is three way link building illegal?

hi everyone!
i'd like to know whether a three way link building is "white hat" or more like a "black hat" SEO practice. i'm talking about 3 way topical linking but not a random selection of websites. I would like to know your opinion.

i've visited google webmaster central site for an answer but it's still not 100% clear. here is the link with google's reply: http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Webmasters/thread?tid=60bba25d3801a260&hl=en

and here is some text from their post:

Three way --> Generally this is what some people do to try and make links look like they are one way and avoid Google downgrading the value of a link...Google is very clever and can spot these sorts of things and doing this in most cases is worse than a two way because it demonstrates that you are trying to cheat the system.

There is only ever one question you need to ask when you are thinking about linking from your site to somebody else and that is "is this link useful for my site visitors" if the answer is yes then put the link in.

The first paragraph of the post above states that three way linking is worse than two way linking but the second paragraph says that a webmaster needs to think "is this link useful for my site visitors". Since the tree way linking i'm thinking about is topical so that would be useful for my visitors. well, at list that's what i think.

Please provide me with you feedback and thoughts. It's very imprtatnt to me.
Your help would be highly appreciated!

 

Are you expecting the internet police to turn up at your door and arrest you? Of course its not illegal.

 

Thanks for your answer, Agent000 but you did not understand my question well.
the word "illegal" i used in terms of SEO guidelines. we run a website and want to do a right thing

 

I understood your question just fine - I was being satirical in my reply.

Illegal means breaking the law. Search engines to not get to make laws; only governments do that.

You should have asked if it was against the guidelines that search engines prefer sites adhere to if you want the site to be ranked appropriately in their search results.

To answer your question:
Pretty much what they search engines say is that they only want to give link juice to links that are natural; are editorially given and are not designed to manipulate the rankings.

Any links other than that are unlikely to get you penalized, but are running a high risk of getting no link juice from them ...

 

google doesnt like link exchanges for the sole purpose of getting pr.

i wont even bother with these. there are so many great ways of getting one way backlinks.

 

HAHAHA I actually laughed out loud at that!

 

dont worry dear its not at all illegal.

 

At this point in time it's questionable whether or not Google can detect three way exchanges. Generally it's believed that Google isn't able to detect them.

They like natural linking - which a 3-way exchange is not - but I think it WILL benefit your site's SEO, so long as the links are pageranked, dofollow, and on topic.

I'd recommend being very picky when you agree to a 3-way exchange. Be sure the site that's going to link to you is worthwhile. You don't want to be on general interest directory sites or in link farms.

If it's related to your niche, there aren't too many links on the page, and it's an established, pageranked site.... then go for it.

 

Hi,
No, it's not illegal as long as you maintain it to look natural to the big G eyes. Try to build three way backlinks that made yourself feel it to be the natural.
Thanks!

 

Google gave you the answer here:

If the sites are relevant to one another, interlinking them is fine. However, I wouldn't do it too many times.

As a general rule, if you're trying to figure out whether a linking technique is against Google's Webmaster Guidelines then ask yourself, "If a Googler were to manually review my site/page as a result of a spam report, would it be immediately obvious to that Google that the inbound and outbound links on that page provide some benefit to the users of the linking site?" If you can honestly answer yes then it makes no difference that your site (or the site you're linking to) ALSO gains some SEO benefit. But if it is NOT obvious that the visitors of the linking site(s) will benefit (like a baby toys site linking to a gambling site which links to a hunting site which links to the baby toys site) then they can only assume that the ONLY reason the sites are interlinking is to manipulate the SERPs... which IS a violation of their guidelines and will almost always result in penalty.

 

Everything is fair in "love and war", when you are fighting for a spot higher up in serps, this is no less than war, of course if you are caught by google, then you loose the war, that is it, nothing is ILLEGAL

 

Not at all illegal, as a matter of fact I brought a blog to first page using mainly 3 way links. to be more specific 3waylinks.net
great place, you can use them and just submit manual links too, that are one way, and you can make money pour in

 

thanks everyone for your input!!! you, guys, been great!!!

 

how can u say its illegal bcz 2 way link bulding and 3 way link building r same different only one in 3way activities 3 website r include and in 2 way only same site put competitor link

 

I don't know much about 3 way link building whether it is illegal or not but yes, link exchange is of use these days. Even this has been accepted my Matt Cutt over his blog. I don't remember the exact URL of that post but he clearly stated that link exchange is of no use these days.

To what you got a reply from Google forums...I think they don't have a problem with 3 way link building but the links should be relevant and they should be useful for your visitors as your website is made for humans and not for machines.

 

Hi, I will suggest you to start with some blogs on blogger and word press. Provide 2-3 links to high pr sites of .gov, .org or sites like wikipedia and others, along with this provide 1-2 link to your own site and other blogs. Do the same thing with another blog and provide 1-2 link from that to your website to which you want to promote. This is one of the best way to get quality link back.

 

Hello Friend,

No , three way link building is not illegal, we can use three way link exchange.

 

Hello, Three way link building is not illegal at all.It will help in search engine rankings.

 

don't worry , it's ok.three way link is better than reciprocity link.

 

not illegal and MUCH more efficient than 2 way links : go for it !