Paid Links: Risk Vs Reward

Link building is a time consuming and sometimes frustrating process for many Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) consultants, however it is an absolutely essential part of ranking well for search engines such as Google.

There are many different strategies for link building such as article marketing, directory submissions, blog commenting, forum commenting, guest blogging, link exchanging and link baits. All these methods can prove to be a successful link building strategy if used and implemented correctly and they are all perfectly acceptable methods that are in line with Google’s guidelines.

Guide Lines

Google has a set list of guidelines that advise what is acceptable and what is not acceptable practice when it comes to optimising your website. Essentially they do not want people to manipulate their search results through ‘non organic’ methods and one such method that is against the guide lines is buying links or ‘paid links’.

Paid Links

As a result of SEO companies wanting to streamline their link building, some look to buy their links because it is essentially a quicker process and some services allow them to buy packages of links. Now this is where it can get a bit tricky because this type of link building can have positive effects on a websites ranking. Furthermore it can make a SEO consultant’s life much simpler because the link building through paid links can be done relatively quickly and hassle free.

Unfortunately paid links as we stated above are against the guide lines and Google is always on the look out for websites that engage in this method of link building. Google has some pretty advanced algorithms that spot patterns that emerge from paid link building especially bulk buying links from link selling services.

The outcome is not good for websites that repeatedly buy links to manipulate their search results and this can end with either a full blacklisting from Google’s search engine or a penalty that can last for months where the website will move down the rankings. This can be a real nightmare for any SEO or website owner thinking of buying links, so you really need to have a good think about whether it is worth taking this kind of a risk for paid links or not.

Grey Area

Every SEO consultant has a different opinion when it comes to paid links and if it is ever acceptable to use them or not. Our opinion is that 90% of the time paid links are just bad news and they will only give you short term success in any online market.

There is a ‘grey area’ though, for example if you owned a workplace health and safety consultants company and were doing some blogger out reaching emails to DIY blogs to produce some original content for their blog in exchange for a link (this is a typical practice in quality organic link building). Now many of the DIY bloggers will be happy to do this as long as the content you produce is good, however some might turn round and say they will give you a link off their next blog post for a £10 fee instead.

This in our opinion is the ‘grey area’ of paid links because there really is no way any search algorithm will know if you paid for this link or not as the blog does not advertise any link selling and to all intents and purposes this could be a 100% organic link through guest blogging.  If you were ever going to buy a link then this is the type of link that would be an acceptable purchase but you do need to be fully aware that you are technically breaking Google’s guidelines therefore risking penalisation.

Conclusion

There are lots of ways to acquire links so we would recommend avoiding paid links as much as possible, however like with any rule there are always exceptions and times when you can take calculated risks to gain a good quality link.

Jon is working with Veritas Consutling who specialise in workplace safety services and health and safety regulations.

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