Many small business websites have a links page. Links pages are simply a web page full of links to other websites. These became popular a few years ago as a way of creating reciprocal links with friends and other businesses in an attempt to boost website visitor numbers (traffic) from those sites.
Not satisfied with the amount of extra traffic these links provided, people then began joining link exchange schemes where they had access to many more reciprocal links. Often these exchange schemes created reciprocal links between two websites that had no relevance to each other at all. For example, a reciprocal link between a beauty therapist and a building company.
Some years ago, directly because of this behaviour, Google decided that link schemes were a bad idea. (Remember that Google’s whole business model is built on the concept of relevance).
Google’s policy on link schemes is very clear – don’t do it.
So what you should ask yourself before linking to other sites is this: “If search engines didn’t exist and the amount of website traffic I got was irrelevant to me, would I still create this link?”
If the answer is yes, then the link probably adds value to your website, so go ahead and create the link.
If the answer is no, then don’t create the link.
Also bear in mind that the website you are linking to needs to add value to your website. So if your link is to a website that creates spam, downloads malware or engages in illegal practices like phishing, Google will take a very dim view of your website indeed and list it accordingly.
Above all, remember that in general, links pages are in violation of Google’s webmaster guidelines, so if you have a links page on your website, go and review it today.
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