a ring?

Google Implementation

The excessive Google implementation can be a burden and degrade the quality of results, sometimes even be the prove that Mahalo’s human factor is contra effective. Best example of this is the news page. Although Mahalo offers many outlets for actual news, if every time I am confronted with Google News at #1, I might as well just use Google News.

Other times I am happy that at least there are some Google results implemented on the site. Even though I know that Mahalo’s aim is to manually write the results for the Top 10000 search terms, when I need a search engine, it also happens to me to search further than the Top 10k search terms. And when I google, I will most of time dig deeper and deeper, using more and more narrowed down search queries.
Mahalo does the opposite for non existing search queries and offers related entries, broadening the results again. What is a better example than a search for Calacanis SEO? Although the first Google result didn’t exactly lead me to Jason’s rant, it had a link to the page I was looking for. Mahalo results are non existing, and related results are everything except related in this example.

The sad thing is that both problems send me back to Google. And that can’t be the purpose of a new search engine, unless I miss the broader picture.

Originally posted on July 8, 2007 @ 12:45 pm

Where’s the Jack Daniels? (SEO is not for Morons)

First off blogging and Seo is not for morons. If you are going to enter the game you better show up. My greatest weakness and almost a trademark is my inability to spell correctly. I can actually spell alright its my ability to proof anything that gets me into trouble.

Some popular gurus in the blogging scene like to run around spouting their wisdom in the SEO scene, most of the time they are entirely wrong. I won’t point out any blatant wrongs but will share with you a few things that will take your blogging to the next level.

Let’s go over a popularly debated topic. Paid Links.
Links are like the intercourse of the internets. Do you really want to pay for links? Just asking. Didn’t mean to offend anyone. Google doesn’t like prostitution but more than likely they won’t penalize those who buy links they will just totally discredit those who are out there selling their link space.

Why don’t they discredit link buyers?

If Google started discrediting bought links then it would be pretty easy for the competion to go out and buy links on obvious link sellers. And then report the link buyers as spammers and watch Google nail em.

Next Question, Site Wide Links or Post Level Links?

Google does not penalize site wide links on new sites. This is a myth. Again it’s a speculated rumor and not proven fact. It could effect your sandboxing only because of the rate at which the links grew. So don’t worry no need to run around asking bloggers to take your new blog off their blogrolls. It doesn’t hurt you. In fact the more links the better. I know some would disagree but the logic just isnt their. Then all the competition would have to do is buy lots of site wide links and wait until Goog punished you and rake in the gold. This is another anti-seo myth. That is full of mularkey. Don’t panic. Take another shot of whiskey and get back to building links.

First in a series entitled SEO is not for Morons

Originally posted on June 29, 2007 @ 11:11 am

3 Things You Can Do To Move Up In Your Search Rankings

When you have a business, your online presence can have a huge impact on how successful your business is able to be. But sadly, just having a website or social media profiles likely won’t be all it takes to have success online. To really make an impact here, you have to know how to affect your search rankings so that people can find you online when searching for something relevant to your business. [Read more…]

Originally posted on December 20, 2021 @ 5:55 pm

3 Things To Figure Out Before Starting Production On Video Content

If you’re ready to start creating some video content for your business or your brand, it can be intimidating to try this for the first time. However, with how well video content does with consumers and customers, it could be well worth your time and money to put video content together. The trick here is making sure that you’re creating quality content that people actually want to spend time watching. [Read more…]

Originally posted on June 28, 2021 @ 5:22 am

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