Linking Strategies

Email this article Printer friendly page

Will Reciprocal Links Get You in Trouble? Eric Ward Linking Strategy Expert, Knoxville, TN - Jan 16, 2004

Editor: I asked my friend Eric Ward, "The Link Mensch," how reciprocal links are being viewed by Google these days. Here's his answer.

Eric Ward

Reciprocity itself is not the problem. Google knows that there are many legitimate reasons sites would link to each other and back. However, many sites offer to swap links for no other reason than in the hope that their Google pagerank might get a bump. Danny Sullivan and I have nearly identical views regarding linking to each other.

If you want your site readers to know about another site because that site will genuinely help them in some way, then sure, link to each other. But if the link is being placed there because someone told you to have a links page, then chances are it will never help you with Google.

Google can't possibly know the intent of every link, so there are certainly examples where links could be helping a site's ranking or hurting it (link farms, all links reciprocal, etc.).

I tell all my clients that they should never let Google dictate their linking strategy, but to ask this question: "If Google didn't exist, would I be doing this?"