Linking to penalized sites

[atlrus]

Many of you might have seen thousands of websites getting penalties over the past couple of weeks. Obviously, another algo tweak is at work, this time targeting the famouse link exchange.

I have been buying links for a while - as an advertisement and to improve search results (busted), and I would like to warn all the webmasters who sell links, and everybody else for that matter.

Selling links to bad websites will get you out of the search results, and by "bad" I dont mean gambling, or adult, but those who have penalties by Google. And if you are out of the SERPs - next month you will not have single customer or advertiser.

Here is how you could find if a website has a penalty:

1. Simply type the whole URL (http://www.google.com) into Google. If:
a). "Sorry, no information is available for the URL" is displayed - the website is banned.
b.) Just the URL is displayed, with no description and no cache (links, similar, and contain the term are still showing) - the website is banned.

Linking to that website, through a link exchange or selling ad space to it, will get you banned, 100%.

Also, If the above prooves to be O.K., you should still check to see if a penalty will be impossed on that website in the near future.
This is how you do this:
1. Type just the domain name in Google (webmasterworld.com), and if just the URL is displayed, with no description and no cache (links, similar, and contain the term are still showing) - the websites is about to be banned.

Also, for those who plan on buying ad space - do the same research about the website selling you the space. If the website is banned, you will not get banned if you just buy ad space (providing you don't link back), but Google will not count those links and you will just throw your money away.

And the most important thing - do not get confused by the PR, a website might have PR8 and still be banned - it just has not been reflected on the toolbar.

I think it was about time for Google to cean itself up a little, and on the other side - the rediculos prices for ad space (gouged by the "PR re-selling) will finally go down, and we could get some traffic on more normal prices.

Anyhow, all this has been verified and I have tons of URLs to prove it. Just take my advice and do your research. The consequences of no doing so could be found here: [webmasterworld.com...]

Peace and top 10 ranking to all :)

[Brett_Tabke]

Very interesting theory. We've been hearing of that one version since cross linking mania month (dec of 2002). If it is true, there is something else to it.

There are several penalized sites on this page:
[searchengineworld.com...]

and it is easily found in google and has never been dropped.

[cabbie]

I also have sites that link to banned sites that continue to do well 6 months on.These links are both old and new.My theory is that you don't get banned by linking to a bad neighbourhood but you can get banned by being part of one.
There may be another factor involved and that is what is the reason google deems a neighbourhood bad.
Maybe there are some indiscretions on a site thats bad enough to give a site a penalty but one in which an innocent webmaster linking to that site cannot be expected to know.

[atlrus]

There is always an exeption to the rule, plus I am sure that there are many other factors evaluated, before a penalty is imposed for bad linking.

As far as "bad neighbourhoods" - there are everywhere and in every major theme, and it's almost impossible to tell which is which.

But even with 50-50 chance - it's not worth losing your website :)

[Powdork]

I too have links to sites penalized by the 'onmouseover redirect' purge with no ill effects (as of yet). While there is merit to your theory and we all must be careful, there are also many holes and the water is leaking out.