Anybody used Linkvana?

What are the advantages and disadvantages of linkvana?

[saikatblogger]

Has anybody used linkvana? The concept looks good; what can be the negative factors of using this tool, if any?

[Planet13]

what can be the negative factors of using this tool, if any?

Well, you could get slapped with an over optimization penalty (OOP) and be banished to the nether regions of the google SERPs for months on end (a lot of people have reported three month penalties, but some have reported penalties up to 18 month long).

I haven't heard anything good or bad about it, so I can't say for sure. But with any link building campaign, you want the links to look natural.

also, I see that they charge monthly, but that they will post your links over time... so I don't know how much bang for your buck you get...

[cnvi]

We bail websites out of this service every week. The problem with it is that it creates a synthetic link acqusition rate which the SE's can spot a mile away. Don't buy into their slick sales pitch. You know the old adage.. if it looks too good to be true..

Plaster my mantra on your computer monitor: "I shall never do anything to my website that can give the SE's a reason to downgrade my rankings". Let the scamsters get downgraded allowing your site to naturally rise above theirs.

[edited by: cnvi at 6:07 pm (utc) on May 31, 2011]

[JohnRoy]

negative factors of using this tool

1. Monthly fee adds up.
2. It's not as (evil?) as skrapebx or snuke - but it's not natural either.

[Planet13]

One other thing, looking at their FAQs on their site:

Q: What type of blogs are you using? Are these free blogs such as blogspot?

A: No, all blogs are wordpress blogs, hosted on domains we own.

So, since they OWN all the blogs that the links are posted on, if google were to discover the blogs they own, then they could pretty much devalue ALL the links pretty easily.

It would be easy for google to set up a fake user account, make a bunch of blog comment posts with a unique text string in them, find all the sites that are displaying that text string, and then devalue ALL links from those sites.

Just something to think about.

I am not saying don't do it, but I am saying investigate other options. If it is too easy, then there is a good chance that your competitors will be using the same system, and therefore the value might decline in terms of your ROI.

[JohnRoy]

It would be easy for google to set up a fake user account, make a bunch of blog comment posts with a unique text string in them, find all the sites that are displaying that text string, and then devalue ALL links from those sites.

easy to setup?! Not so sure. imho that's NOT the way google would/should handle this.

(a) For every official (linkvana) scheme there are plenty underground ones that are hard to discover.

(b) If I would be linkvana I would reserve a fraction of the network for each customer so the other blocks are preserved.

(c) A Blog network changes all the time (if they're in business), old ones getting retired and new ones popping up. So the bad list google might compile today would loose value next month.

[Planet13]

(b) If I would be linkvana I would reserve a fraction of the network for each customer so the other blocks are preserved.

I think that Linkvana alludes to that in their FAQs. While it would make it harder for the search engines to detect the complete network of sties, it would also have a potential drawback that your links would appear on a lower number of domains.

So you would end up making more posts on fewer domains, as opposed to less posts on more domains. I believe the latter is preferable in terms of flowing page rank.

At least, that is what I get from reading the FAQs.

[CainIV]

I tested this actually on a throwaway domain in an affiliate space I am in. (I own one authority website, and another with about 100 unique c class relevant links)

The site dropped from page 2 to 7 within two weeks after moving steadily up to the top of page two over time.

Sometimes it might work. Personally, I think the risk of having someone see my backlinks as automated and calculated vs spending time developing great websites and great inbound link strategies always has me chasing and improving part two :)

[ryan33]

I have heard a lot of mixed opinions on Linkvana.

I have never done this before. Is this a good place to start or would anyone recommend another provider?

Thanks

[martinibuster]

Is this a good place to start or would anyone recommend another provider?

Check out the posts above yours.