5 Ways to Tell if a Blog Link is Gold or Rotten
Sometimes when you’re on the prowl looking to acquire links via link trades, buying links or contributing optimized content to a blog in return for a link or two, you can run into some sites which may seem like you’ve struck link gold .. but these opportunities may prove too good to be true.
Case in point, you may find some site owners who are more or less giving away good links on sites with high PageRank or lots of incoming links, but what may look like incredible places to get links from, but I highly suggest taking a deeper look before striking a deal. Here are some red flags to look for when judging the quality of a site.
Topic Irrelevance : Is the site’s content relevant to its theme or URL? Site relevance is one of the first things I look at when judging the quality of a site or linking partner. If it’s a blog, are all of the posts about the genre or theme of the site? Or are they just blatant reviews designed to make money. If the answer is the latter, then that site has no real value and will probably lose anything it currently has going for it right now. If so, the value of your link will be nothing, or some negative value could be associated with your link.
Dropped Domains : Look through the history of the site via Archive.org and its Whois information to see if the site has been dropped. Google looks at two aspects with dropped or transferred domains : has the site changed hands and has the site changed content.
If you find an obvious site like CatholicsforLieberman.org with lots of juicy association or church links pointing to it, and the site is a WordPress blog running off a default template and blogging about office furniture, stay away from it; it’s been dropped, picked up and all of its old good content was replaced with crap.
Buy a Sponsored Post Buttons : I’m not going to name any companies, but there are a lot of paid blogging review companies out there. Some use good blogs, are responsible and a bit under the radar, others are pure garbage and will result in negative association with a bad linking neighborhood. If you see buttons to buy a post on a blog, WITH A PRICE, and the posts say “Sponsored Post”, and you see that the links in the posts don’t use a no-follow .. hit your back button NOW!
Penises, Viagra and Poker : OK, this should be a given but if the site or blog which you are thinking about obtaining a link from links out to or writes about online gambling sites, penis enlargement or sex pills like Viagra, there’s a 99% chance that you’re about to obtain a link from a spam blog (or splog). Don’t do it. Don’t even think about it … unless you sell penis pumps or have an online poker spam site (and if you do, I hope you’re thinking of better ways of getting links … like comment spamming Search Engine Journal or Daily SEO Tip!)
Generic WordPress Defaults : Not all blogs with generic WordPress templates are spam, but a lot of the spam blogs I run into do not venture too far away from the freebie WordPress templates available from Fantastico or basic WordPress template sites. You’ve probably seen these when you first develop a WordPress blog.
Also, check their “About Us” page, if it says the following, the blog could be spam, new, or just lacking some basic TLC :
This is an example of a WordPress page, you could edit this to put information about yourself or your site so readers know where you are coming from. You can create as many pages like this one or sub-pages as you like and manage all of your content inside of WordPress.
I really do use this as a quality indicator and if I find a good blog for becoming a link partner with and I see that they have not changed their About Us page, I usually make sure they do so before embarking on a blogging or link campaign with them.
These are a few of lots of quality indicators I generally look at when reviewing a site. How do you judge the quality of a site before working with it or contributing linked content to it? Please leave a comment.
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48 Responses to “5 Ways to Tell if a Blog Link is Gold or Rotten”
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Nice writeup. Domains, topic irrelevance and penis/casino stuff are some of the first things I look for.
Nice post. These are good things for me to keep in mind this year as I start to get into SEO.
Duane Brown’s last incredible blog post..Bolding your Title in PPC Campaigns. Does it work?
OK, this post is a must-read for all those doing link building on their own.
! Never waste money / effort on a rotten link.
Dropped domains; thanks for opening my eyes up to this. What if a a site had bought a high quality domain and 301ed over to their own pages, how would you check that?
CybernautSEO’s last incredible blog post..Link Building for a French Website
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 12:44 pm
I really don’t see that as being much of an issue, but yeah, it’s worth looking into if the high quality page is not relevant to the 301 target page.
Yea, Penis, Viagra, Poker in that order. It’s pretty much a given!
Wes McDermott’s last incredible blog post..Paid Links! Why the Hell Not?
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Sounds like a normal Friday evening in the Baker household LOL!
Marvelous post right here! Now I know what to always look for whenever I want to do anything concerning blog Linking. That’s right…
Justice O. Omorodion’s last incredible blog post..Home Business Systems – The Maverick Money Makers Tips.
Hi Loren,
I agree with you that some folks are providing link back to “casino & online gaming sites” obtaining links or for sponsored review.
It’s bed practice and infect you won’t able to create authenticate information provider of your niche.
If you want to be authenticate and popular just provide good and clean information. It’ll help you out…
Web application development’s last incredible blog post..Guidelines for choosing an authentic seo service provider
Now what am I going to do with this PR 5 Viagra link?
Gerald Weber’s last incredible blog post..10 MORE Examples of Creative Twitter Uses
…and from where are those peni$ enlargement, viagra, animal s3x, underage s3x, s3x enhancers, and etc spam coming from ?!
My newbie site is bombarded with those kind of spams on a regular basis..
(Sigh)
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
I suggest using the WP-Spam Free and Bad BEhavior plugins for WordPress blogs.
Good stuff, Loren. But this tactic is not even in my repertoire of link building tactics. Do people even bother with link trades (i.e. reciprocal linking)? I thought that was the big no-no of Link Building or am I behind with the times?
Laurence Flynn’s last incredible blog post..Twitter Loses Funding, Announces Closure
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
I’m a full believer that limited and resourceful link “trading” is part of the overall diverse & natural linking landscape. Many of the sites in our blogroll or other blogrolls link to each other. It’s not because we are “trading” back and forth, but because of the niche, mutual admiration and relevance.
Furthermore, there are a lot of link acquisition sharks that prey on sites which don’t know better, charging for links on spam blogs or setting up linking schemes associated with such blogs.
Generally I look also this values (thanks to seoquake toolbar):
how many outbound links per page have the site?
how many incoming links have the site?
how many on the homepage and how many on the subpages?
As a legit poker blogger, I take offense
Gugel’s last incredible blog post..UIGEA Repeal in the Works?
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
If you’re legit, then you shouldn’t take any offense
Nice post although I would contend with your poker comment (and online gambling in general). There are quite a few high quality sits in that arena out there.
Splogs exist in every single industry especially in the lead generation (mortgage and finance) vertical.
Assess each site on it’s own individual merit. Also you can always use http://whois.domaintools.com/dailyseotip.com for a bunch of great information.
Cheers!
Dannomatic’s last incredible blog post..Dan Nedelko’s Twitter Updates for 2009-03-16
Loren Baker Reply:
March 18th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
Cheers Dan, but keep in mind, if a site is supposed to be about home decor or pickup trucks, and then you find a bunch of Party Poker posts and Penis Explosion posts in its archive, it’s running the risk of being flagged and is a spam enabler.
Excellent post. Unfortunately, every week I am contacted by those who don’t know any better that are taking links anywhere they can get them. I try to tell them. At least now I have another resource to point them to.
People will believe the most outrageous claims except the ones that go against what they have already decided to commit to. A little backup is always helpful.
it is a very useful post for SEO beginers. There are many good tips and ideas I will keep in my mind.
Janna Baker’s last incredible blog post..Spring: The Season for a New Healthy Lifestyle
Great post. I think another point worth mentioning, and it might be the simplest of all… How frequently are posts made on the blog? Every month, every week, every couple hours? If you’re reading a post that looks outdated, or has no comments, then there’s probably not a lot of eyeballs on it. Which means less exposure for your links.
Same type of thing can be applied to forums. Usually the main page has a count of how many members there are, and you can gauge how often users are posting threads. The more the merrier!
Whoast’s last incredible blog post..10 Keys to Crafting an Effective Call to Action
What about some basics like checking how recently the page was cached in google – if there’s a direct path from the home, how many clicks from the home the content lives, how recent the cache date is of the home, etc…
There are many aspects to consider.
Note to self: do the about us page already. -JP
Print blog’s last incredible blog post..Why Discount Offers Can Boost Your Business
This is the most informative for seo and blog posts.
Listorbit’s last incredible blog post..Listorbit Today released its Industry-Specific Datacards
Buying blog posts is a risky game!
At least this post is gold for me. I am thinking about buying links for a blog I want to rank for a competitive keyword. I am going to study it from this perspective.
While we’re on the topic… I’m offering free links on a quality blog right now.
If you want one-way links from a quality site, send your Data Loss Horror Story to our blog. We’ll even pay you for your story!
SEO links and prizes. It’s like a win-win situation. You win twice.
The dropped domains tip is a pretty good one and not many starters know about it
Well done
I’ve got one question though….
I found this article via sphinn…When i came here there was a welcome msg for sphinn user’s Which worpdress plugin is this?It’s awesome i got to admit
Thanks in advance!!!
George’s last incredible blog post..Search engine reputation management in Greece
excellent post,, as @Ann said ‘must read’
having relevant links is very important to mention cause lots of us just keep commenting at any topic to get more links
Ghada
Ghada’s last incredible blog post..Getting things done allen
I think another point worth mentioning, and it might be the simplest of all… How frequently are posts made on the blog? Every month, every week, every couple hours? If you’re reading a post that looks outdated, or has no comments, then there’s probably not a lot of eyeballs on it. Which means less exposure for your links.
Same type of thing can be applied to forums. Usually the main page has a count of how many members there are, and you can gauge how often users are posting threads. The more the merrier!
The dropped domains tip is a pretty good one and not many starters know about it
Well done
I’ve got one question though….
I found this article via sphinn…When i came here there was a welcome msg for sphinn user’s Which worpdress plugin is this?It’s awesome i got to admit
Thanks in advance!!!
Regards,
CEO,
http://www.yomuzik.net
Sometimes I wonder if Google is smart enough to realize the difference between the contexts of links. There are so many myths out there in the SEO community, that I can’t take their word for anything.
Someone should really do a test about this: one website would get links: one from websites within the same topic, and one 50% more links, but from random websites. Who gets the top spot?
Nice writeup…
Looking for the same on blogger, typepad and other also to find out how to choose right blog from not being caught into spam.
Thanks loren, nice post
excellent post,, as @Ann said ‘must read’
having relevant links is very important to mention cause lots of us just keep commenting at any topic to get more links
Ghada
Ghada’s last incredible blog post..
Unfortunately I think quite a few comments I have made are on bad blogs, and now they are stuck there – a disappointing side effect of being new to blogging I guess.
very valuable post thanks for sharing.
very helpful,I recommend this to any beginners in SEO
definately agree with you – whenever i see viagra or steroids or poker post i know i shouldnt post a link
Thank you for the blog, I found that its important to blog in the right niche as you have described. I really like this site alot. Thank you.