Reciprocal Linking Can Get You Banned From Google

Well for years now, actually since the Big Daddy update, webmasters and SEOs have been pondering and discussing amongst themselves and the community whether Google has been penalizing or discounting links to a site because it is a reciprocal link. There is no need to wait any longer though…according to the new Google Webmaster Guidelines regarding Search Engine Optimization, “Web sites are no longer permitted to exchange links” which is one of the fundamental practices on the internet. It explicitly states “Link to me and I’ll link to you” is Reciprocal Linking an activity that Google considers a “Link Scheme” that has a likelihood of getting you BANNED!

I think it is ridiculous, and Google should not have released this kind of information until they had the proper context and wording. Over at Esoteric Labs Google’s Adam Lasnik is trying to paraphrase the Google Guidelines stating “We Googlers are nonetheless chatting about ways we can better clarify our stance on this subject.” Reciprocal linking was a part of the internet before Google existed and will continue to be part of the internet during Google’s existence. I understand if Google wants to discount links from Bad Neighbourhoods, but there is no need to release such a general document without clarification that could cause all the commotion in the webmaster community as it has.

Long Tail For SEO

An interesting article I came across was Aaron’s blog post, “How to Estimate the Length & Value of the Long Tail for Your Target Market’s Keywords“. It was an interesting read about How do you determine how much value there is in the head of a keyword space compared to the tail of the same marketplace?

A good observation Aaron made was to examine Search Auto-Completion to see additional popular phrases that may be easier to rank for. I see this as an essential part alongside using competitive research tools.

I think all Aaron’s points are great, and I firmly believe after working on numerous high profile – high traffic sites, that if you find yourself ranking #7 for a page that does not target a specific term, perhaps you WILL rank #1 or #2 for it and for related phrases if you make pages that are focused on a tighter niche and are more tailored to longtail queries.

Above The Fold in Email Marketing

Email Marketing is the new buzz word within the online marketing companies. Email is the means to reach numerous subscribers with multiple great messages and promotions. A common overlooked aspect of email optimization is the Preview Window. The preview window refers to the portion of your Outlook that displays your email once you click on the email. As you know, emails extend beyond the preview window causing you to scroll to have to read it. Well, similar to Search Engine Optimization, in email optimization we try to place great content “Above The Fold” to gain the readers interest.

Here are some elements to place above the fold:

• Tagline
• Name of Publication
• Name of Company/Logo
• Headlines
• Link to Website
• Date
• Volume or Issue #

Avoid placing long stories, third party advertising or too much advertising for your products Above the Fold.

Addition To Sitemap Protocol

There has finally been an enhancement to the standardized sitemap protocol developed by Google, Yahoo and MSN – Autodiscovery. Autodiscovery gives siteowners the ability to easily share their sitemaps with all search engines at once, avoiding the overhead of manually submitting them to each search engine.

The protocol works as follows. Add the following line to your robots.txt file:

Sitemap:

This is an important addition, yet not the end all be all for sitemaps. I know MSN had stated they have not yet planned on viewing this protocol but will in the future.

Advice From SEO Allstars

With the help of numerous SEO gurus, including Danny Sullivan, Eric Ward and Rand Fishkin, there is a Search Engine Ranking Factors List. It’s hard to criticize anything that these SEO’s have to say since the many of them introduced the world to SEO. Without further ado, here are the Top 10 Positive Factors:

• Keyword Use in Title Tag
• Global Link Popularity of Site
• Anchor Text of Inbound Link
• Link Popularity within Site’s Internal Link Structure
• Age of Site
• Topical Relevance of Inbound Links To Site
• Link Popularity of Site In Topical Community
• Keyword Use in Body Text
• Global Link Popularity of Linking Site
• Rate of New Inbound Links to Site

My only addition to these factors is having the keyword in the domain name. I believe link development is necessary to get your site out of the ’sandbox’, but once it’s out, having the keyword in the domain name is highly effective. Now the Top 5 Negative Factors:

• Server is Often Inaccessible to Bots
• Content Very Similar or Duplicate of Existing Content in the Index
• External Links to Low Quality/Spam Sites
• Duplicate Title/Meta Tags on Many Pages
• Participation in Link Schemes or Actively Selling Links

So if your site has ANY of the negative factors, you should look into changing it, or contact us and we can discuss it further.

The Future Importance of SEO

Well, SEO has been and most likely will always be seen as black magic. But the importance in this industry is growing with each and every day. From large scale businesses to Mom and Pop shops, SEO will benefit your website more than you could imagine. It will bring you traffic, brand your company, and even give you reputation. This cartoon just reminds me of how important Search Engine Optimization is in our everyday lives, and my instinct is that SEO will play a larger role in my child’s life!

Protect Your Web Assets

Protecting your website is as essential to SEO as developing an SEO strategy. One simple mishap could easily counteract all your hard work. So today I’m going to list a few things you can do to protect your online assets.

1. Password Protect Your Website Logs To Avoid Referrer Spam
2. 301 Re-direct Non-www To www Or Vice Versa
3. Don’t Give 200 Code For 404 Error
4. Don’t Give 200 Code For Wildcard Subdomains
5. Write Proper Code – Prevent SQL Injections
6. Avoid 302 Hijacking By Removing Unnecessary 302 Re-directs