Do any of you have experience (hard core proof) to show why this example below would have a negative impact on SEO? <div style="visibility:hidden; display:none"><a href="http://www.yahoo.com">'This is a best site'</a></div> Essentially this would hide the link . . . . Your thoughts?
There are valid uses for this such as drop down menus and tabbed subpages. So I don't think the search engines would automatically penalize for something like this. If you just use it to hide a link like that, competitors can report you for hidden text or cloaking. It most definitely is against Google's TOS. It is not much different than using the same color font as the background. Still you can probably can get away with it until someone reports it and months later when Google finally processes that report.
Would the penalization go to the site which contained the link . . . or would it go against the site that the link was pointing to, or both?
I think it would only affect the site with the hidden text on their site. Then again it might lead Google to investigate the backlinks of the other site too. This could lead to them finding paid links or other things against their tos.
This is considered a "hidden link" and Google considers it "blackhat". Now, if you take the "style" and move it to your CSS file, it is considered "intentional" and can get your site Gray barred. The "design rule of thumb" is: It must be visible on page load and then turned off by javaScript located in the Body. Anything else is considered hidden. And no, Google will not catch you. It will be a competitor that will report you to Google. In addition, this is the major problem with javaScript menu systems.
I am also thinking same ground. Use of Div with hidden stuff may harm, no solid points where google say this