Link Farm FFA's

What is a good strategy when using links?

[dinodod]

Ok, I have several pages that all link to the same 4 link farms.

The 1st link farm is to another site and contains 400 links

The 2nd - 4th point to different sites which all overlay each other. Each of these farms has about 100 links

Now, I'm sure that I'll be smacked for too many links as I just read in this site so I am wondering what is a good way to create a LINK FARM?

[Brett_Tabke]

FFa's are out. They send you little traffic and are a major source of spam.

[dinodod]

What in the heck are FFa's?
"FFa's are out"

What do you suggest?

[Brett_Tabke]

Free For Alls (aka: link farms, or link farm directories). Most often come from using free submit services on the web.

That has been one of the tricks as of late is using the free web submitters to actually attack your competition. The free web submitters are submitting to hundreds of lesser ffa's/link farms and that can really hurt your rankings on some engines.

[tedster]

>> using the free submitters to actually attack your competition.

Is there any defense against this?

I have one client who went out on their own and tried to help by doing one of those free submits. Their Google rank plummetted, and the clean-up has taken a lot of time (may never get rid of all those off-topic links). I can't imagine how to defend against this kind of off-topic linking if it was an intentional campaign.

[Brett_Tabke]

Not that I know of Ted.

[littleman]

It's like the old spam penalty AV use to have for over submitting.

[dinodod]

So if FFA's are out, how can I get 'relative' material?

If I have a page and I link every keyword to another page that describes that keyword in further detail, would this help?

[paynt]

Hello dinodod,

I suggest getting our site listed first in the entire major directories (ODP, Yahoo, Excite especially). Then, look for topic related portals and submit to those. If you are in a specific region do a search on Google for "region directory" or "region hub", that type of search and submit to those.

You can also find topic specific vortals to submit to. I would mine as many of these as possible. Next is finding those reciprocal links from industry related partners. Run a link check in Google for your top competitors and see which are linking to them. Go for it and see if you can get some of those to link to you. Create a link page for the reciprocal link partners.

[mark_roach]

>>The free web submitters are submitting to hundreds of >>lesser ffa's/link farms and that can really hurt your >>rankings on some engines

Brett do you think that sites in your old "buddy links" program will be damaged in a similar way ?

If so is it worth running a campaign on here to get people to take down their old BL pages ?

[Brett_Tabke]

Not at all Mark. In fact I know we are still seeing a miniboost from them. There aren't that many left. I'm not convinced that any engine has taken any kind of stance against them at all. I've talked to Google, Inktomi, and Fast - all responded with "huh"? I don't buy reports to the contrary. They'd have to go after webrings, bookmark lists, resources lists...etc. just not worth their time to stress out over it.

[mark_roach]

Thanks Brett, I took my pages down a while ago, but I know that there are still some pages that link to me out there.

[dinodod]

[[[ I suggest getting our site listed first in the entire major directories (ODP, Yahoo, Excite especially). ]]]

Is there a site that has a list of these directories so that I can submit to them?

[dinodod]

Then, look for topic related portals and submit to those. If you are in a specific region do a search on Google for "region directory" or "region hub", that type of search and submit to those.

You can also find topic specific vortals to submit to. I would mine as many of these as possible

---------------------------------------------

Ok, exactly what do you mean by "topic related portals"?
Are you referring to more directories or what?

Sorry I don't understand.

[paynt]

Well, it depends on what your client is all about. For party planners get listed in event management portals. For health products get listed in health related portals. The more specific to your industry the better.

[dinodod]

I was referring to what exactly are 'portals'
Can you explain that term a little more?

Thanks!

[Mike_Mackin]

>is there a site

Search Engine Watch [searchenginewatch.com]

[paynt]

I was suggesting more like
[specialeventsite.com...]
which is an industry specific portal for event planning.

or something like
[hline.org...]
for healthcare in Michigan.

or
[naturalfood.tradeworlds.com...]
for a natural foods portal.

There are many of them, very specific to an industry and very good for submitting a site to.

Hope that helps.

[Marcia]

>There are many of them, very specific to an industry and very good for submitting a site to.

What is the best way to hunt those down,for specific topics and industries?

[mark_roach]

Marcia

Search for your chosen keywords on a variety of engines, register with the ones that are consistently returned in the top results.

Mark
ps. I know a good dogs one ;)

[paynt]

Marcia, I run several searches on Google using the topic (example: events, health, natural foods) and then directory, I'll repeat this replacing directory for hub, then vortal, then link directory. i use Google because then I know the directory, hub, vortal, portal is actually listed in Google. If you are picking and choosing then go for the ones with the highest page rank. I just go for as many as I can get that are in my topic or theme and are obviously not a link farm.

note: Be sure that when you are submitting a link that it's not to a directory only using ODP data as these go right back to ODP and that might not be in your best interest.

[dinodod]

Just curious but when will the major directories allow free submissions to the directory again?

I checked out Webcrawler & Yahoo! and both are charging for a submission into the directory! EEKK!!

Whats up with that?