Linkwheel is a structure of links on high pagerank web 2.0 platform
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Basically a continous link structure that goes in a circle.
That's the original structure of linkwheels but as with everything else regarding backlink building things change over time. It's better for a linkwheel to have a little more complexity today. A lot more depth and less interlinking between branches or spokes.
This won't leave a footprint. Just don't link all the hubs and feeder sites to one another and you'll be fine.
BassTrackerBoats method is a lot safer for your website than the original linkwheel design. He's got it down to a pretty simple process for creating the network of backlinks and it's been working pretty well for people using it. Search his threads if you want to learn more about it.
So..evidently there are two schools of thought on linking hubs together.
Not hearing anything about the implications or what is the consensus view.
There isn't really two schools of thought regarding linkwheels. The concept has just evolved over time. The original linkwheel in which the hubs link to the spokes and the spokes link together is pretty easy for google to identify. Once it became too common a practice google made adjustments to minimize the value of that design so it had to evolve into more complex structures. The main point is to capture as much link juice as possible and funnel it up to your main site. Interlinking the spokes actually can create a little more juice, but also makes it a higher risk of being seen as artificial and discounted. Later on when it's old hat to you then you can experiment to see if any interlinking works better for you. You're probably safer (especially if your just starting off learning how to do it) to just not interlink any spokes.
... the "buffer sites" really only serve to keep your money site from getting sandboxed. There isn't any other benefit to them really.
Well protecting your site is a pretty significant benefit actually.
The other benefit is that you gain that protection without really losing anything at all.
You site still has a lot of links to it from those buffer sites and those backlinks is still funnelling all that link juice to your site from the entire network of backlinks you created.
...The basic idea of this actually is only to speed up the indexing process, but you do not need that because you can speed up indexing with other methods...
... As I see it, the interlinking does not give additional link juice, in fact every OBL will lower the link value of your hubs, so you are only rerouting the link power without additional benefit.
The basic idea is more than that. The idea is to pass enough value to your site not just to be indexed, but to significantly inprove your serp position.
interlinking actually can create additional link juice. You need to really study the original Page Rank equations to understand why. That's why the linkwheel was originally figured out. By interlinking the spokes the structure actually passed more PR than the simply having the spokes linking to the hub only. The problem is that it isn't really enough to justify the risk since google will discount an obvious linkwheel. Since you have to have more depth to the structure now anyway, you can add more value instead by just linking farther out with a lot more backlinks.
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Basically with linkwheels, link pyramids, silo sites, buffer sites, link pushing, and any other structured linking you're just trying to duplicate a popular website's natural backlinking structure and distill it down to it's most powerful aspects. Since you create the pages yourself you have much more control of the keyword relevancy throughout the entire backlink network structure. The idea is to pass the largest amount of link juice up to your main site with the smallest number of backlinks necessary.
Along with any structured link network you create, you should of course also continue with a regular backlinking campaign. A reasonable amount of backlinks to your money site and a much larger campaign building backlinks to the buffer sites and link silos in your backlink network.
