I see tons of conflicting reports/suggestions from everyone on how to build links, which in turn builds page ran, which in turn helps you get a better SERP result. (And I"ve seen a lot of arguments saying page rank is now useless, link building doesn't help page ranks, etc.) But regardless of all that, what about the old fashioned link for a link exchange? Does it truly help with google rankings these days? WIth so many link farms and bot builders out there, I imagine only the very basic link swaps will work: Meaning only if you display a small manually selected bunch of links are your site (say 5 or 10) and they are closely related to the content they are linked to. IN other words, a true link swap the way they were originally meant to be used for. Is that the case these days? Or will any old link from any site do just as well? And does a reverse link really downgrade your link's value or is that a thing of the past as well?
In link exchange a link is devalued but I heard it still carries some weight. John Chow, a successful SEO is using this method. I am waiting to see the long term effect.
It's still valuable I believe. And when you're neck to neck in competition with other sites, maybe a few extra reciprocal links would determine who gets the top spot.
link exchanges do have value if they are of relevance to each other in terms of content, sitewide blogrolls, like the one i have on crmchump have helped me, get link exchanges done with authority sites and those with higher PR than you.
please correct me. i'm not an expert but this is what I think after reading some articles about it. Traditional Link exchange still helps if the link comes from a relevant site and it is actually better than to have a one way link from unrelevant site.. well again that's what I understood after reading some articles about link building. But then again please correct me if I'm wrong.