[Fredrik Robert]

Is this a good practice to add a link from any high Authority website to my blog or article as it ranked well for SEO purpose. I usually create a hidden back link to my blog's to get better ranking. Is this good or i may be penalized for the same ?

[CityCM]

I too would be interested in this. I read an article a couple of weeks ago that said footer links aren't much use because Google don't value them highly enough, so I was thinking about hidden links in the body somewhere.

[MikeChipshop]

Pretty damn sure Google would penalise the use of hidden links.
I have no evidence of this but i would be very surprised if they didn't.

[terydinho]

Again, no evidence, but Google aren't stupid - their whole ethos for backlinks is about linking back to quality content and providing a quality user experience - now if you hide links, surely you break the rules on UX?

In my opinion it is a no-no - don't try to take shortcuts, do it right and you'll reap the benefits!

[zed]

as above. They'd just see it as hidden content.

[bocaj]

It depends what exactly you mean by 'hidden'.

Hidden as in white text on a white background, or hidden as in a carefully placed reference point for the article.

I.E doing a website on well thought out pricing presentation, and conveniently plugging your own site as an example?

[CityCM]

bocaj, on 06 October 2011 - 03:46 PM, said:

or hidden as in a carefully placed reference point for the article.

I.E doing a website on well thought out pricing presentation, and conveniently plugging your own site as an example?

That's what I meant, hidden as in not visibly a link (i.e. make it display as normal text with css)

[Jason Dexter]

Or hidden as in placed behind a div layer. There ARE ways around it, but you have to question what your doing if thats the way you get backlinks.

[rallport]

Looking at what information Google currently and what it does I'm pretty sure a hidden link will get picked up very fast and it definitely won't fool some of the smartest web people around - if not reported by a users.

[Jason Dexter]

Just to answer a question:

You won't be penalised for doing this, but the website your doing it on could get penalised.

Remember folks, anything that happens off-site, you won't get penalised as you don't have 100% of the control

[roothost]

I think the OP needs to clarify exactly what he means by hidden.

[BlueDreamer]

The very fact the OP is trying to "hide" a link is suspicious. Instead of trying to fool search engines why not just do the damned thing properly in the first place?

[Cristebo]

The thing is that you don't be penalized by receiving links from another sites. The one who will be penalized is the website that will hide the link, because the visitor see a thing and the google robot see a different thing.
Your site will be penalized only if someone report that thing to Google.

[Alan Poly]

Is this a excellent practice to put in a link from any high Authority website to my blog or article as it ranked well for SEO principle. I usually generate a unseen back link to my blog's to get superior ranking. Is this excellent or i may be penalized for the similar ?

[MikeChipshop]

Alan Poly, on 28 December 2011 - 12:17 PM, said:

Is this a excellent practice to put in a link from any high Authority website to my blog or article as it ranked well for SEO principle. I usually generate a unseen back link to my blog's to get superior ranking. Is this excellent or i may be penalized for the similar ?

What's this? The Indian Bill and Ted?

[rallport]

MikeChipshop, on 28 December 2011 - 12:21 PM, said:

What's this? The Indian Bill and Ted?

Ban? I'm honestly bored of their generic responses. I'm sure they have a book of them they use depending on what the general topic is.

[mOxby Design]

Any time you are treating search engines (not just Google) differently from human visitors you are getting into the realms of a potential penalty. You may see a short-term gain but it is not worth the risk of a long-term penalty/

As has been said above Google isn't stupid and their algorithms get updated so often you cannot assume you can get away with stuff like hidden links, hidden search-engine-only-content etc.

And why do you need to hide a 'high quality' link or good content anyway. If you're providing a great page and have a link to a helpful resource for your visitors, then why hide it in the first place. Wanting to hide it suggests you shouldn't have that link to me.

[Nile Hadwards]

Invisible linking is count in black hat seo and Search engine don't like this type of linking. In most of cases search engine gives penalty to those websites who do internal linking.

This post has been edited by Nile Hadwards: 02 February 2012 - 12:12 PM