Hi all

 

Okay I have clients as do many other Web Designers (I promise this is going somewhere). I have a link back to my site on their sites. Now if I link to their sites in my portfolio am I making those links to my site worthless? How does this linking thing work? I know we've talked about it before but I really just want answers. I can guess all I want but answers would be good. Does anyone actually know? God this is frustrating.

 

Please advise

If you take the theory that reprocical linking is useless then yes, you make those links useless, simple as that.

 

Only difference is that I usually place a link on every page of my customers website, and only 1 from my portfolio.

 

Anyone who would like to elaborate?

If you take the theory that reprocical linking is useless then yes, you make those links useless, simple as that.

 

Only difference is that I usually place a link on every page of my customers website, and only 1 from my portfolio.

 

Anyone who would like to elaborate?

 

Hi Sunlust

 

Placing your link in numerous pages on the same site is not of much benefit, all those links count as one anyway, plus the fact that a future algorithm change might take a view that the practice amounted to spamming (stranger things have happened in the history of Google). Equally, your one reciprocal link is having the effect you mentioned yourself, as what is considered one link, is being negated by your link.

 

If the sites have relevance to each other and depending on other factors, such as Page Rank (not the green pixels), anchor text and the text around the link, there can be benefit in reciprocal linking. Although bearing in mind recent statements from Google and to a lesser extent Yahoo, better to look for another strategy.

That's not true pegasus, links on multiple pages do not count as one.

 

Also reciprocal linking certainly doesn't hurt you or make the links 'useless' unless they are low/no PR sites.

 

If you want to safeguard then just add rel="nofollow" to the <a> tag of any outbound links

That's not true pegasus, links on multiple pages do not count as one.

 

Also reciprocal linking certainly doesn't hurt you or make the links 'useless' unless they are low/no PR sites.

 

If you want to safeguard then just add rel="nofollow" to the <a> tag of any outbound links

 

Hi Eggman

 

The point about rel="nofollow" is of course relevant to all links and useful to discuss in this context. Essentially though, the post was about links that might be beneficial to search engine ranking, which as I know you appreciate, does not apply to nofollow links.

 

You should read my post again. I did not state that reciprocal links hurt you, look at the last paragraph, including " there can be benefit in reciprocal linking." Beyond that, I simply speculated, who knows what the future might hold. Bearing in mind Google changes over the last couple of years, I wouldn't rule out the possibility that excessive linking from the same site might ultimately cause all links to be ignored. Not a direct penalty but still a negative effect.

 

That is of course purely speculation and in the same way that suggestions paid links, or paid blog posts, would become a major problem were seen as ridiculous four years ago, that has come to pass. What is not speculation is the part of the post you refer to in " That's not true pegasus, links on multiple pages do not count as one. "

 

If I am wrong, then Google staff are also wrong. This has been made clear on several occasions, last time I remember was on stage at SEO Seattle. If you mean that all, or more than one of the links shows up in link lists, from a Yahoo link search, or even in Webmaster Tools, they may well do, they are separate links. However, I was referring to links that might have a value in terms of Google's internal Page Rank, which appeared to match the nature of the original post. In those terms, you can have 1000 links from one site, which may hold potential for increased traffic and theoretically an indirect impact on SERPs; beyond that, 999 of them serve little practical purpose.

Only the first line was directed at you. and aside from that I think you'll find that outbound links and the use of the nofollow attribute are highly relevant to both inbound and outbound linking.

 

My point was that a link applied to the footer file of a site does not count as one link, it counts as a link on every single page where the footer file is included.

I've always been in the practice of linking to a copy of my clients website hosted on the same server as my portfolio, this offers a number of advantages including:

 

- Not having to worry about your link becoming a reciprocal link,

- Doesn't matter if their server goes down as you have your own copy,

- It could help with SEO as your site will have more pages to get indexed (this is definitely speculation by me),

- You won't be obscuring your clients web stats because of people visiting from your site!

 

Of course this might not be such a good idea if the site you have built is often updated by the client resulting in a constant change of content.

scaz interesting idea. So Eggman, is it good to have a link on my clients footer on each page or not?

scaz interesting idea. So Eggman, is it good to have a link on my clients footer on each page or not?

It's good to put your name on there so other people can see you, more business etc.

 

Whether a link is beneficial or not, I don't think anyone "really" knows, everyone can make guesses and assumptions.

 

As Eggman said put rel="nofollow" on the link, which if I am right I think the search engines won't follow it so it won't count towards SEO.

No put rel="nofollow" on outbound links from YOUR site,

 

and yes inbound links from the footer of your clients' sites absolutely DO help you! I can't imagine why anyone would think they don't! lol

No put rel="nofollow" on outbound links from YOUR site,

 

and yes inbound links from the footer of your clients' sites absolutely DO help you! I can't imagine why anyone would think they don't! lol

Hi Eggman

 

" Why would anyone think they don't? " Perhaps because senior search engine staff and authoritive SEO sources, including one you recently recommended have all made this clear, presumably this was just an international April fool, spread over several years.

 

Interesting that the top post in the Google forum mentioning this is from someone busy filing a reinclusion request, who did admit they had gone over the top. Not suggesting that will be needed by most but setting aside the opinion of many well versed people, just think of the logic.

 

A link is a link, some of less value than others but even forum links can have a value. So if instead of making one post in a forum with a link, you make hundreds, what you are suggesting is that the higher number of links serve better. This would be such a simple method of manipulating search engines that they would have to be completely mad to even consider the idea. Although they may be of more intrinsic value, the same applies to numerous links from a website you designed, or on different pages of a directory, or varying pages of a supplier you are linked to, all the same.

 

You are welcome to believe what you wish but you must acknowledge this makes everyone else wrong and the whole search engine system pointless. If they allowed this, there would be ten thousand sites up and running by the end of the week offering to do it for you.

 

" Only the first line was directed at you. and aside from that I think you'll find that outbound links and the use of the nofollow attribute are highly relevant to both inbound and outbound linking. "

 

I didn't take any of the post as particularly directed at me. This is a forum, the idea is open, friendly debate. I don't take anything personally and pleased to see we at least agree on the relevance of nofollow to outbound links. Equally important to many sites on internal links, not controlling the flow of link juice inside a site is a waste.

Goldstein

 

A completely different alternative that makes the discussion a little redundant -

 

why not just take shots for your porfolio rather than links?

you keep people on your site, show them what you want to

you can even make it look better in the way you present the shots and touch them up

 

AND you overcome this little dilemma too

Aren't you two talking about two different things? I think I've got this right:

 

Pegasus you're saying that 100 links on the same page isn't going to be beneficial.

Eggman's talking about one link per page, just many links on one site.

 

(If I haven't got this right then my apologies but it would show there's a lack of clarity here!)

 

Isn't that a different matter? I'm not wading into the debate - it's seriously just a case of I'm confused and I think there's been some confusion over what Eggman's saying. Both seem to make sense to me and don't contradict each-other.

 

Oh, I found this the other day which is a giggle and might be related (then again I lost the will to read it and just got to the juicy comment fight!).

Aren't you two talking about two different things? I think I've got this right:

 

Pegasus you're saying that 100 links on the same page isn't going to be beneficial.

Eggman's talking about one link per page, just many links on one site.

 

(If I haven't got this right then my apologies but it would show there's a lack of clarity here!)

 

Isn't that a different matter? I'm not wading into the debate - it's seriously just a case of I'm confused and I think there's been some confusion over what Eggman's saying. Both seem to make sense to me and don't contradict each-other.

 

Oh, I found this the other day which is a giggle and might be related (then again I lost the will to read it and just got to the juicy comment fight!).

 

Hi wizely

 

Definitely no apology needed, I am often guilty of a lack of clarity. If that's the case here, then I will clear that up. I am saying that , in general, more than one link from the same site has little value, not just from the same page. Matt restated in the post you highlighted what has often been stated, relating to both page wide and site wide links- Where the anchor text is the same, the links beyond one will be disregarded. - This would typically be the case for sitewide footer links from a designer, so they may conceivably draw traffic but have no real value to search engines. On occassions when Google and Yahoo engineers have been asked about multiple inbound links from one site regardless of anchor text, the response has been that the same would apply, although I admit that at Seomoz, this was qualified by "in most cases". There may be situations where someone offers several links to quite different parts of a substantial site, perhaps Wikipedia, with unrelated anchor text, maybe this would have a value.

 

You could argue the same might apply to other sites, with subdomains possibly, although Google recently stated they are now treating them the same as folders, partly for link spam reasons. There will always be exceptions to a rule and I might have been too definitive in my argument but for nearly all sites, the practice of repetitive linking is of no benefit. I do also suspect that the clamping down on various types of links will increase. Not to invoke the penalties that cause mass screaming, Google had enough of that regarding paid links, they will just gradually discount more and more links in the quest to get back where they started. When a link was viewed as a freely given editorial vote and there for no other reason. Not entirely for altruistic reasons, they know this is the best way to be the best search provider and that builds their real business, advertising not search.

Makes sense and seems intuitive - so no doubt people are sceptical!!! Thanks for clearing-up my confusion - again I'm not saying I know either way I just got muddled on what either way was!

 

I would say, purely for my way of operating, I would still put those links in the footer across whole sites because I'm more interested in humans than robots! From my point of view - qualified traffic is my aim - not search engine rankings for the sake of it. I'd prefer to get visitors who've seen my work and clicked-through because they like it.

 

If something makes good business sense and doesn't negatively effect SEO then I shouldn't worry at all about the SEO aspects it would just be a bonus if it happened to have a positive effect.

Makes sense and seems intuitive - so no doubt people are sceptical!!! Thanks for clearing-up my confusion - again I'm not saying I know either way I just got muddled on what either way was!

 

I would say, purely for my way of operating, I would still put those links in the footer across whole sites because I'm more interested in humans than robots! From my point of qualified traffic is my aim - not search engine rankings for the sake of it. I'd prefer to get visitors who've seen my work and clicked-through because they like it.

 

If something makes good business sense and doesn't negatively effect SEO then I shouldn't worry at all about the SEO aspects it would just be a bonus if it happened to have a positive effect.

 

Hi wizely

 

I completely agree with you and wouldn't wish to put anyone off adding footer links if they wish. There is an argument that having the links on each page is part of the consistency that visitors consciously and unconsciously look for. I suspect this over long discussion is my fault, for going too far down the road from an SEO only aspect. Must stick a postit on my screen " Websites Are For Visitors." Just remember to take it off when someone wanders in who wants to pay for the other part.

Goldstein

 

A completely different alternative that makes the discussion a little redundant -

 

why not just take shots for your porfolio rather than links?

you keep people on your site, show them what you want to

you can even make it look better in the way you present the shots and touch them up

 

AND you overcome this little dilemma too

 

That's what I currently do. But I also have links on the bottom of my clients pages.

Wow I finally got to the end of the thread so far. I've created a monster!

removed.

Ha I loved reading this thread, kept me quite entertained.

Whilst I don't know everything about SEO, I do agree with Egg here.

I've got to admit this whole thread got me totally confused! I thought it was a simple case of 2 folks talking about 2 different things (site-wide links 1 per page as opposed to lots of links on the same page) but it's got way beyond that!

I hope my posts didn't add fuel to any flames (apologies if so) - the only opinion I offered was to Seth and that was "stuff thinking about SEO if it gets you human visitors do it!", other than that I just was trying to get it straight in my head what was going-on.

 

This below from Eggman sums-up my approach to SEO and I think it should be the "SEO standards" just like everyone strives for w3c standard designs:

 

In fact here's my complete SEO strategy to the world - do not hire an SEO company or 'professional' simply do this:

 

Titles

Descriptions

Clean URLs

Headings

Content

 

Fill them with GOOD content and update often: your site will prevail.

 

As for your final point on local search, I could not agree more - and if there was one thing that I would add to that list then that would be it.