Building world-class Search Engine Optimization expertise

Next up:
Search Engine Q&A On Links


Have questions about links? In this session, search engine representatives provide answers to the audience. Be sure to have prepared yourself by attending other link-oriented sessions earlier in the conference.
Moderator:
Chris Sherman, Executive Editor, SearchEngineWatch.com President of Searchwise
Speaker:
Tim Converse, Engineering Manager, Yahoo! Inc.
Adam Lasnik, Search Evangelist, Google
TBA, MSN Search
Vivek Pathak, Infrastructure Product Manager, Ask.com

• There is no universal sandbox that everyone goes to. However there are many signal Google uses to determine if something is good or spammy. Garner natural links, make navigation clear, don’t make your site in Flash. Patience is then the best remedy. There is no explicit sandbox in Yahoo either. If you are not showing up at first it might be that you aren’t widely known. Since there is no sandbox there is no technique to get out of a sandbox.
• The descriptiveness of a text link helps the search engines. If users would find something helpful then so would the engine.
• Search engineers use the “smell test”. If something looks spammy, who you are linking to that is going to denote a closer look. If you have a significant number of links from a single directory all to the same page they will probably just pick one.
• If your content is syndicated in something like feedburner, the engine would rather give the link to the original content. But there is nothing the writer that can do other than submit the situation to the engine’s webmaster forum.
• Absolute or relative links. Spiders will unwind relative links into absolute links anyway. So whatever works best for the developer. However, it’s easier to break a relative link and cause a 404. Google gives a stronger push for absolute links… they can be a safer option.
• Cross domain linking with a 302 redirect, it will not be seen as a vote for the page that it redirects to.
• A sitewide link from one domain to another in Yahoo has diminishing returns (it’s not viewed as abusive but will not significantly help). An engine is trying to algorithmically determine what is an authentic vote of confidence. Markers of novelty and authenticity is what they are looking for.
• Having the same link on all of your client sites back to your site (Powered by) is not seen as something that is intentionally malicious and it won’t be ignored. If there are a ton of links that weren’t there before, an engine might see that as something to take action on. If these links appear on different kinds of sites at different times that is decent.
• As long as a title attribute on a link doesn’t “smell bad” it won’t probably significantly help you, but if it’s useful for the visitor then it is a good idea.
• 301 like pages to like pages. Do not 301 a lot of pages to the home page.
• One domain with a lot of content is going to do better than multiple domains with a smaller amount of content. There is a slight bias to larger content sites. In the Windows Vista case, should they create a new domain or role it into the main Microsoft… it depends on what is better for the customer. In most cases, a one page or two page site is not going to be viewed as important. Watch out for creating many many domains without much content all linking back to a single domain.
• Does 301 carry age? Age is one factor of determining value. 301′s transfer pagerank. But not all aspects are carried over. There is going to be time lag. It is your best possible option.
• “noindex follow” is the same as saying just “noindex”. Anything that is done in excess in combination with certain signals can throw a red flag. “How does it look in context to other signals… in combination things can look different.
• If an engine can recognize a paid link the value will not be as much as a link that doesn’t look paid.
• Google is against buying links for the sole purpose of giving pagerank.
• nofollow is still used for discovery but it is not used for link popularity. The link is not treated as a vote. You cannot hurt yourself by using a nofollow link. So the link is still spidered.
• If you feel you are having difficulty with your site sign up for a webmaster central account with Google to see if they have any errors they are showing for your site. Google says they are considering offering more information about links but there is nothing specific now.