I own a couple link directory style sites which have been in so type of yo-yo google penalty for the last couple years. I was thinking the issue maybe because I link to my own sites first on each of my pages. At the top of all my directory category pages I have oneway links to my own sites. Over my entire site there is a hundred or so links to sites I own and are all on the same host and IP. I was thinking this maybe causing some sort of interlink penalty for my sites with google. Does anyone know if oneway links to my own sites would cause a penalty? Would placing a rel=nofollow tag on all my own URLs help fix this penalty?
I interlink extensively between my sites where it is appropriate. If one page is related to another page on a different site then I make the link. I never link unrelated pages and haven't had any problems. If you think you have a link related penalty then I'd reduce the number of links you have going between your sites...or for sure reduce the number of keyword loaded links. Then see what happens over the next month or two. Do some research on the -950 penalty and it might give you some suggestions on what to change.
If you have a directory you can be affected by the sites in it Becareful who you add to your directory
I was under the impression that google penalizes you for interlinking your sites, are you guys saying that is not true?
Interlinking your sites doesn't mean an automatic penalty, google just ignores the link as it isn't a "natural" link. Mass linking to your own sites can very well be seen as a link farm and you can get penalized for that. If you want to link to your own sites for traffic, then go ahead. Adding "nofollow" to the link will certainly keep you from having any problems with google.
you'd better let your sites into several groups, each group foucus on the same topic, and link to each other.
If your doing it for traffic purposes from site to site and your not worried about using the link to build your rank in google then use the nofollow tag as google will not penalize you on this. Sometimes google will see your interlinking as SPAM and penalize your sites accordingly trust me this as happened to me I know longer interlink between them if I do I use nofollow.
Only do interlinking with your relevant URLs, with relevant anchor text and remember not to reciprocate at any cost. I have a personal experience that reciprocal linking using your own sites within one IP can really drop you down.
So does that include 2 websites domain and sub-domain ? What is the best way to link between forum.xxx.com and www.xxx.com ? should both have footer/header/menu links ? link only one direction ? does the link power go from site to sub domain site ? Thanks, John