The Death of Link Building

by 95 replies
109
The Death of Link Building and the Rebirth of Link Earning - Whiteboard Friday | SEOmoz

I said exactly that in a thread a few weeks ago, and certain people with vested interests in "link building" were quick on jump on me. Nice to see at least some people agree with me

Yes, building fake links do still work. The point is, though, if that's all or mostly what you're doing, you will get hit sooner or later. I do my share of link buying where it makes sense, but it's only a small percentage of my overall SEO efforts.
#search engine optimization #building #death #link
  • So true man.

    Google is getting smarter and SEO's are just getting stupider and stupider.

    However, link building is still working in some ways but its more about link baiting the right way now.
  • Offer good content and you wont have to worry about these changes. You have to think long term. Thats where most fall short.
    • [3] replies

    • adding JUST good content is nothing but "adding pure (or high quality) water in ocean ".
      That doesn't work , You also need to shout out about your content (I am not saying spamming, Just quality links)
      • [ 1 ] Thanks
      • [2] replies
    • So you want to tell that content is 80% and backlink is only 20%?
    • The problem with this is that there will be just about 500 000 other people in every niche that are doing the same thing - providing excellent content.
  • Quality of link does matter dude...
    • [1] reply
    • Yes,Google's Latest update is aimed at Anti-Spam , we smart seoers must avoid these kinds of bad back links
      • Paid Links. Buying paid links is often the most likely SEO error that a brand can make. There are various paid link companies that make this process seem legitimate, and it's possible to buy links on sites that appear to be high quality. However, it's important to remember that buying links is absolutely against Google's guidelines, and can lead to very severe penalties. Save your advertising dollars for PPC, and avoid buying links entirely.
      • Blog and Forum Spam. Basically any link building program that relies on leaving many low-quality links on forums or blogs should be avoided completely. Don't get caught in services that promise hundreds of links, or programs that generate links automatically. Google is well aware of these techniques, and Penguin should catch these spam links very quickly.
      • Article Spam. The days of article spinning and junk guest-blogging are over. While syndicating quality content is still a great link marketing technique, the operative word is quality. Between Penguin and Panda, junk content is no longer a reasonable linking tactic.
      • Link Exchanges. Another ancient SEO strategy, the practice of trading links for SEO value is a trick that Google's been aware of for years. While high quality, related sites can naturally interlink without any problems, artificially swapping links should always be avoided.
  • Nothing New here at all. SEOmoz has done things on whitehat link building for awhile and Rand isn't saying as the title implies that link building is dead he's just coming up with a catchy link bait way of saying = "do white hat link building" that has been around for years.

    I had to laugh at the first line on his whiteboard list though

    Link exchange/reciprocal <-------> Cross promotion/ partnership

    Semoz does like to dress things up because they know google is watching them as one of the prominent SEO companies but thats just pure semantics. He even tries to say that the linking back and forth there is natural which it clearly is not . Its bought and paid for under a partnership/cross promotion agreement and still by any definition of reciprocal still reciprocal link building



    Do you buy links because you are ranking #1 and just want to see if you can go higher than number one? No. So the reason you buy is to rank. Thats exactly what the Video says not to do. I'm sure that you would not be buying if you didn't need to so your buying any links contradicts what Rand's point is.

    However Seomoz has had studies where they indicated such and such a SEO company who we respect bought links "just to see what would happen" (yeah uh-huh). One thing you got to understand about Rand and SEOmoz. They are front and center before google execs.Theres no way they could tell people while the camera is going to go and buy links

    Instead they talk about "Partnerships" "cross promotions" which when you undress it is nothing more than using financial incentives to BUY links.
    • [ 2 ] Thanks
    • [3] replies
    • Mike,
      Thanks for your insight. I know in one of the threads you commented positively about GSA SER. In post-Penguin world how can I use GSA. It has many options: blog comment, Directory, Document Sharing, Foru, Guestbook, Image Comment, INdexer, Pingback, Referrer, Social Bookwork, Social Network, Trackback, Video and Web 2.0. Which of these should be directed at lower tiers and which ones to money site if any.
    • Good points Mike. Although are you suggesting buying links first or after you have tried to negotiate for links that your competition has?

      Not gonna lie I've purchased links an it works great as does link baiting.

    • Well said , I totally agree. It's pretty clear that the big guys are sweeping the competition using these tactics. So if we want to be in the competition we must provide good content for users and build links .. a lot of links!. I believe that this is the first rule in the seo game. If one don't like or follow the rules so I advice him to quit playing! simply because he will loose most of the time.
  • jfambrini

    I have been hugely disappointed in GSA. Yes I did recommend it when it seemed that you could use it to target high pr Sites and participate manually with some relevance but in more recent uses I just can't get it to do what it claims it will do. it is most DEFINITELY NOT a tool that can be used in a white hat way as I thought.

    I still have some hope for it but to me right now the way it works makes it probably one of the spammiest tools I have come across. It will put your links on pages you directly told it not to. I can't get it it to obey the filters and the filters were the only thing that stopped it from blasting all over the place.

    I just turned it off completely. Sven is a good programmer and may fix it but he and his team are under some impression that nofollows are good and that aiming all that junk at even your money site is good so its a toss up to me if it will ever improve.

    I would suggest scrapebox for finding good sites to participate on. Try and find them in niches you know and care about and can provide useful input and community involvement. I always have to say this because people assume and assume but I use scrapebox just for scraping not posting
    • [1] reply
    • Thanks for taking time to give your honest opinion. I was just about to purchase it. Can it still be used for pointing to blogs or other lower tiers that point to the money site?

      Thanks for the tip on Scrapebox will give it a look. I assume it has a trial version?
      • [1] reply
  • Content is KING! Linking is QUEEN!
    Content is the VEHICLE! Linking is the FUEL!

    • [1] reply
    • Content is PEANUT BUTTER! Linking is JELLY!
      Content is the ARMPIT! Linking is the DEODORANT!

      see i can do it to.
      • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • Link building isn't dead yet, that's clear for sure. Perhaps the old link building techniques are dead already. But there are still legit ways on how to build links. Google is only telling us to do it with more quality.
  • 4 weeks ago I started some reciprocal link building on 2 of my sites that got spanked.
    Both came back to original placings pre-update within 8-10 days.
  • I havent even watched the video, but its Rand Fishkin and SEOmoz, so i know i am in for some white hat propoganda.

    I am just going to say this is flat out BULLSHIT. I ranked a blogspot web 2.0 for a very hard 10k month internet marketing product within 2 weeks with one day of pure all out linkspam.

    When i cant do this we can have this discussion. Until then, shut up Fishkin.
    • [1] reply
    • Sure, that works great for like a week, maybe two, maybe a month if you are lucky. We'll see you then, when you're complaining because Google crapped on your site and you have to start all over.

      Totally agree about seomoz's whitehat bs. It gets stupid sometimes. I mean, Google must be directly emailing these guys stuff to say. Sometimes I feel like I'm listening to a presidential candidate tell me how much he cares.
  • So SEO gets easier but takes longer to see results.

    No more busting your rump (yeah right, it's automated). No more building backlinks. Just build high quality content, submit to social sites, and wait till your blood turns to dust. No longer can you control your destiny or makes things happen in this business. Now you must wait for Lord Google to bless you with it's mighty Wand of Ranking.

    Not sure if I buy it all. Sure, there's lots of changes coming from Big G...but there HAS to be a working automated backlink strategy still out there.
  • Banned
    What is fake linK??
    • [1] reply
    • Fake links are what most of the SEO people on odesk do. They have software that posts the same garbage over and over to random sites. Better to find a good seo partner that can produce hi-quality content, because the search engines recognize the fake links.
  • Banned
    You mean software like scrapebox?
  • threads like this make me angry.. what possessed you to create such a false and misleading thread AND title? ... :p
  • "Death" ROFLMAO!
    Yeah, Death of crap building not link building.
    • [1] reply
    • Absolutely! lol people generalize link building too much.
      • [1] reply
  • I completely agree with U.. Google is getting smarter and smarter day by day.. People have to only build high quality links in a time diversified manner..
  • Its all about quality always and every update says just this only.So building and earning quality links is the only solution,but how you do it is the matter of concern.
  • In my opinion, you need to build links that aren't just for SEO...the links also have to generate their own traffic like links in guest blog posts and online press releases. Combine this with truly valuable content and active social media, and it's a very effective SEO recipe.
  • Can it be?????????
    It can not be if you Linking and making relation ship with your links by right ways.
    All depend on quality.
  • Banned
    So true. but really tough to believe. But what will happen to the SEO industry? mainly the manual SEO?
  • This is not the end of link building.. try to earn hard link building rather than easy one
  • I think Link Building never death. If we doing quality link building its always helps us to drive more & more traffic in website which boost our ranking in SERPs.
  • Completely agree with OP. Google will hit you sooner or later. Low quality links will only end up hurting you in the long run.
  • Its all about quality
  • I am also thinking the same thing that Link Building process is now getting dead because of recently penguin and panda updates from Google and many SEO Expert are tense because of it and SEO is also getting tough day by day and no one knows how to achieve better ranking with Link Building process.
  • The truth is, if you are going to go by all the things this guys are saying you will never get any work done on your site except if the internet is your hobby then you will not be disappointed with SEOMoz. Otherwise, take what they say with a pinch of salt and work more from your own findings..
  • Banned
    SEOmoz is one of the biggest sources of non effective mental mastrerbation SEO info on the web.

    Like literally useless crap
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • Banned
    If you have to listen to SEOmoz you're better off finding a complete new hobby, what a total bunch of nitpickers are that.

    Link building is far from dead, it's just that it can lead faster to penalties, especially when combined with poor onpage stuff like putting your kw everything where it can be (h1, alt img, title, content, bolder, underlined, url, etc).

    The times that you just have to watch out for kw stuffing are over, the rules are a lot tighter, also with anchor txt's. If you obey by the new rules then it still works as well as before. Heck even spam can still work if executed in the right way (if spam lasts is a different story but I know people who are real successful with short time spamming to make a fast buck and rinse / repeat.
    • [ 1 ] Thanks
  • The idea that one can create compelling enough content and links will come on their own accord is only true for 0.000000000000001 of content out there. Rest of us mortals must struggle to get links the old-fashioned way. Few have the courage to say "Emperor has no clothes"
    • [1] reply
    • Looks like you do your on-page optimization the old fashioned way as well. It's not 1999 anymore. You don't have to stuff your page titles like that. Even then it wasn't a good idea.
  • Wow! I must to say wow about it. As New Bie i dont know much about it. Thank You for your information about link building after Penguin...
  • Nice. Hopefully white-hat strategies will start paying better rewards!
  • It is the rich content that will guarantee you great results than risking your business on questionable links.
    • [1] reply
    • Banned
      Good point. A local dentists websites MUST have GREAT GROUNDBREAKING CONTENT if he want sot rank

      Jeez
      • [ 1 ] Thanks
      • [1] reply
  • Just so you know, content is not the ONLY way to earn links. It's probably the easiest, but it's certainly not the only way.

    This article explains better than I can here. The example provided is similiar to that of your local dentist.
    Non-Content Based Link Opportunities Are Often Missed - Search Engine Watch (#SEW)

    So guys, keep using it as an excuse to not give your clients what they deserve - A real SEO professional. Eventually they'll wise up and look elsewhere.
    • [3] replies
    • Banned
      One of my clients is ranked first page for credit repair..I think they are happy...

      Seriously try to pull this crap off with a big client...they dont care about your mental masturbation or link theory

      All they want is numbers. When you come to them 2 months later with "oh well SEOmoz says" or "oh well our earning link plan is finally starting to work"

      Boom your cut

      If you have a HUGE client, little "earned" links on inner pages of sites wont do shit for their rankings

      If you juggle small clients you wont have time to do this hippy bullshit for each of them

      Sorry, this earned crap wont fly when it comes to reporting time with clients. Wise up buddy
      • [ 2 ] Thanks
      • [1] reply
    • you have much to learn dude...
      • [1] reply
    • Sponsors, donars, and industry directories are all paid links that can all be manipulated.
  • No way backlinking is dying. If your site contain some quality contents then you will obviously get good backlinks.
  • A diverse linking profile with anchor text variation is what google wants to see.
  • Link building is NOT dead, building a bunch of SPAM/trash links is dead.. There's a diffrence here... Diversity, I don't care if you build bad backlinks, they are still great for keeping your profile natural. Also you still need links to rank, backlinking will never be dead unless something replaces the scale entirely, which is going to take a long time.
  • Banned
    yes back links is wroking
  • I would love to see a case study of what people consider "link building". I'm sure personal definitions are highly diverse ranging from useless spam linking techniques all the way to highly relevant contextual links, but yet the same term is being used to describe two completely opposite approaches.

    Mass disarray, propaganda, and miscommunication ensues.
    • [1] reply
    • HI, I am very interested in proper link building. I was wondering if you could please elaborate on the different types.

      Please explain the mass disarray and propaganda in link building. I see many people offer different types. Which ones should I stay away from? and what types should I use? Whether I hire someone, or do them my self.
  • Pro Tip: Link building isn't dead.

    Thread is useless

    /thread
  • Actually linkbuilding is still alive, they are trying to bury it so that there will be less competition. Let say 3/4 of the linkbuilder believes this then the competition is lesser by 3/4.

    There are a couple of linkbuilding strategies that are less effective today on the new algorithm at the same time there are linkbuilding strategies today that really works.

    Everything in this world has a basic principle and that very basic principle can't be ignored. As the weather keeps changing and becoming more and more unpredictable so as Google Algorithm we just need to step up and keep up with these changes.
  • You need to provide quality content for visitors + use right white hat link building( including social media sources )
  • Not the full link building is death but decrease the priority of the off page link building.
    and increase priority of quality, relative and natural back-link.
  • Link Building never death. It works like backbone in SEO. But create quality links only.
  • SEO is about link building.. if Link building dies then no more SEO then.. yah.. the title just means to build quality backlinks and use white hat method... no spam links, no software generated links..

    there are still lots of SEO companies that are looking for a quality link builders.. .see it for your own, just search it in Google.. even in CL.. just saying
  • Nice post,, but the master publisher still doing link building and it is still working. While google is smarter than before.
  • Most people in here just create shitty little websites and spam links to it and rank..that of course still works fine. Rand is not talking to you folks for the most part, he's geared towards REAL businesses and brands.
    • [ 2 ] Thanks
    • [2] replies
    • "Rand is geared towards REAL businesses and brands", says you. Then you claim we build 'sh*tty lil websites! You've got a lot of nerve generalizing this fine institution known as the Warrior Forum in this manner. This isn't the first time I've taken note of your condescending attitude towards this forum and its esteemed members.

      BTW, your "brand" is a mis-spelled EMD. Your momma must be so proud of you
    • thats why there is opportunity in the serps...most big brands are afraid to use the strategies that everyone knows are effective...they cant afford to get their site slapped.
  • i think it still depends on how you build links. The problem with link building is that people spam too much. I guess majority of link builders do, otherwise, Google shouldn't have noticed it. I still go for link building - that is to create few links at a time from various link sources. This way, I could get my links more diversified.
  • SEO is being harder and harder day by day due to the google's new techniques.
  • Great post and read. I agree and I'm trying to vary my SEO greatly.
  • PerformanceMan, have you read his blog? It's full of awesome marketing tips (that won't work on shitty sites that do dominate this forum).

    A large brand-recognised site gets its backlink profile scrutinised non-stop so it can't get away with cheap tricks and dodgy links. When they get found out then Google must take action to save-face. Many affiliate marketers won't even share their websites here because they are afraid what another member might do to them. A 'real business' would however love the exposure as it helps build their brand.
    • [1] reply
    • No, I haven't read his blog. There's nothing about his forum persona that would entice me to want to learn more about what he thinks. So, at the very least he's doing a lousy job of marketing his brand on this forum.

      Most 'large brands' as you call them are not focused solely on SEO. How could they be? They have large budgets to execute multiple marketing strategies, and search engine marketing is just one of them. If they can't build some natural links based on business relationships, media buys, and the like I'd be amazed. If your 'big brand' is spamming the internet with the types of links that generate 'unnatural linking' messages I have no sympathy for you.

      This website has many affiliate marketers, but there are also plenty of business owners. This is the largest marketing forum on the whole internet, so there's plenty of diversity.

      The bottom line is, link building hasn't died. The "Death of..." or "... has died" is one of the most overused link-bait headlines of all time. It's a vast generalization that has no basis in reality.

      Link building is being done successfully each and ever day all over the world, millions of times per day. People who advocate one form of link building over another remind me of religious zealots. If a method works, use it. But there's no reason to carry on and try and paint everyone with a broad brush because you think you found the 'Holy Grail' of link building. The only guarantee with SEO is that it will continue to change.

      Keep in mind there's many reasons people don't share their URLs here.

      1) People don't want hundreds of dofollow links to their website from an unrelated resource
      2) There are TONS of trolls here. They won't 'destroy' your business, but they will attack you to win an argument in a thread
      3) The signature link won't bring them the kind of business they're looking for.
  • He didn't said its Dead! He said it could be done in more better way, which is crucially needed right now.
  • just have to get smarter people!
    Links still work, if you can earn'em you can build'em!
    • [1] reply
    • Best post of the thread

      If you can earn'em....you can build'em!

      A skilled SEO can simulate 'earned links' as fast as another person can 'earn them.'
  • I dont think it would cause death for link building. May be there would be more streamlined way of link building activities here after.
  • Banned
    [DELETED]
  • There is nothing like fake links. It's either permanent or temporary link. If you want to get to the top of search engines, you have to build lots of quality backlinks.
  • What are some ways to build quality links?
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    The Death of Link Building

    The Death of Link Building and the Rebirth of Link Earning - Whiteboard Friday | SEOmoz I said exactly that in a thread a few weeks ago, and certain people with vested interests in "link building" were quick on jump on me. Nice to see at least some people agree with me