Google Penalty For Similar Backlinks?, Does Google penalise a site for having many backlinks that all contain Options

[rayjoy]

Does Google really penalise a site for having many backlinks, just because they all consistently use the same keyword(s) in the anchor text?

I have just been here ... www.weboma.com/receive-traffic-both-from-google-and-yahoo-not-just-one-of-them/

Half way down the page the author states:
"2- Google can easily understand when a webmaster tries to make an artificial link popularity for his/her website. Google likes websites to look normal and natural and the links they receive to be natural and organic too. When you try to increase your website link popularity by exchanging links or submitting your website to tens of web directories, your website backlinks don’t look natural and organic because most of them will have the same anchor text. ( emphasis mine )
This is good to have the keywords in the anchor text but when your website has a lot of backlinks with the same keyword, it means someone has tried to increase your website link popularity artificially."

This concerns me a little because I am NOT a big fan of reciprocal linking. I believe in the "organic" natural process of linking, BUT I also help people create links to my site by requesting they do so by using certain keywords that would be of most benefit to me. The end is result is that most people creating "organic" links to my site do so using the keywords I have requested, ( usually by using the html code I have provided which includes a banner graphic. )

Question: Does Google penalise a site for having many backward links ( even non-reciprocal links ) that all utilise the same ( or very similar ) keywords in the anchor text of the link?

I've just discovered the following additional comment further down in the same aforementioned article...

"For example your website will be banned by Yahoo if most of the backlinks are reciprocal. This is what that MSN does too. Google doesn’t ban such websites but will penalize them in the way that they can not be seen on the first pages for any of the keywords. It means Google just indexes such websites but doesn’t rank them."

Surely not!
I would appreciate your comments on this.

This post has been edited by Jill: Mar 5 2007, 10:26 PM

Reason for edit: removed live links as per rules

[Jill]

Question: Does Google penalise a site for having many backward links ( even non-reciprocal links ) that all utilise the same ( or very similar ) keywords in the anchor text of the link?

Is your site penalized?

If not, you pretty much have your answer, no?

Nobody knows better than those doing the things that are stated in the article.

[Michael Martinez]

Varying the anchor text is recommended by many people for a variety of reasons, some of them more plausible than others.

I've made canned code available to other domains for years and hundreds of sites link to some of my sub-sections, which perform well in search results. I've never been penalized by Google nor any other search engine so far as I am aware.

I've always regarded the "vary your inbound link anchor text" warning to be more applicable to people who spam up their backlinks than to people who just get a lot of similar backlinks naturally.

Unless your site doesn't rank for anything in Google, I'm inclined to agree with Jill. Why worry?

[Biz-Giant]

Hello...

I dont advice using the same title as it would look funny and if you get to many to fast you will be penalized
if your website is NEW and all of a sudden google looks and sees 450 backlinks it could raise red flags.
Its not recommended and most submission services offer 3 titles for you to add so that they can vary them.

As for the last part about yahoo.. pffft 80% use google and the other 20% are all the rest so id concentrate
on making google happy not so much yahoo... but to each his own

thx
malcolm1

[jehochman]

Its not recommended and most submission services offer 3 titles for you to add so that they can vary them.

Not recommended by who? What's not recommended is buying links on a bunch of sites that nobody uses in an attempt to boost your rankings. These "directories" are often nothing more than link farms for hire.

At most Google will ignore useless inbound links. The reason they don't penalize you for your inbound links is that anybody can buy a bunch of links. I could buy 1000 identical inbound links to my competitor's site. Clearly, Google can't ban them for that or it would be trivially easy for people to knock other sites out of Google.

[krystof]

I don't claim to know really...good question and good answers... I would just like to point out these levels of concern:

1. Large number of links all totally identical.
2. Links not identical, but containing the same 'big money' keyphrases.
3. Keyphrases not identical, but usually containing all the same keywords. (I.e., you change the reciprocal linkage script every few months, inserting different 'meaningful words' among the keywords.)
4. Focus on several keywords, and asking reciprical linkers to choose from among these, or yourself varying which keyword you 'recommend' this month...or put at the top of the list...

My little opinion:
To worry about no. 1 is to be careful, and that's what SEO is about.
To worry about no. 2 is to be type A compulsive, and that has my sympathy.
To worry about no. 3 is to be almost paranoid, and that has my pity.

...And it seems to me that Rayjoy is doing something like no. 4...

I would not worry about that, my friend. No, rather....I would worry about you if you are worried about that...

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif) When is the last time you bought your wife flowers...? Get away from that computer...!

This post has been edited by krystof: Apr 15 2007, 12:10 PM

[EtnaInteractive]

I try to divine answers to questions like this by asking myself how the application of such a strategy could impact Google's ability to deliver quality results.

If I were Google's engineers, and I saw one site with 100 unique backlinks, and another very smilar site with 100 identical backlinks, I think I would favor the site with the unique backlinks. The reasons are obvious, unique links are far more likely to have occured naturally, while only a concerted effort to self promote would have resulted in the identical backlinks.

I agree that the identical nature of the links should not hurt rankings (or we could do this to hurt our competitors), but my guess is that it is of little help.

For what it is worth, that is my thought process.

Ryan

[chrishirst]

I agree that the identical nature of the links should not hurt rankings (or we could do this to hurt our competitors), but my guess is that it is of little help.

I would pretty much concur with this rationale (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

and welcome to HR (IMG:style_emoticons/default/hi.gif)

[Bill Platt]

Its not recommended and most submission services offer 3 titles for you to add so that they can vary them.

I know that I am late to this party, but I noted one thing that really stood out that needed to be addressed.

The idea that most submission services offer 3 titles is something I feel is entirely incorrect. I have seen myself that option on at most two article submission sites.

They greater concern here is the idea that switching titles will help one's search placement. It won't, and it will not help your standing with consumers either. If consumers stumble over two articles and realize that they are one article with two titles, they will feel as if the writer deceived them.

And if anyone thinks they can fool a search engine by placing two titles or three with the same article, they are truly fooling themselves. Google can tell if the article is the same, even if the titles have been changed.

The only reason I can think that one might have in order to put two copies of an article into the wild with more than one title would be for the purpose of getting the same article on one site with more than one copy of an article on that site. And when the website owners catches you doing something like that, you will have your articles removed and your future submissions blocked.

Where is the win-win in this practice? There isn't one. How about writing three articles instead? That makes more sense.

As to rotating anchor text, that is something that definitely makes sense.

[projectphp]

If consumers stumble over two articles and realize that they are one article with two titles, they will feel as if the writer deceived them.

Really? You think people care that much? IMHO this is a common fallacy, that people accuratelt judge every action you taqke, for the reasons Paul Graham makes here. I would think seeing two articles would only help, after all, you are wanted as a writer in TWO places, so you must be good (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

The only reason I can think that

I can think of another: different markets. If one copy is on a site that is tech focussed, it might get a title like "Linus Powns Sun", where as on a more business site the title "Linux Creator Challenges Sun's Open Source Credentials" might be deemed more appropriate. The article could be the same, but the "hook" what gets people to read, which is all a title is, is better when geared towards a specific target audience.

[krystof]

I agree that the identical nature of the links should not hurt rankings (or we could do this to hurt our competitors), but my guess is that it is of little help.

For what it is worth, that is my thought process.

Ryan

• Just like to thank Ryan for this fine insight, and Chrishirst for highlighting it. (Otherwise I might have missed it.)
• Also thanks again to Rayjoy for this question, and everyone for the good replies. I am changing my behavior to encourage varied incoming links, to a degree that is easy and practical. I doubt that this makes much difference right now, and search engines are always changing, and there are many of them, and sometimes you do well in a secondary engine. But not liking to fiddle constantly, I just like to do what makes sense long term to me, 'if I were a search engine.'
• Nonetheless, I disagree with the conventional wisdom here that 'you can depend on the search engines to be rational.' Nope. Google right now is not even filtering 'same-site multiple results' well, and certainly not filtering the noise well. Being rational is just maybe your best bet long-term, but no sure thing.
• About article submission sites: it is rumored that one well-known SEO expert, who originally based his ratings on article submissions, was later forced to change from .COM to .ORG (i.e., restart his site) because of degradings due to 'identical content.' So, as one who believes this rumor (because I noticed his PR down to 0 and his subsequent domain change), I must agree somewhat with Bill Platt as well as somewhat with ProjectPHP: if you do submit articles, best to provide 3 totally different articles. (Or ideally, different wording for each site that uses an article. And never invite anyone to copy directly from your site.)
• This also shows that 'maybe' it is not totally true, that 'anything that someone else does off your site will not affect you.'
• Items that I would degrade if I were a search engine (although I would not necessarily publicize it, which might result in removing the value): .biz, .info, etc., excessive length of domain URL, excessive hyphens in domain URL, and yes, showing up a lot on FFA sites. These are all things that 'supposedly' search engines do not look at--but at the same time, everyone knows they are excellent indicators of a crummy site...
  (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sarcastic_blum.gif) I.e., I would challenge any SEO expert who says 'this does not matter': go to such a site, and buy something using your credit card.... heh... NO WAY...!

This post has been edited by krystof: Jun 17 2007, 12:09 PM

[Bill Platt]

Really? You think people care that much? IMHO this is a common fallacy, that people accuratelt judge every action you taqke, for the reasons Paul Graham makes here. I would think seeing two articles would only help, after all, you are wanted as a writer in TWO places, so you must be good (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

I do. I read a book one time by an author and thought it was an excellent book. The next time that author had a book in circulation, I was excited and bought it. While I was reading the book, I could not help but feel that I had read this stuff before. So I pulled the original book and made some comparisons.

The author had put a new first chapter in his second book, and then rearranged chapters and paragraphs from his firist book, through the length of his second book.

I felt cheated, and I have never purchased anything from that author ever again, and I never will.

Maybe "people" don't care that much, but I do.

I read an article one time by a friend. The same deja vue occured. I did some searching and found the same article as written by another. I dropped my friend a note and told her someone else was using her article as their own. She fessed up that she had bought the article as a PLR package. I have never read her stuff since either.

It is about integrity, and if someone does not have it, I don't bother to read their stuff.

I can think of another: different markets. If one copy is on a site that is tech focussed, it might get a title like "Linus Powns Sun", where as on a more business site the title "Linux Creator Challenges Sun's Open Source Credentials" might be deemed more appropriate. The article could be the same, but the "hook" what gets people to read, which is all a title is, is better when geared towards a specific target audience.

I can almost concede the point about the different bait on different hooks. But, I still see it as a risk. I won't do it myself, but you have to make your own choices.

[Jill]

it is rumored that one well-known SEO expert, who originally based his ratings on article submissions, was later forced to change from .COM to .ORG (i.e., restart his site) because of degradings due to 'identical content.'

It's rumors like that which make people do crazy things.

That said, if your entire site is simply a collection of articles published elsewhere, you really don't have much of a site, now do you?

[krystof]

Thank you Jill... for clarifying that in your opinion, 'identical content' is not automatically recognized or degraded by search engines. (If I read you correctly.) This is the first time I have heard such an opinion. For example, I seem to recall an article in a newsletter (possibly yours) 2-3 years ago, something like: "Be careful about referencing PDF files with identical content." My inference (perhaps wrong) in many similar suggestions was that search engines use 'identical content filters' as an indication of mirror sites, mirror pages, or just plain unoriginal (poor quality) content.

I, myself, do not believe that Google is nearly as sensitive about 'identical content' as many people seem to assume. Nonethless, this belief is widespread. Although certainly just my non-expert opinion, I also believe in that opinion based partly on what I saw. (It would be improper for me publicly to name the SEO site that was degraded, and I may well be mistaken about the causes. I would welcome any moderator-level member here to PM me privately about this.)

PS -- I would certainly agree with Jill that regardless of SEO needs, it is in poor taste to use a lot of 'free articles' on your own site. I hope it is understood that my points were about submitting your own 'free articles' to other sites and also getting them posted in ezine archives as a 'guest writer.' (Also recommended in practically every ezine manual as a top way to attract new opt-in subscribers.) All I am saying is... I would not submit any article which is verbatim to any page on my own site... especially if submitting many such articles... nor would I post any message on my site that gives people the slightest idea that they are welcome to copy my articles...!

...anyway, something it seems I may be unclear about... so I will be looking to read more...

This post has been edited by krystof: Jun 19 2007, 11:54 PM

[Jill]

Krystof, you may want to read my Duplicate Content Penalty Myth article at SEL.