Automatic link exchange is a strict no. Google is coming down heavily on such programs. Manual link exchange is ok as long as you avoid “bad neighborhoods” which are websites which using automatic link directories, which have porn, spam, spyware, and cracks and so on. Make sure you don’t exchange links with such websites. It is important that you exchange links with websites which are similar to your website.
In general google hates link directories and link farms which exist just for the purpose of increasing page rank. If that was allowed everybody would join 50-100 such programs. It’s not allowed. However as long as google doesn’t find out and doesn’t penalize your website, you can have it. Make a note of your most important search terms and see the google ranking for these terms. Keep checking the rankings for these terms every week. There are 2 types of google penalties
1) Minus 30 penalty
2) Minus 950 penalty
Automatic and irrelevant linking can be easily detected by google and can get you banned or penalized easily. Matt Cutts, a senior engineer of google recently said websites running link directories just for the purpose of boosting PR’s and gaming the search engines will be penalized heavily from May.
If you find you have got any of these penalties then immediately remove the link directory and file for a re inclusion with google. If someone visits your website and finds out you are using link directories to boost your ranking and if they complain to google, then you will be penalized immediately. So be careful and keep checking your rankings on a weekly basis.
Tags: SEO, Link Exchange, Seo
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