Let's break this down: - Cloaking (showing crawlers deceptive content about a site) PowerLinks has never used cloaking that I am aware of. - Massive domain interlinking- Use of affiliate programs without the addition of substantial unique content From what I read on their forums, a majority of PowerLinks members use the Exclusion Filters, which does away with the duplicate content problems associated with many link exchange programs. - Use of reciprocal link programs (aka "link farms") If this was a bad thing, then everyone who exchanges links would be in trouble. - Hidden text Again, PowerLinks has never used any hidden text that I am aware of. I double-checked my links pages, and I haven't found any at all. - Excessive keyword repetition Well, I guess CNN had better scour the Web and get rid of all those references to "Headline News" in their anchor text - or they might get banned. (Maybe this is why Google put all of those extra o's in their AdWords anchor text - so they wouldn't get banned by Yahoo for repetitive anchor text - LOL!!!) If you were the only one out of 4700 members who got banned, it sounds like you may have been doing something that Yahoo didn't like. Maybe some blogging and pinging? Only you would know, but don't be too quick to blame someone else. Like I said, if PowerLinks members were getting banned en masse, you might be onto something. But from what I have found, you are the only member who has made this kind of accusation. I even emailed their support team, and they have not received reports of anyone else being banned. I have also emailed several other long-time PowerLinks members that I know (they actually referred me there), and they are still in good standing on Yahoo and Google. Again, all of these accusations are just pure speculation based on fears and not on facts. PowerLinks made the mistake of creating those subdomain links pages, and they have paid for that. They have owned up to it (based on the email they sent all their members), and have quickly done something about it. So, if you want to blame them for something that is factual, blame them for that. But as far as the rest of your list goes, it just doesn't hold water. Anyway, I am glad that you are back in Yahoo. I wish you the best.
I agree with Mark. I don't know of any other sites that got banned or lost PR. I have had several sites with PowerLinks and i got nothing but good results. I cancelled the subscriptions as soon as i was aware they were banned but my sites themselves haven't been excluded. The only bad thing that has happened is that one of my sites has dropped to the second page of Google because its losing the links that were gained through PowerLinks. I'm rapidly trying to replace them (not to rapidly though ). I doubt if i'll join again but it does seem like you are blaming PL's for everything.
a subdomains is this forums.digitalpoint.com zip.bing.ca any thing before the actual domain. i have used linkmarket it was ok i now only use linkmetro and guys it is possible its not powerlinks i was heart broken when the evidence pointed in thier direction.. i was paying powerlinks over $120 a month (got in when some domains were only 1.95 per month) and wow the links.. I hope/wish i was/am wrong about powerlinks but only the SE know the true reasons now if only they would tell us why they banned us...
There could be other reasoons that is making your site rank top. I think it is waste of money to join powerlinks ( or now linksmaster ) type link exchanges.
I think folks who are unsuccessful in using Automatic Link Exchange service are either doing something else to cause issues, or not using the service correctly. First of all, 1. Never accept all partners at once. "You cant control who links to you, but you CAN control who you link to". In a large network, it is probable that some shady sites may exist. 2. Visit and approve your partners carefully. Visit approved partners regularly for issues such as Fraud, missing links, or other errors. Neither gotlinks nor linksmaster automatically check for fraud such as tampering with robots.txt, nofollow/noindex, etc... 3. Choose a service that offers Variable Anchor Text and description. This could reduce potential spammy concerns. linksmaster does not have this, but Gotlinks does. 4. Choose a small network instead of a large network. (Less spammy if that is your concern. But there is no proof even with large networks, otherwise these PR4 pages I randomly found, would be PR0 or banned. If you look at other partners, you may find PR5 or PR6, etc example, example2). 5. Stay ahead and Configure multi-way links since Reciprocal may become a thing of the past. Neither linksmaster nor gotlinks offers multiway You are also welcome to join our free small network which provides more features (variable text, gradual link release, keyword filter to search for partners, multi-way linking, Partner Fraud check, etc...)
Your tool looks very nice Neof. We (members form the Taggle Team) are working on a similar one in France. We are wondering why none of the tools we are seing aren't doing multi way link and gradual link release. Concerning variable anchortext, we will ask a lot of work to the webmasters joining the newtork as their links will be inlcuded in phrases they'll have to provide. I can't explain everything here but we are working on a high quality tool which will be released on a very small network as the beta version won't include the linkvalue or linkranking algo (it calculate the value of the links you offer to the network and allows you to convert them into links from the network to you pages) and the anti spam algo (same thing as before but it also looks for people trying to exploit the network). These 2 modules will be develloped later. We would be happy to use your tool as it looks verry good, at least on the paper, and for us the small network is very important at the begining because the trust will be the only way to have a decent network, so members co-optation (as we do on the Taggle forum) is essential: you could benefit from good members you bring in the network but if they do stupid things, they will be banned and you could get penalized.
Hi Turulillo, Automated Multi-way linking is a new concept. A > B > C > D > E ... > A. I am not aware of any network offering this where millions of sites can be linked as such fairly easily, achieving one-way links from different class C IP's. You are wise to keep your network small. Most users don't really understand the proper way of using an automatic link exchange network. Many users sign up expecting many links instantly and are not picky about the partners they link to. When they do this, it is the same as saying "I want to tell search engines I just got hundreds of links all at once" and "yes, I am willing link to a shady site as well a good site". Automatic Link Exchange should be treated as Manual. The benefit is all the members are already conveniently listed in the network. You just login and approve each member. The system does not email any member to beg for approval on your behalf. Once both parties approve each other when they login from time to time, and their links automatically appear in each other's directory. But many new users may be impatient. They may approve all members by default and do not go through each partner site to check for legitimacy or other issues. This is not recommended in a large network. In a smaller network this may be ok if the network staff checks all partners, which they usually do. I have posted examples of successful sites and can also say that one of our member's links page was at PR0 in Jan, and in a month, PR3. This does not occur for all members, but I want to point out the possibillities comparable to manual link exchange. Many users may get a bad experience and post about their experience without realizing it was due to improper usage. Thus, when you launch your new system, it is important to keep all members "educated" as much as possible to be careful about asking for hundreds of links at once because "you just might get what you asked for". Not only this, some users may improperly use other automatic link exchange networks on the same site, and you may have to educate them (like we do) on how to use those too. I think it is a necessity to educate all new users carefully to prevent any bad experience (which can happen on manual link exchange just as well). Thanks for joining us, and good luck to you on your network...
this is from google Certain actions such as buying or selling links to increase a site's PageRank value or cloaking - writing text in such a way that it can be seen by search engines but not by users - can result in penalization. Please review our quality guidelines at http://www.google.com/webmasters/guidelines.html for more information. If you identify problems with your website and make the changes necessary to comply with these guidelines, please do not hesitate to contact us. if you read the google guidelines you see this and more Have other relevant sites link to yours. Don't participate in link schemes designed to increase your site's ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or "bad neighborhoods" on the web, as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links. Ive learned the HARD way to avoid these programs or offers
Hi Bloodwrath, I think your problem is different: when you have the same article copied and pasted thousands of time, with the same link, the same anchortext, that's sounds worth and it's easiest to detect that Neof's network. It's exactly the same problem than the DMOZ dup' directories. There is no more such pages in BigDaddy and Google don't give credit anymore to the links coming from them. In this case, I don't think that Google blames the websites receiving these links because they represent a insignificant pourcentage of all the BL they're receiving. But in your case, you have a website which is massively backlinked by thousands of duplicated pages + anchor and they represent a big poucentage of your BL. I think your problem is coming from there.
The above is not really applicable to our discussion since it applies to buying one-way links. But I have been tracking a site that bought >100,000 links from free web hosting sites, and Goog credited only about 16,000 links. Perhaps the other 82,000 were "penalized" or sandboxed... The site still ranks#1 on most competitive keywords after 6 months and these links are still there. "Link scheme" is not defined specifically in the guidelines. I believe the act of any Link exchange is already a "link scheme" between two webmasters. But Manual link exchange between webmasters has been in existence for a long time, and there is no evidence of penalty by Google. There is a section in this forum promoting such exchanges. Automatic link exchange is similar to manual link exchange except the exchange occurs with less effort so you can spend more time with your family. The above quote shows that a bad experience can happen in a manual link exchange just as well as in an automatic link exchange. In an automatic link exchange, due to more partners, it takes more effort to manually check the partners regularly but if there is an auto-fraud checker, then the checking can be much easier. Previously I have posted several links and sites that have PR4, PR5 using automatic link exchange service. If Automatic Link Exchange is bad, then they would be PR0 nor banned. This successful evidence proves that use of Automatic Link Exchange properly can be rewarding even in a large network, although my preference is with smaller networks. To use an automatic link exchange effectively, dont just link to anyone in the network. And look for these features: 1. Variable anchor text/description (allows several phrases to represent your site, and duplicate content is less of an issue) 2. Gradual link release (simulates the slow pace of manually acquiring links) Nice to Have: 3. Auto-checker for Missing links and Fraud 4. Multi-way linking (get one-way link to your site) I'm not sure how other folks in this thread became unsuccessful in using automatic link exchange. I am assuming they were linking to everyone that comes along by default without much checking, or something else is causing the issue. If you have a site (whether Manual or Automatic) that recently dropped significantly in ranking, then we can ask: 1. Did I check my partners for hidden or missing linkback to my site? 2. If the linkback is present, is there any scheme that block search engine from following my backlink? 3. Is the partner site banned?
Hi, neof. I went to see you link exchange service and I need to upgrade coz I cannot put your code to my site. My site is directory already so generate page code is not important for me. I see but then I see What on earth? Is that plan is available or not? Regards, Sxperm
What do you think about multi ways link building ? Is it SEO benefit ? What is their affect on sites ? I really wonder. Thanks