Link Directory

a question about spider behavior

[tonmo]

Hello:

I've spent a bit of time using the site search function, but haven't seen an answer to my specific question:

I've added a Link Directory to my site. I used to edit a "site reviews" page by hand, but it got a bit unwieldy, so I decided to add a nice PHP Yahoo-style link directory, with a couple layers of categories. Visitors can suggest links to add, but they don't get added unless I approve them via the admin tool. i.e., I maintain full editorial control.

The question: am I hurting my page rank? This script counts the number of outgoing hits to other sites. As such, the URLs look something like this:

www.example.com/links/directory/click.php?url=www.ExternalSite.com/index.html&id=38

The script seems to add the "&id=[SomeNumber]" at the end, seems this is instrumental in the hit-counting.

Now: will Google and other bots and spiders recognize me as being a good scout and linking to other sites, or will this all be ignored? i.e., when comparing the current method I've employed to simply linking to "www.ExternalSite.com" directly, am I now at a disadvantage for any reason?

Thanks in advance!

[edited by: Woz at 6:47 am (utc) on May 9, 2003]
[edit reason] delinked example link [/edit]

[Emma McCreary]

I would like to know the answer to that as well.

Here's one thread that talks about it:
[webmasterworld.com...]

But they don't come to much of a conclusion.

<added>
Here they say PR is passed on through these links:
[webmasterworld.com...]
</added>

[tonmo]

Sounds good Emma, thank you!

[Powdork]

Google is getting better at handling those type of links but they are still less likely to be followed. Specifically, my understanding is that the bots have a hard time with session IDs because they think the same page is really multiple pages. In addition they may have a problem with the '?' in the querystring.

[WebGuerrilla]

tonmo,

Your original question is whether or not the click tracking script will impact your PageRank.

The answer would be no. The script may or may not impact whether or not the sites you link to receive PageRank from your site, but it won't have a negative impact on the PR your page already has.

[tonmo]

Thank you, but I guess I'm now confused... Can you clarify for me that my PR is in no way based on how many quality links I have from my site to others? Somehow I thought this was the case (ie, if Google's bots somehow determine that I'm linking out to a lot of great sites under my keyword, they'll reward me with a better PR).

Thanks again, I appreciate it.