low quality links - profile, blogs etc

[myk33]

Hi all,

My website which now brings 80% of my business i started working on around 1 year ago from now. I studied SEO mainly using this forum and some good articles on the net.

I started with article marketing and some blog commenting. I then acquired some quality links from related websites, DMOZ, Y DIR and links on resellers pages on corporate websites.

I then started to use services on this forum which started to work great. and pushed all my major keywords to positions 1 - 5 on the SERPs.

I feel sometimes its just too good to be true, the majority of my links for targeted keywords are all mostly from profile links, spun articles and directories.

my question is, in the eyes of Google are these crappy links? I would have though Google would have had an algo to devalue these kinds of links.

also, a link on a high PR profile is considered spam. However does having your link on the main page of the forum hold more weight and considered more authoritive?

just some things that are playing on my mind.

cheers!

 

[biffordm]

I think the reality of the situation is that Google isn't as sophisticated as people like to believe. If you follow Matt Cutts advice you'll never get ranked for anything, ever. I used to follow the 100% white hat method to the T until I realized that I was being beaten by people who were using what are considered at least grey area techniques, if not completely black hat.

The point is that you're putting work into this, and that counts for a lot. Since testing some of the same things out that you've mentioned I've learned one major thing: If you're taking your time, writing content, writing unique comments, etc., while using a "black hat" method you generally slide under the radar. It's when you push out thousands of crappy spam comments to unrelated sites, don't spin content out enough, and so on that you get hit.

 

[JenniFranks]

I then acquired some quality links from related websites, DMOZ, Y DIR and links on resellers pages on corporate websites.

You actually got listed in DMOZ? By what manner of magic did you manage that?

 

[eunicemartinez_21]

Are you strongly holding the position for your keywords? I mean are you there for a long time now? If yes then just continue to do what you are doing. You have a proven method for ranking your site and you have proven it by yourself.

 

[myk33]

Hi all thanks for your replys.

Dmoz was a pain but managed it with some blood sweat and tears.

Generally all our keywords stay put with the of change here and there.

I will keep doing what I am doing but it starts to become too easy in my eyes an then the ratio of good links to junk drops.

I guess that I am being pessimistic about things but as the usual junk links that most people use which ranks their sites well with work I will keep using this method.

Also looking at most corporate websites that sell a business service that are listed well in google all have a few good links such as Dmoz or t directory or listed on a partners page. But 99% of the other stuff is junk such as paid or rented links. Pointless articles and spam.

This just gives me the answer that if you want to rank well just spam the he'll out of your site! And intheory no one should be making their own backlinks! Instead others should e linking you!

In a but shell with my limited experience If you want to do well in SEO you have to play the system!!! Just like near 99% of others!

Cheers, mike

 

[myk33]

Sorry for the bad grammar this was posted on my cell.

 

[dannyhw]

biffordm actually just hit the nail on the head. There are a lot of tricks that people think should be possible to detect and devalue, but when you look at it from the standpoint of an engineer you will realize how difficult it really is. This is where black hat and gray hat happen. Now I've been in it since the very beginning and they've made great strides in reducing spam, but as we all know they can't combat 100% of it. It's at the point where black hat is no longer worth it to me, but some of the same tricks remain, some new ones have popped up and there are people still making money at it.

Another thing is that at this point they don't really care all that much. There are tons of spam sites, but the percentage of phrases that are affected in any way is very small. It's all lower competition, very commercial terms. Black hatters are the least of their problems these days.

I will say I like pure white hat much better than black hat. It requires some real creativity and the rewards are much greater, but it's nearly impossible to break into if you're relying on affiliate programs. You need to have clients with resources you can leverage.

 

[docbother]

You actually got listed in DMOZ? By what manner of magic did you manage that?

Yeah. What Jenni said!

That was probably the best spent blood sweat and tears in all your efforts.

 

[nikoman]

In google's eyes your links are really crappy. Your sites are a long term investment so mix up forced linking with white hat. In other words, give something of value to the page where you are putting the links and that value will reward you.

 

[bobtnega]

It'll always be a cat and mouse game with black/grayhats trying to outrun the google engineers. Each google algorithm update is an effort to stamp out more of these SEO/linking loop holes that have been found in the last few months. Your site is ranking well now and will probably continue to until google figures out how to block out the forum spam. By then there'll probably be another method to follow to boost your rank that will be a bit more tricky for google to detect... and so goes the game