Outgoing Links Now Very Important?, Rumor - please confirm or deny. Options

[Deverill]

A friend told me that there's been a change in how Google measures good sites. You need outgoing links, AND incoming links. Not necessarily to and from the same sites.

Of course you need incoming links for Google to think you're important but what about the outgoing? This sounds like something someone made up but she says she read it in one of the newsletters but couldn't remember which.

Anyone know about this? (If it's real I know you folks do! (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) )

[Scottie]

I've thought that since Novembers' big shakeup. No proof, but I do think relevant outgoing links are playing a part in the ranking process.

[amabaie]

I have seen no proof of it yet, but it seems so obvious that it is amazing that it has not been the case all along.

A site with no outbound links is a dead end, and why would a search engine want to send someone to a dead end, when it could send someone to a place with plenty of further reading available?

Abnd a site with links only to sites that link back is almost for certain trying to "cook the books". Links to link partners cannot be anywhere near as "useful" as links with no strings attached.

With the usual "all other things being equal" caveat, and IMHO.

[qwerty]

At the very least, a link, whether it's pointing to one of your pages or someone else's, puts relevant keywords on your page. And the fact that it's in and/or near anchor text most likely helps as well.

The other points -- that by linking out you're avoiding acting as a dead end and you're demonstrating a degree of authority on your subject matter (you know enough to recommend other sources of information) -- probably helps as well.

[brendan]

Let me preface this by saying that I have no solid proof to back-up what I am about to say. Take it as you will!

1. There is nothing wrong with dead-end pages. For example, if I wish to purchase an "RCA DRC230N DVD player" and I am ready to buy, the best page for me to find is the 'buy here' page at Best Buy or some other electronics store. This page will have no outgoing links. ( I can think of many other examples where a dead-end page is a better result than a page full of quality links, but I don't want to waffle too much. )

2. Outgoing links are controlled by the owner of the site. They are therefore subject to manipulation for ranking purposes. That is why incoming links are so important.

3.

why would a search engine want to send someone to a dead end, when it could send someone to a place with plenty of further reading available?

The more times a searcher returns to Google, the more chances there are for that searcher to click on advertising. It is not in their best interest to send a searcher off to 'plenty of further reading', and no chance of returning to Google.

[SanDiegoMedia]

I have numerous sites that do extremely well in their rankings and they have no outbound links. They are also in a competitive industry. I doubt that outbound links hold much water on determining where a site ranks for a term.

Why would an engine rank a site higher for linking to a site, when they can rank the site it links to higher?

[scolling]

In some circumstances weighting for Rank is given to two page categories; Hubs and Authorities, with the whole thing being a "chicken and egg" scenario, i.e. a good authority is defined by one that is referred to by other good authorities and good hubs, and a good hub is determined by how many good authorities it links to.

When a search is conducted, ranking can be influence by how good an authority or hub the web page is.

In this model, having useful outbound links to informative pages that add value to the content of the page will help identify that page as a good hub and therefore help with the pages ranking.

... or so the theory goes, but in any case, linking to sites that add value to the users experience of your site will help your site achieve its goal; whether that is to make the user buy something, contact you or leave better informed.

Simon

[Jill]

My favorite form of learning new SEO..."I heard this from my brother's cousin's uncle"!

Google wants what Google has always wanted -- pages that provide some sort of usefulness to the people Google sends to them. Some of those will naturally have links out to other sites, some of those won't. Some will have H1 tags, some won't. Some will have keywords in the page, some will only have keywords in links pointing to the page. Some will have high PageRank, some will not.

Google looks at all different things, but it has to look at each individual page (and perhaps each site) and take it on its own merits.

The bottom line is that you should do what makes the most sense for your site and its own situation. If you want to link out to other sites because it's helpful to your visitors, then you should do it! If you don't think there will be any benefit to your visitors to link to other sites, then don't. Either way will only help or hurt you in so much as you do it just because you're trying to figure out what Google might like.

Who cares what Google might like? Does Google buy your products or services?

Funny thing is when you use common sense and think about what makes your site be the best it can be, it turns out to be exactly what Google likes (in many cases, and when Google is not broken (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) ).

Jill

[blackpool]

Funny thing is when you use common sense and think about what makes your site be the best it can be, it turns out to be exactly what Google likes

Absolutely spot on Jill (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/appl.gif)

[Deverill]

The bottom line is that you should do what makes the most sense for your site and its own situation.

Who cares what Google might like? Does Google buy your products or services?

Ah, Jill, the centering voice of reason. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Seriously, thanks for saying - what is this, 1,203,398,328th time, again what we need to remember. I try to remind myself that Google's not the only game in town. It's easy to get caught up in the rat-race to the top of Google but if my site stinks and no one wants to buy from it then what matter is the Google rank? :slap:

Again, thanks for repeating it until we get it - now back to our meditation - "good content - good visitors - good content for the good visitors." (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[Nathan Malone]

I totally agree. I have seen spammy sites rank #1 for competitive terms but they had very little traffic to things like forums because people simply didn't like the look of the site. Having a useable site is more important then search engine rankings as the other posters said above because if people don't like your site, then they aren't likely to come back.

[Scottie]

I just want to take this moment to claim "dead end sites- sites with no outgoing links" as a term I came up with over a year ago at IHY- unfortunately, it's in the staff room in a rant thread about people looking for ways to hide their outgoing links so you can't verify it, but it's my term, I tell you!

(IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

You are welcome to use it though. .05 per usage is all I'm asking...

[Jill]

Well, I'm the creator of the # so there! (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) (According to Googlisms.)

[amabaie]

I just want to take this moment to claim "dead end sites- sites with no outgoing links" as a term I came up with over a year ago at IHY- unfortunately, it's in the staff room in a rant thread about people looking for ways to hide their outgoing links so you can't verify it, but it's my term, I tell you!

OK, officially give you credit for it. I thought I just made it up, but you might have been whispering it to me in my sleep. (IMG:http://www.highrankings.com/forum/style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

To respond to critics, I also have a site that has a policy of not linking out. That has made link exchanges and listing in some directories impossible. It also makes it a dead-end site. Yet I have gotten it great rankings in a fairlky competitive field.

Does that mean that outbound links don't count? Of course not. Just like PR, outbound links are one of the hundred-odd factors Google will look at.

Can I prove that Google looks at outbound links? Of course not. My post above was just about common sense, which Google often (but not always!) has. No more, no less.

That being said, if we all had no outbound links, there would be no Web.

[SearchRank]

Can I prove that Google looks at outbound links?  Of course not.

Of course there is proof that Google looks at outbound links. From their own guidelines:

Don't participate in link schemes designed to increase your site's ranking or PageRank. In particular, avoid links to web spammers or "bad neighborhoods" on the web as your own ranking may be affected adversely by those links.

This would seem to indicate that they have a list of known web spammers and bad neighborhoods that if they find a site linking to them, it is noted and as they say, "your own ranking may be affected adversely."

As others have said, I too have clients in which their sites really do not have any links to external sites and they do quite well. It really depends on the industry they are in. I'm sure if I had the time, I could find many sites that do not externally link beat out others sites that do in the SERPs. Therefore I think outbound links are only important if they are good for your end user but not a necessary factor to position yourself well in the SERPs.