Do you need permission to link to others?

[gwilliamj]

If you link to other websites without them exchanging the link back with you, who does this better benefit? Does it only benefit them, or can it help you as well?

[jbinbpt]

Hey there gwilliamj,
Welcome to Webmaster World....

Outbound links from your site only helps the other site. Benefit from Google only comes from those who feels that your site is important enough to link to.

If not we all would link to Google or Webmasterworld and reap the benefits.

As far as needing permission to link, it's generaly considered not necessary. I would give them a heads up and I would remove any link that the site asked me to.

jb

[coconutz]

Welcome to WebmasterWorld gwilliamj. The primary beneficiary of the link would be the page that the link points to. This is not to say that there is no benefit to your own page.

You're giving them a portion of the PageRank that is transferred by the linking page.

Your giving them the benfit of anchor text, if used. This may increase the relevance of their page for the keyword terms in the anchor text.

You could be providing them with more traffic.

If you find the page may have value to you and visitors, consider linking to it even if they do not reciprocate. There are a number of sites that I link directly to as they are related to the topic of my site. Has it helped us? I think so.

Here are a few past discussions on outbound linking. The Link Development Library [webmasterworld.com] has some good threads also.

How to choose outbound links [webmasterworld.com]

The Value of Outbound links now... [webmasterworld.com]

Outbound Links -Authority Site Linking [webmasterworld.com]

As far as needing permission, I wouldn't worry about it if it's relevant to your own site. If someone is offended, they might contact you but I seriously doubt it. Everyone's looking for as many incoming links as they can get. :)

[layer8]

There is less than 1 percent chance you will come accross mentally retarded webmaster. If you catch these on a bad day, they may activate spam cop just for asking them for a link or try some other form of abuse. If you accept this, then no problem, if you want to prevent this from happening - make sure you do not compete with them in some way directly.

It has only happend to me once and the guy told me I had to take down all my links, I simply found it funny. He also asked me to remove his link - problem was he had activated spam cop and was hiding behind a spamcop email address.

Still it did not effect me that much and he is now benefiting from my link - I just wished they would be less paranoid sometimes.

[buckworks]

Linking out to another site creates a chance to add useful spider food to your own page(s). Don't just give them a bare-bones link; take the time to write a description that accurately describes the other site but also supports some of YOUR keywords. That way you'll both win.

[nakulgoyal]

gwilliamj, linking to others passes your PR to others. They get the benefit and not you. Not a loss to you, but NO BENEFIT.

[progex]

"gwilliamj, linking to others passes your PR to others. They get the benefit and not you. Not a loss to you, but NO BENEFIT."

Meaning, you're PR isn't reduced, correct?

[karmov]

Your PR isn't "reduced" however you do decrease the amount of potential Page Rank available to you. I would suggest readin up on PR to understand better. In the end, the Page Rank that you will be potentially deprived of will be insignificant.