SEO Tycoon

**Bulvox** · 12-21-2007, 06:23 AM

I am a newb at this SEO stuff I guess, but anyways what exactly is "Link Exchange"?

**Jaguar.X.05** · 12-21-2007, 06:51 AM

This is the procedure by which one site agrees to link to another site in return for a link back from that site.

**chrishirst** · 12-21-2007, 07:30 AM

Quote:

but anyways what exactly is "Link Exchange"?

Pretty much pointless.

**fbuenanry** · 12-21-2007, 07:32 AM

Link exchange is a widely used SEO technique by "exchanging links" (literally) to other relevant sites considering that both parties agrees to exchange links and that you and your partner will benefit and will be useful for your visitors.

**wayner78** · 12-22-2007, 10:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Pretty much pointless.

So backlinks don't carry much weight in the search engines? I was planning to get working on link exchanging but if there are more effective methods, I'll hold off.

**chrishirst** · 12-22-2007, 10:48 AM

On the contrary, some backlinks are very useful for getting interested visitors and some are useful for SEs as well.

It's simply that the links you would get from link exchanging aren't either of those usually.

**ADAM Web Design** · 12-22-2007, 02:45 PM

To answer your question as stated first, link exchange is a process by which Site A links to Site B, in exchange for a link from Site B to Site A. Sort of a cross-promotional thing.

But...as Hirst said, SEO-based link exchange is a thoroughly pointless SEO technique based on two widely prevailing SEO myths:

1) Inbound links are the magic bullet to #1 ranking for any keyword and phrase that an SEO could ever want.

2) Link exchange is the best way to get those inbound links, because it's the easiest (more people are willing to give a link when they get one.)

Now...to understand the problem with both of those theories (particularly #2), take SEO out of the equation for a minute and evaluate hyperlinks based solely on traffic. Would you end up with more net traffic (visitors received - visitors sent away) based on an unreciprocated link to your site or based on a reciprocated link? In the case of the former, you don't have to send any visitors away; in the case of the latter, you do. So...in all likelihood, the former is the better link...you won't end up with a net traffic loss (since visitors won't leave through any reciprocated links) and you'll likely end up with a gain.

Now...let's consider a common page set up for link exchange:

http://www.houston3dstudio.com/direc...-services.html

A rough count of the links on that page (not counting navigation and site-wide links) indicates that there are 89 links to other sites. On top of that, it takes two clicks from the home page (and only the home page in this particular case, as the "directory" isn't linked from any other page on the site) to get to this category. On the "directory" category page itself, there are 39 categories (http://www.houston3dstudio.com/directory.html).

What are the odds of a regular user (not a bot, but an actual real live human being) finding the directory link buried at the bottom of the home page (as most of them are), picking the right category out of 39, and picking your link from the 89 from that category? Not very good, are they? You're not likely to see any traffic from that link. Seems like a bit of a waste, doesn't it?

Search engines, because they're operated and programmed by humans, are built using similar logic. In particular, Google has been wise to this tactic for quite some time now. They won't catch all the link exchangers (to be fair, they can't), but they catch a very large percentage of them. Do you want to be one of the ones caught in the Google/MSN/Yahoo! net?

This isn't to suggest all inbound links are bad.

Some of them, as Hirst pointed out, are very good. But you don't just "get" them...you earn them. You provide something unique, original, and useful on some level and you'll see the inbound links come in without even having to worry about what search engines are doing...why? Because they'll send you actual, human visitors.

Link exchange is and always was a stupid pet trick. Don't go there.

**jamestl2** · 12-26-2007, 09:03 PM

If you're still not convinced, you could also look at it this way and ask yourself some questions:

Put yourself in your site's visitors shoes.

Would you be likely to click on the link?
Would you trust the site? (along with considering what the outbound link's anchor text is)
Does the link offer anything of value to the website and its traffic?

As Adam and Chris already pointed out link exchange for SEO purposes is mostly useless, but............ in a few instances it is possible for your site's users to benefit from the link, as long as it directs them to useful information.

**steve crete** · 12-29-2007, 10:32 AM

Link exchange is when i place a link of one of your sites to my site and you place a link back in one of yours sites.

**x3mario** · 01-03-2008, 12:25 PM

Link exchange:
Putting your site link to my site and in return you will put my site link in your site too....

**~DaRk-EyE~** · 01-04-2008, 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by x3mario

Link exchange:
Putting your site link to my site and in return you will put my site link in your site too....

This one is called "Reciprocal Link Exchange"...
Another type of link exchange is an "A-B-C link exchange" this one is effective for getting one way links to your site...

**Guerrilla** · 01-07-2008, 10:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Pretty much pointless.

I know where you're coming from Chris as they have been greatly depreciated recently but if you trade a small amount of links with good established websites in related fields it will get a new website started and improve its rankings. Not as much as high quality one way links will but in a lot of cases well enough to achieve rankings that bring traffic.

**mhaye_01** · 01-07-2008, 01:40 PM

Link Trade-from the term itself, trade of links,.
trade links only to those quality, relevant and related site,.
Just avoid excessive linking as google is tired of this practice

**Learning Newbie** · 01-07-2008, 04:25 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ADAM Web Design

1) Inbound links are the magic bullet to #1 ranking for any keyword and phrase that an SEO could ever want.

Actually, this is the truth. Inbound links are what puts someone at the top slot for any given query, on average. With a few exceptions. The difference is that it's so many links from so many respected places, versus a handful on forums signatures, blog comments, and free directories.

Why does Adobe rank #1 for "click here"? Because of links. Because of like 10 million links, so people can't unseat them from this completely worthless search phrase by getting 200 low quality links. But it's still links.

Why does Google's "other" button act like "I feel Wiki?" Links. Quality links and quantity links. When a person wants to establish the truth or falsehood of something, quickly, they copy and paste from Wikipedia, where every other word is a link to some article. Wiki Wonka has links from half the blogs on the planet, from lots of journalism sites, from everywhere. Sort of the same thing is true for Snopes, but on a much smaller level.

On page SEO, true Optimization, is about your headings and title tags and making sure session IDs don't make your site hard to spider. But that's a level playing field. It's links that tilt it one way or the other.

The difference is some links are quality links, and some are garbage. The ones that are easy to get, and that most SEO eBooks tell you to chase, aren't going to help. The ones that you can't influence getting or not getting are the ones that do most of the help ranking. But it's still links. It's just quality links. Think of it like this - if you can easily get the link, so can your competitor, and you're back to that level playing field.

**dyer** · 08:38 PM

Link Exchange is nothing but Build a connection from one site to another site & vise versa. Link exchange took part major role in Search Engine.

Note that you have to exchange links only with relevant sites. Other wise you may lose your site quality.

< link drop removed >

**chrishirst** · 01-09-2008, 08:39 PM

Quote:

Link exchange took part major role in Search Engine.

Note that you have to exchange links only with relevant sites. Other wise you may lose your site quality.

No and No.

**vangogh** · 01-09-2008, 09:53 PM

Let's all take a step back away from the trees so we can have a look at the entire forest.

The idea behind a link in the eyes of a search engine is that it's a vote for a web page. Ideally one link would equal one vote, but given how people try to use links to manipulate rank it can't be seen that way. It might also be better to see a link as a recommendation and some recommendations are better than others depending on the source.

My brother is an accountant so I would sooner trust his recommendation about something related to accounting than I would the guy working in the local 7-11.

If you link to me only because I link to you then neither of us is really voting or recommending each other. However if you have a page selling shoes and I have a page selling shoe laces it makes sense that we would want to link to each other. In that case the links probably do represent some kind of vote or recommendation. If you have a page selling a travel package to Mexico and I have a page selling shoelaces and we link them neither link makes much sense and is probably not going to be seen as an honest vote.

When it comes to link exchanges whether it's a direct reciprocal link (page A links to page B and page B links to page A) or if it's some kind of three-way link (page A links to page B, page B links to page C, page C links to page A), search engines are still looking for the concept of a vote or recommendation.

You can use common sense to decide whether you're engaging in a link exchange based on an honest recommendation or based on a desire to manipulate where the pages rank. A search engine may or may not be able to make that same decision, but they will continue to try and they will continue to get better at making the determination.

Should you exchange links? Depends on why you're doing it and how others might view the exchange. Will search engines alway be able to tell when if you exchange links only to manipulate rankings? Probably not, but they will try and even if they can't figure it out now there's a good chance they will figure it out later.

**MaanDAW** · 01-11-2008, 05:34 AM

Link exchange is just like finding a perfect partnership for your business, so you must to consider the relevancy and what would be the good benefits that a both party will have for their site in exchanging links...