Is Keyword stuffing enough to get a penalty?

a site seems penalized but I think its kosher

[GilbertZ]

A customer of mine looks like he's penalized. I got a front page link to him from PR6 and know he's got a bunch of backlinks but he's PR3. His front page has several very long paragraphs in very small text and at a glance it looks like keyword stuffing, but in fact it is real text with real meaning behind it. I know the guy very well and he's not the type to do link farms and the like, I doubt it very much it's anything like that...is keyword stuffing the cause?

Any experts mind if I sticky you the url?

[jeremy goodrich]

I don't think it has been banned, or penalized, if it's got 3 PageRank.

When was the link from the PR6 gained? And it's still there? No server downtime, or anything?

And has google spidered the PR6 since the link was added? Has there been *at least* 1 update since then?

How many outbound links is the link competing with to your PR 3 client's site? If there are more than a few, the PR benefit will not the the same...is the link straight, or through a server side redirect, like a 302? That might not transfer PR the same way, you know.

:)

Also, how 'small' is this text? What size font? Relative, or absolute? Using style sheets? Internal, or external?

As you can see, there are a lot of factors involved. (laughing) And, could you please tell us what you had for breakfast on the day that the links were gained to your clients site?

Was it healthy, containing lots of fiber, vitamins and nutrients? If so, it may be that Googlebot was leary, because of your strange eating habits...try some bacon and hashbrowns. j/k

That *should* do the trick nicely.

Give it two updates, and get worried if the site is still PR 6 that gave the link, and the other is still PR 3.

[GilbertZ]

OK, Here are some answers:

>>I don't think it has been banned, or penalized, if it's got 3 PageRank.<<

The front is 3, all other links are PR0.

>>When was the link from the PR6 gained? And it's still there? No server downtime, or anything?<<

A year ago. No server downtime. PR6 page is in the google cache.

>>And has google spidered the PR6 since the link was added? Has there been *at least* 1 update since then? <<

About 12.

>>How many outbound links is the link competing with to your PR 3 client's site?<<

A fair number.

>>is the link straight, or through a server side redirect, like a 302? That might not transfer PR the same way, you know. <<

Yup, straight through.

What also makes me suspicious is that besides the fact that the DMOZ and Google and Zeal directory listings don't show up as backlinks (there are no backlinks at all) is that doing a search for "contains" the domain name does show almost 1500 links. One of them is Brittanica on a page that shows a pagerank of 8.

>>Also, how 'small' is this text? What size font? Relative, or absolute? Using style sheets? Internal, or external?<<

I didn't really study the code but I'll take another look if you think it matters..

>>Give it two updates, and get worried if the site is still PR 6 that gave the link, and the other is still PR 3.<<

see above.

[austtr]

In my pet areas, keyword stuffing is very commonplace in many top ranking sites. I'm not saying that contributes to their success, but to answer your question, it would seem Google is not penalising for it at this time.