An SEOer just told me that we can't use reciprocal links anymore & they will actually count against us. Is this true? Thanks Michelle
They definately still work in MSN and Yahoo...They even seem to still work in Google for less competitive terms. Most professional SEOs though will say the same thing that your friend did, that they don't work at all and will hurt you
k, just to be clear, he wasn't a friend, he was someone I was interviewing for the job. So, why would they say that if it's not true? Thanks Michelle
There is so much FUD regarding the effectivenes of reciprocated linking. From what we currently see, there are no disadvantages to moderate reciprocal linking. Some may claim otherwise but I've yet to see any reason for us to discontinue our current practice which may include reciprocated links as part of a campaign. We try to strike a natural balance between directory listings, one way links from authorative sites, resource collections, in content links and reciprocated links.
Because they have read it a hundred times from other SEOs who heard it from other SEOs etc in forums. I wouldn't hire someone who only used recip links but as the previous poster said, there is a balance there which to me a good SEO should acknowledge. I would judge him based on his total plan to get your site ranked.
I firmly believe that random recipricol links won't count and may even hurt your site in large numbers. Targeted recipricol links from quality content sites in your niche I'm sure still help. As yfs says, it's always a good idea to mix up your link building, and I see no reason why good recipricol links shouldn't be part of that mix.
As far as Reciprocal Links are concerned Google is restricting these links as most of the sites are internlinked with each other which are hosted in same shared server and which share same ip and this would lead to link farming as per google. To avoid this Google is strictly considering and giving more weightage to inbound links and three way linking which interm considers as popular links. But most of the SEO experts who shared their views during Google Jagger update was Reciprocal Links will be ignored by google and more emphasis will given for inbound links and three way linking and even the changes was observed in some of my sites.
I think when most people refer to recips its not with their own sites. Interlinking is a completely different issue.
Dead & Devalued are also every different, if its on topic and relevant then I feel you should recip, not randomly with off topic sites.