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I understand that if I cross link lots of different sites I "could" get penalised and some/all of my sites banned from Google. For example, I have a UK dating directory site and a ringtone site, I feel I should be able to put a link on every page of the dating site with a link to ( ie advertising) my ringtone web site. From a visitor point of view, although they are two different "markets" it is reasonable to say that someone visiting a UK dating site may be interested in a UK ringtone service. Would they frown on this such a practice at Google?
On a related subject, how would Google know I owned both sites, do they simply go on IP Address or do they do a domain look up, in which case, what is to stop me using dummy data in at my domain registrar. Is there any other information Google can use to identify two sites are owned by the same company.
As a side note to my earlier point, I have noticed that some webmasters are offering to add reciprocal links on every page of their web sites. IOW you put a link to their site on every page of your site and they do the same on their site. If you have a good site with home page of PR6 and hundreds (if not thousands) of other pages with PR1-5, the total PR transfer could be quite substantial. Whilst this could be considered to be spam (especially if done as a reciprocal arrangement), if the links in was one way by way of a paid advertisement would this make it more legit?
Finally, if I have a link into my site from a "bad neighbourhood" or link farm would this get me banned, if I DO NOT have a link back into these "dodgy" sites. I am assuming I wouldn't, as otherwise it would be easy to get a competitors site kicked out of Google. However what is to stop someone having one "bad site" which links IN to these link farms and arrange for the reciprocal link OUT coming to the "good site". I'm sure the spammers must have thought of this trick but how would Google spot it and stop it.
I understand that if I cross link lots of different sites I "could" get penalised and some/all of my sites banned from Google. For example, I have a UK dating directory site and a ringtone site, I feel I should be able to put a link on every page of the dating site with a link to ( ie advertising) my ringtone web site. From a visitor point of view, although they are two different "markets" it is reasonable to say that someone visiting a UK dating site may be interested in a UK ringtone service. Would they frown on this such a practice at Google?
There are legitimate reasons to crosslinks sites.
Imagine a free CMS that requires you to have a link at the bottom to the CMS-HP.
It also won't increase your PR, but you could use it for keywords I think.
I don't think you will be penalized for it (if it's not hidden linking).
Linking from every page on a dating site to a ringtone site is not the same as cross linking. The links are only going in one direction. OTOH, if you start to link back, it is a different story (especially if you do this on every page with 3 or more sites). You can also look at it from a visitor point of view. If somebody goes to your site and visits 10 pages before leaving the site, does it really help to put the same add on every page?