Link Scam or a Legit Technique?

Are the network networks' days long gone or they are still alive?

[promar]

Not even sure that this is the right category, but nevertheless…

We have been approached by a company offering “(name of promotion service)” which includes creating numerous template-based landing pages targeting a single KW + location.
A part of the sales pitch was the statement that those landing pages are also doing quite well in search. They showed me an example of a dummy page which has 99% of “lorem ipsum” content with just a couple of KW reach heading.

I was surprised to see that this page is ranked #1 in Google search under a fairly popular search term + location.

The trick was that they have over a hundred footer links to identical dummy landing pages were the only modifications were the targeted KW and the location. All these dummy pages are linked with each other.

My only impression was – “a link scam”, but the presenter claimed that the techniques they use are legit and comply with Google policies, and whatever they do they “run by Google” first.

I thought the link networks’ days have long gone, but it’s not obviously the case in this instance. Or it’s a risk that one take until caught by Google?







[edited by: not2easy at 10:50 pm (utc) on Oct 8, 2021]

[edited by: martinibuster at 5:45 pm (utc) on Oct 9, 2021]
[edit reason] No links please, see ToS [/edit]

[lucy24]

Look at it this way: You have known yourself, your mind, your feelings, and your gut instinct for so-and-so-many years. (Probably quite a few years, if you’ve been posting since 2004.)

You have known company X for, let’s say, three days.

Barring compelling evidence to the contrary, which of the two should you trust?

[promar]

Hey, lucy24, no doubts here at all. I guess it was more of a rhetorical question - I've been absolutely shut by seeing anything like that in 2021, so just thought I'd share it. The most appalling part was the "everything we do we run by Google first" statement. Mind you, it's a fairly large public company.

[not2easy]

You are right to view these great new ideas as nothing more than new variations of those old link chains, networks or web rings. The link scheme sounds even less valuable and helpful to participants as the old versions were. There seem to be people in the business of trying to reinvent the wheel online, operating on the idea that it is possible there are people who might buy into it because they never heard of it before. Many people trying today were not around last time. ;)

[promar]

Couldn't agree more, not2easy. I'm frustrated because they sell it to people with no- or very little SEO knowledge and, unfortunately, use the landing page as an example of their great SEO achievements, making the whole industry look dodgy. I actually reported them, so it'd be interesting to see if anything happen given the "complying with Google policies" and "run by Google" claims. I don't expect much from the robotic review though.