I was just reading an article on how to get more out of your website and one line in particular jumped out at me.

The article said:

“A word of caution – link building isn’t what it used to be. Only do it with reputable sites.”

By this I assume they mean that you can’t just get hundreds or thousands of links back from nasty vast link farms set up on the other side of the world purely to supply links.

Google have really cracked down on “nasty” links and will really penalise you if you’re in the wrong neighbourhoods as it knows you’re only doing it to cheat the system and make your site look more popular than it really is. That’s one of the key things the Google Penguin updates look to clamp down on.

However, this isn’t anything new. I’ve been doing SEO for 10 years and it’s ALWAYS been the case that you should stay away from these nasty link farms and that you should ALWAYS consider quality over quantity.

The difference now is that Google is getting more sophsticated and is now able to identify when you’re doing things you shouldn’t and is very ready to punish you if you do.

There are certainly lots of black-hat SEO’s out there who always knew it was naughty but did it anyway and aimed to stay under the radar because it got them / their clients good results. But I think there were probably a lot of people who just thought it was the “norm” / what you were supposed to do. And now they’re picking up the pieces and nursing their wrist which Google has well and truly slapped.

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