When it comes to linkbuilding, you guys ever "slow it down"?

Sometimes I feel paranoid that after I bust through to the top 10, that my consistent link building eventually gets me slapped by Google and I get sandboxed (not all sites, but some).

Once you guys reach top rankings, do you guys ever "taper" it off?

I have some sites where I have rankings like #4-#7 etc, and they receive a decent amount of traffic and have been stuck there for quite some time now.

These sites are fairly new, so the fact they are ranking so well is great.

However I feel like if I continue blasting away trying to get to the top spot, that I may get "flagged" and drop waaayyy down.

So at this point, would you guys "slow it down" a little and maybe cut down your blasts to the point where you still maintain these rankings, but hopefully slowly creep up to the top spot?

I know it is counter intuitive to the "just keep buildin", but I feel every time I drive to "take it to the hole" I get smacked.

Curious to your thoughts.

I usually take them to page one, and leave them for at least a few months. In that period I add new content - about one article per week or a video. After a few months I blast the new content

rinse and repeat

If your site is new I would concentrate on creating new content and thereby target new long tail keywords. Just do a few high PR backlinks a week during a few months and then you can reconsider your decision based on if you move in the SERP. I would rather reach the top within a 1 year span than getting #1 position and then get dropped from the index.

Go big or go home..

I blast my sites full throttle 10k a day until rank 1 and i continue blasting.

What I would do in your place is deep linking,linkwheels and pyramids.If you didnt do those,do them right now and you shouldnt regret.

Don't stop until you reach #1. Consistent linking looks way more natural than intermittent bursts.

I like starting slowly, and then i just follow my SERP
if its advancing nice, i just continue the same
if it stays in certain position for a week then make more effort linkbuiding (20-30% more)
i repeat it until reaching page 1 (or page 2 or maybe top 5 or 3 depending how competitive KW is)
Then its time to go slowly - i wait for 3 weeks for changes and then increase my link building if site doesnt go up

I build new content regularly - once a week - from first time site was indexed, usually with quality, but sometime with rewrites if no time for research. It takes me half and hour to rewrite a 700 words article.

Later i change it with quality unique stuff on same subject...