Page 39 - The Dark Side of Back Link Building

THE DARK SIDE OF LINK BUILDING 39

That isn’t to say that you can’t do it at all. Link exchange agreements are probably
quite common.

Google’s guidelines state that “excessive link exchanges” count as link schemes.

You could probably build a few link exchanges with other high-quality websites
and business partners as long as you treat them like sponsored links, and they also
benefit users.

You should nofollow these links and properly disclose relationships just like a paid link.

This will significantly reduce their SEO value, but that’s the point.

The intent is the kicker on this one. Link exchanges are fine if you don’t use them to

manipulate your website’s rankings. If you are doing it to improve your SEO and you’re
not using nofollows, you’re playing a riskier game.

Can You Build Effective Reciprocal Links

For SEO?

Not really. You should be doing it for other reasons, just like paid links.

If you try and build these links for SEO, Google will probably notice.

Is it necessarily a big deal if Google pegs some of your links as unnatural? That
depends. The chances are it will just ignore them. So, how much time and effort are

you willing to potentially waste?

Manual penalties are, of course, a risk with all tactics that technically fall under the

definition of a link scheme. As the algorithms get better, manual penalties aren’t
needed as much. You’re unlikely to catch one for a few link exchanges, and Google’s

John Mueller said that a manual penalty would probably only be applied if link
exchanges make up most of your backlinks.