What's your comfort level in shades of gray?

Posted Wednesday, February 21st, 2007. Filed under Link Building.

This afternoon I was consulting with a new client in an ultra-competitive keyword industry, and he showed me how 6 out of the top 10 sites are using a counter program to gather tons of backlinks — hundreds of .edu's even using this stat counter program.

Then tonight I got another email from a client who sits at #2 for his biggest phrase, while the guy at #1 is doing some serious blog "spamming."

The old advice is "Google will catch that stuff eventually," but we all know that "one day" might be tomorrow, might be next year, or might be never. There are all shades of gray in the SEO world, and just because someone's shade is grayer than mine doesn't mean I've got anything against them.

My advice still stays the same: if you're thinking long-term, don't play those games. What's your advice?

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9 Responses to “What’s your comfort level in shades of gray?”

  1. Link Building and Emails - Humans do it Better. - Jim Boykin’s Internet Marketing Blog Says:
    February 21st, 2007 at 2:30 am

    [...] SEO Tools « What’s your comfort level in shades of gray? [...]

  2. Richard Says:
    February 22nd, 2007 at 8:03 am

    I’ve been thinking/doing long term for about 7 years. I know all too well how bad it feels when the rankings are favoring the spammy sort. Despite that, It’s a great feeling when customers tell me that a friend of their’s recomended my business to them. (that is very comforting when the rankings are messed up)

    Self-inflicted-misconfigured servers, can really make for sad rankings (forget what Spammy McSpammerton is doing; make sure that your rudder is pointed straight!)

    -I’m sure people have their stoires…

  3. Esoos Bobnar Says:
    February 23rd, 2007 at 3:50 pm

    Counter spam = old school widgetbait

  4. Matt Says:
    February 27th, 2007 at 4:33 am

    Hi Jim,

    Whilst I buy links too, I am actually finding myself siding with the counters guy. I mean if the counter was a nifty script, for example say phpLD, VB or ArticleDashboard people wouldn’t be complaining.

    I remember the days when on site counters were considered to be cool things.

  5. Bestmiler Says:
    February 27th, 2007 at 7:05 pm

    I’ve always thought the same thing. It’s better to play it safe now. Like you said, eventually it will come back to haunt them but we don’t know when.

  6. Tech Blog Says:
    May 25th, 2007 at 9:05 pm

    I haven’t done any link buying up until now. I started to pay for paid posting, and a couple of site wide links. The results are amazing. Doing things the legit way isn’t the way to go

  7. TravelRob Says:
    September 5th, 2007 at 1:18 am

    I have not yet brought links but was planning to do so, I feel your article explains things quite well and I will reconsider my approach. Great article. Thanks.

  8. jack Says:
    September 17th, 2007 at 9:05 am

    Buying links is not organically grown SEO – so, in a way it is good if google can spot it.

  9. Caroline Mobiles Says:
    September 21st, 2007 at 6:35 am

    As with all these shades of gray, it comes down to your appetite for risk.. knowing that their rankings could be wiped out tomorrow cant be good for sleeping at night. But I suppose the big players diversify with different shades of gray on different sites. In that sense its not unlike any other investment.