Cross-linking using rich anchor text - erk!

[Kay]

There's still plenty of buzz about the Penguin update and I've been reading up on it. Now I'm a wee bit worried.

Penguin was supposed to nuke the sites using spammy tactics. These include a variety of things such as unnatural links, keyword stuffing, etc. There's even some suggestion that abuse of EMDs could lead to being penalised. So far there's not much that we didn't already know was a bit dodgy and it was risky to use these methods.

However, I do quite a lot of cross-linking between my sites. (I've mentioned it on here before somewhere in a different context.) I'm not trying to game the system. I honestly believe I'm doing it for legitimate reasons. If I visit a city, I may post a general piece about that city on my expat site. If I go to a restaurant there, I'll post about it on my food blog. And if I find somewhere that might be good for disabled travellers, then I post about it on my accessible travel site. Naturally, I cross-link them all as it's extra relevant information. If someone is reading an article on any one of the sites, then they might like to click through to read more on the others.

The sites are all on the same server and all owned by the same company. There has never been any attempt to pretend that they're independent of each other to fool or game anyone. Now I'm getting concerned that some of my perfectly OK sites are going to get hit in the cross-fire, as G takes out the bad guys. Gee, I'm getting so fed up of this running about worrying about all G's changes, the sooner I get weaned off this G dependence the better.

I do understand the reasons for the changes, but sometimes it seems they take such a broad brush to it and they don't care who they destroy in the process. By the time they've let all their animals loose on us, goodness knows what their search results will look like. I'm starting to think that free traffic from G is the worst kind of traffic to get. Maybe it's best just to ignore them and get on with building the traffic by other means.

How about you? Are you still dancing to their tune or have you moved on to other things?

[mikeb]

It is hard to say.

I have more or less stopped link building except for social links in the last 2 months, waiting to find the consensus of wisdom.

It does not seem to be linking per se causing problems - but the variety and diversity of key and none key anchor text that matters. So if the titles of your posts are long and complex, not base keyword - I cannot see them doing anything but help as anchor text , because that is natural.

The EMD is a question. I actually think that EMD will help more, because "brand" is now supposedly important. For many EMD sites, the brand is the same as the domain name, so it is hard for google to penalze without throwing babys out with bathwater.. That is - if your domain is cheapaccounting and brand and company are cheapaccounting - links in that name are natural. I actually see EMD ranking on thinner content in harder niches than before.

[cash ninja]

I do the same as you Kay, where relevant I cross link between my sites. I haven't stopped doing this, or removed the links since the google updates over the past few months.

As far as EMDs go, there are a lot of differences of opinion at the moment on these, some people are saying that they are being penalised whereas others think they may actually benefit because it's more natural for them to have a high percentage of links where the anchor text is the keyword they are targeting (because it's also the 'brand' name) - this fits with my experience too, where one of my sites is being outranked by a couple of other sites because theirs have the keyword(s) that we are all targeting in the domain name, whereas mine doesn't, despite my site having better page rank, being older, having more incoming links, etc, etc.

[Kay]

[Edit - this was a reply to MikeB.]

Funnily enough, I'm right in the middle of writing an article about EMDs post-Penguin. I've done heaps of research on the subject. Obviously, I don't want to go into great detail here, and negate any point of writing the article itself, so I'll try to summarise briefly some of my findings so far.

EMDs were a quick way to get your site zooming up in the SERPs.

When people realised this, they abused it. (Tried to game G.)

G doesn't like being gamed so they've clamped down on how much value they give to EMDs.

G can't penalise all EMDs because some are perfectly legitimate uses of the domain.

Therefore, some people argue that EMDs are still good for giving you a ranking advantage, as long as G doesn't decide to punish you for it.

That's how I understand it anyway.

[akirk]

I am sure that Google are intelligent enough to distinguish between the phrase EMDs such as 'wheretogetcheapcarinsurance.com' and real ones such as directline.com etc.
I think that there is a danger in generalising Google's approach - EMD good / bad - I am sure that it is far more subtle than that

Alasdair

[JJMcClure]

I'm starting to think that free traffic from G is the worst kind of traffic to get. Maybe it's best just to ignore them and get on with building the traffic by other means.

How about you? Are you still dancing to their tune or have you moved on to other things?

Interestingly, the phrase 'dance to the tune' means to "to always obey someone who has power over you" and Google have no power over me.

When considering traffic from Google, I've always just tried not to trip spam filters. If you can answer yes to the following question that Google always ask then you'll usually be ok with them.

"Would you do it if there were no search engines and does it help your users?"

It's a simple philosophy and if you get where they're coming from you'll get SEO and Google's attitude towards the content of their index. There may be times when we inadvertently mimic a spammy technique but that's always going to be the rare case and not the norm. I'm starting to think more and more that Penguin was aimed at SEO's because it's hurt so many link builders. Like mikeb, I've suspended all link building.

[Kay]

Like mikeb, I've suspended all link building.

But why?

"Would you do it if there were no search engines and does it help your users?"

Why were you building links anyway? To game the SEs or just to build traffic?

One could argue that if you've regularly been building organic links and now you suddenly stop, then presumably you must've been doing something naughty in the first place or you wouldn't be stopping now cos you're scared of being caught doing it. That would look like a very unnatural pattern of link building to me.

Would I be building links if there were no search engines?

Damn right, I would. How are people going to find my site if I don't have links into it? Offline advertising, I suppose. Maybe I could go on the telly.

[glideinyostride]

Gee, I'm getting so fed up of this running about worrying about all G's changes, the sooner I get weaned off this G dependence the better.

Sorry if this detracts from the conversation, but how does one go about attracting traffic from other SE's without also being noticed by the G men? Isn't it all coming from the same source?

As far as EMDs go, I finally completed my first purchase last weekend and haven't noticed any drops in page listing, etc after the transfer and I hope I don't.

[Kay]

...how does one go about attracting traffic from other SE's without also being noticed by the G men? Isn't it all coming from the same source?

The point isn't so much about getting traffic from the other search engines, it's more about using other ways to drive traffic to your site.

Try this thread for loads of great ideas about traffic building.
http://experienced-people.net/forums...etting-traffic

[JJMcClure]

But why?

Because of the debate over whether or not you can hurt yourself with links, that's what the most devastating aspect of Penguin has been. There have been a couple threads on this forum discussing it.

Why were you building links anyway? To game the SEs or just to build traffic?

Same thing.

One could argue that if you've regularly been building organic links and now you suddenly stop, then presumably you must've been doing something naughty in the first place or you wouldn't be stopping now cos you're scared of being caught doing it. That would look like a very unnatural pattern of link building to me.

Yeah, nightmare isn't it. What is a 'natural' link profile? How do Google tell one from an unnatural link profile? These are the questions that link builders have been asking and debating for years.

Would I be building links if there were no search engines?

Damn right, I would. How are people going to find my site if I don't have links into it? Offline advertising, I suppose. Maybe I could go on the telly.

Then you should be ok with links intended for humans to see, it's the links we build that are only intended to increase our rankings and that we wouldn't build if there were no search engines that we need to worry about. Telling them apart or acquiring the latter that look like the former is the hard bit.