How about signing guestbooks for link popularity?

Does this work?

[chopin2256]

I've noticed that in my guesbook, I get alot of spam. At first I thought these people actually were writing to me about what they thought of my site. Then after I stopped being so naive, they were only signing my guestbook for a free link! I smelled something fishy becuase their responses were too generic. I think I will get rid of my guestbook, it seems useless really.

So my question is, would signing a guestbook help increase link popularity, and have any of you guys used this method? This seems like a poor method, but does it work?

[Philosopher]

This is a VERY old and pretty much outdated trick. It can still work to some extent, but not much.

Don't waste your time. Your time would be put to much better use finding quality links or writing quality content.

[Freedom]

This worked great from 1999-2003 but 2 years ago is ancient history on the net.

Go for quality and theme. There's lots of affordable link building teams for hire out there.

[hp11]

I would rather put my energy into building quality backlinks.

[guitaristinus]

I agree, it can work to some extent.

But it doesn't take much time. Do a search for guestbook + [your keywords].

Including keywords in search gets you on theme.

Got a page about Miami? A search on Google for the words guestbook + miami shows a guestbook with a page rank of 5. For link pop, that's quality enough for me.

Maybe sign one a week. Have as many links from nonguestbook sites as well.

Warning: Overuse may get you banned.

[larryhatch]

Hi Guitarist: (I made a living playing bass, long long ago ..)

"Warning: Overuse may get you banned. "
That would be my concern too. It doesn't look very natural.

Not that they would do this, but what's to prevent the major engines
from putting up dummy guestbooks to see what fish jump into the net?
That would be a quick and dirty way to identify spammers, would it not?
I mean, here's a guestbook on a site about apple trees. In come URLs for hotels,
travel, florists .. (apple blossoms? I don't think so .. ) -Larry

[guitaristinus]

Larry,

I hadn't thought about a SE sting. Would they want to put a dummy page on top of the SERPs? Could happen.

From the guestbook page that shows up on the search we can take a couple of side links to make sure there really is a site.

[larryhatch]

Guitar: I was only half-serious in suggesting a guestbook trap, but its not impossible.
If the engines DO such a thing, I'm sure they would put up a realistic dummy site to match. - Larry

[MidwestMerchant]

I see no problem in putting your link into a guestbook if you actually did visit the site..and make a true comment about it. One post above stated doing one a week. This isnt a horrible idea if you are actually visiting a site and they have a guestbook available. I think its non sense trying to spam them and as others said, probably only helps to a certain extent..but if your visiting a site and they have a guestbook..why not make a true comment about it and get your link out there, you visited and browsed the site; you earn your link..just my 2 cents

[wheel]

Well, I'll be! What's old is new again. I've never bothered with guestbook links but did as you suggested and I'm seeing the odd pr4 and pr 5 links.

I wouldn't over do this, but I don't see much wrong with the odd one.