Let's say that you have a link exchange, but your outbound links you put on a different domain. You make the link page on the other domain to look like it is still part of your site. Will this appear to Google that you only have inbound links and therefore make your pagerank higher?
i believe what you are reffering to is called Triangle Linking. although i'm not exactly sure from your description. no need to hide it or trick people though to make the link page LOOK like it's on the same site. just naturally provide the outbound link from a good standing site that isn't the one they are linking too. who cares?
About 85% of PR can pass, and the PR is split by the number of outbound links on your site. So the more outbound links, the less PR that passes out per link. I think you are talking about YOUR page PR decreasing because you have outbound links. I've seen theories that your PR can decrease with outbound links, but I have never seen any evidence of that. I have pages which list links to suppliers of certain products and they might contain 30 outbound links. These are not link exchanges (but google has no way of knowing this) and these pages contain the same PR as a page with no outbound links. If there is any PR leak, it is very, very small. If you put the links are on another domain, they won't have share the same PR of the domain and unless it is the same type of site, you are giving someone a non-relevant link. I personally wouldn't do it unless the link partner knows about it. A three-way link is done so it doesn't look like you are exchanging links with a site. Someone places a link to your site, and you return the link (with their knowledge) on another site you own. Since there is no obvious connection, this makes it a lot harder (if not impossible) for a search engine to detect. Since you would have a direct link to this other domain, there would be a connection. I guess if you didn't have any outbound links, the links to your site might be seen as one-way and more valuable, so I guess it could give you more PR. Making it look like your links are on the domain, when they really aren't, sounds like you don't want your link partners to know about it? If not, why just not do a three-way exchange to begin with?
"You make the link page on the other domain to look like it is still part of your site." Doesn't sound like a normal three-way to me. I don't know why you would want the link page to appear it was part of your site unless you don't want the link partners to know what you are doing.
Does anyone have any evidence that three way linking (from another domain) works better than using links from another page within the same site?
right, that's why in my post i said there is no need to do that. just place the link on a good standing site that isn't the one being linked to. Regardless, even if he places the link on another domain and hides it (or makes it look like the same site or whatever crapola he wants to do).. it's still 3 way linking.. just unethical, crappy, i might come find you and smack you in the face if you put my link there 3 way linking
The idea behind Page Rank is that a link to your site is a "vote" that it is a more important site. Exchanging links for the sole purpose of increasing PR defeats that and would be very easy to detect. I've seen talk that google discounts those links (it would be hard prove one way or the other), but even if they haven't started discounting links, three-way link exchanges are becoming more popular as they can be impossible to detect i.e. Site A has link to B, see if site B has link to A. There is mention of this in the google patent, but you can't be sure google is currently using it. I know google can ignore or discount a link from Site A to Site B if they are hosted on the same class c ip. Google also mentions checking registar information to see if Site A is registered to the same owner as Site B and discounting or ignoring the link- In my experience, they do not currently appear to be doing this as long as the sites are with different hosts.
Well, I was under the impression that the more outbound links you have on your domain, the lower your PR for that domain will become. I mean, if links are really "votes", then reciprocal links are just like saying "I vote for you, you vote for me". Where as if they are only inbound, then it's like someone voted for you without you giving anything in return and that would be more of a "real" vote and therefore more valuable. Am I wrong in thinking this?
No But what you are talking about is not a new idea (3 way linking).. and, you ARE giving a vote in return, just from a different site. This way it looks like the situation you mentioned above to the SE's. But the fact is, if you're trying to fool people into saying hey, i'm giving you a reciprocal link from my site.. then place the link on a different (& worthless) url that looks the same, you're barking up the wrong tree. I'd notice the difference in a heartbeat and tell you to put my link from your crap url where the sun doesn't shine. Why not just be up front about it? most webmasters are savvy enough to appreciate that type of deal anyway. as long as the site you are putting the link on has some link popularity and is relevant to the subject at hand.
This is what I was thinking. The more outbound links, the less PR. Otherwise, every link directory website would have a PR of 10 with all the inbound links it gets. However, because link directories have so many outbound links, this balances out the sites PR. Good point, it is unethical and worthy of a slap from the person you are exchanging links with, but does it work to increase your PR...regardless of the immoral implications? Yeah, for example, you could use an Iframe, so it looks like the page is on your domain, when it really isn't. *Edit...Yeah, it's unethical. LOL
Well, I didn't say anything about not being up front about it. I was simply wondering if it helps PR to provide a reciprocal link from another domain.