Reciprocal Links

How long to you wait for a reply?

[Jane_Doe]

Just curious.....If you fill out a reciprocal link form on another site, what is your time frame for waiting for a reponse? If you have not heard from them in a week do you remove their link, or do you give them longer than that?

[coconutz]

Posting reciprocal links may not be a priority for other webmasters, some I know only update their links on a monthly basis.

[Jane_Doe]

I don't really like to leave links up for a month as often it's just giving free links away to people who have no intention of ever giving me a reciprocal link.

I've been doing two weeks but then I wonder it that is too short. I'm trying to find a good balance of giving other webmasters a reasonable time to reciprocate links and yet not be a patsy for link scammers.

[edited by: Jane_Doe at 10:50 pm (utc) on Sep. 21, 2003]

[Lilliabeth]

If some one replied and said they wanted to recip, and would get around to posting soon, I'd probably give them lots of time, but I think a week should be plenty of time for them to reply to the email and let me know they are interested.

[Jane_Doe]

For me a week seems reasonable as well, but then I work on my sites every day, and I realize that may not be true for others.

Any more opinions?

[nakulgoyal]

It's better to have a script on your server where u add the links and then after say 30 days run the script to remove all links to websites who do not have a link back.

But when you do this, make sure u have the links page URL taken from the webmaster and check that for a link because almost none of the people will place a link to you on thier homepage.

[nym_fan]

I would say 10-14 days unless they saw otherwise on the website.

I have actually got replies weeks later-had even forgotten about them at that point :)

[Liane]

You are asking for a link and presumably, you are putting a link on your site in good faith ... hoping for a response. Right?

Don't do that! Get a response first and regardless of what their site says. Deal with it after you have heard from the webmaster ... or whomever.

Don't go giving away PR just because their site says something to the effect of :

"Once we have been able to verify your link to us, we will blah, blah, blah"

Horsepucky! Don't spend an ounce of energy adding their link until you hear back from them. Don't "pay" for a darned thing until you KNOW for certain, it is a two way street!

Reciprocal links are a dime a dozen. Link to those you honestly feel deserve a link. If you really "want" a link back from a site and they stipulate that you have to supply a link first ... don't do it! Tell them you intend to give them the link and if you'd like, attach the copy/link in your e:mail ... but make it clear that you want to know what you can expect in return and the timeline you might expect for your link.

Its only fair and if you have a worthy site, you will likely get a more immediate result. :)

[jeffb]

My experience is that half of the sites that make a big point of saying, "We love linking with other sites," have no intention of ever linking to anyone and are only out to build their incoming links with webmasters who put up links to them and never check back.

After a month of no reciprocal link, I send an e-mail telling them that I hope they've benefitted from our link to them, but that we need to make room for some new links and are dropping those who have not linked back to us. I might get one or two who decide to link back at that point, but the vast majority of those who don't respond to the first offer never will.

[jdancing]

I wait 10 days. I use a link checking service so if it does not find the link they get deleted. No second emails.

Sometimes I delete a site that links back because the link checking service gives a false negative. If they email me asking ‘where is their link?’ I'll put it back up.

I don't have the time for link begging because I would rather build content. Once you get to a PR5 or 6 it’s amazing how the link beggars come to you. Then I do nothing but pick and choose who I will accept as a link partner....

Also, construct your site so your link page has PR. If your Home Page is a PR6, make sure your link pages are at least the magic number of PR4. I don’t understand why sites with a PR6 allow their link pages to be a PR 2.

My rule of thumb is to spend no more that 15 minutes per day on links.

Dancing