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Broadly, yes - we're very interested in this issue. Unfortunately, it's incredibly complicated. A couple of key points: (1) We have no idea which links Google discounts. There's no API or signal or crawl trick that will tell us, and there's really no way to measure the impact of any single link. So, we're forced to try to deduce the signals they use. Unfortunately, even those signals can take a mountain of data to process, and so it gets computationally more and more complex. (2) Our crawl does bias toward what we believe are higher-quality links. In other words, we try to focus on quality over quantity in our data. So, in that sense, we do discount them, to some degree. This is mostly based on authority-based metrics, though, not on "spamminess". (3) Dr. Matt Peters here at SEOmoz is actively working on a project to classify link spam and try to emulate Google's behavior. That's been a very difficult project, but the goal is to measure spam more effectively and eventually try to integrate what we learn back into the crawl. I can't currently give you an ETA on that project, but it is something the Data Science team is working hard on.

I've been using Blurbpoint for a while now and liked them. They were's "amazing" but they did a good job...3 stars sounds about right to me. I have a tiny limited budget to work with and I had to put them on hold or cancel since I decided to use the budget elsewhere, part of which is here at SEOMoz. They worked on 5 keywords for me and I increased rankings well, not overnight, but over time.

I agree. As a link building method, social bookmarking is bad. As a method to drive buzz and get exposure and links for awesome content, Reddit and similar tools can be great. Reddit, StumbleUpon, and similar tools are not really social bookmarking sites, either.

May I know the platform of website ? If it is wordpress, just one plugin is needed in that case.

Hi Adam, May I know the landing pages ? You can group similar keywords and make landing page for those specific keywords. And built backlinks for that page. If you create multiple pages for one keyword, Google might treat those pages as "Doorway Pages".

Thanks  Mr SanketPatel  . I will try .

_As you have said you have translators in your team, you can always approach high quality blogs in German to get your article posted therein. I do not know why you are after article directories which are heavily affected by Panda and there is no point in submitting article in English language article submission. Since these sites are visited by English speaking people, why you should be wasting your time by submitting your article there. Rather try email marketing, Adwords, banner advertising etc. _

Hi Hardley, Dana has listed some great factors to consider when choosing directories. However just consider the relevance of that directory rather than just the raw authority of the site. Example (I've just been to Australia Zoo, hence this example) You're doing SEO for a company that transports Kaulas. The best link you could get isn't from a high authority site, with a PR of 8, & 1,000,000 links. It's from the most relevant sites. Out there somewhere will be a website on the perils of transporting Kaulas, written by the foremost expert in the world. Target that site. In the case of directories, you target animal related ones. Because Google will know what the site is about, you won't need to worry about adding a list of keywords. Hope that help Iain - Reload Media

Try http://www.ahrefs.com  They have a free and paid version and are pretty good about showing new backlinks every day. You might also try the software plug-in at http://www.screamingfrog.com  - Also an excellent resource, not only for backlinks, but many other things too (i.e. crawl errors, etc). Good luck! Dana

Yes, there's definitely an awesome way to do this in SEOMoz. You need to set up a campaign, and then associate keywords with that campaign. If you have several different categories of keywords you can separate them with tags to group like words together. I would highly recommend also putting in as many competitors as possible so you can see where they rank for the same terms. Once you've put in your keywords, SEOMoz will crawl once a week and track the rankings over time. You will also be able to export complete history for keywords over time. THis is extremely helpful in determining if you are going up or down for your most important terms. Every site is a little different, so the best thing to do is just get in there and play with it and you'll soon find what works best for you. Hope that helps! Being able to track keywords like this, together with compeitors' rankings is what make SEOMoz Pro worth every penny (IMHO). Dana

Hi Cecil, DMOZ as Kane mentions is trustworthy and valuble. Many directories scrape it, earning more directory links. I've read a great article on getting accepted into DMOZ here: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/want-to-get-listed-in-dmoz-become-an-editor Hope this helps.

Thanks guys. I should probably clarify. I do know what to do on the site itself. And I have several ideas on what to do to build inbound links( in which social will play a large part) as I realize that is their only hope of ranking. I plan to target universities that have social good programs to try and get on their radar as one example. I'll also be looking for guest blogging opportunities on related sites. And we'll also be doing Facebook campaigns. The whole site is social and is built around the concept of social good sharing. So as we get users, the buzz will happen because the system invites it. But I'm looking for ways to get Google to notice even without that happening yet. Clearly, given that there is no content to speak of, inbound links and social shares, tweets and the likes are critical. But, given the competition and the lack of content, this is a very difficult task. Love to hear any creative ideas to do so if you have them. We've been recommending more content, but they won't listen. So I plan to share your comments here in the form of an audit report and in the hopes of getting them to comply. If anyone has any good supporting data to prove the data, I'd love to see that as well. Thanks for backing me on the need for more content! Keep those recommendations coming! Thanks.

It looks like you're a PRO user. I'd recommend going to the Keyword Difficulty Tool and typing in your primary keyword. Let's assume it's "kratom capsules." The other websites ranking for that keyword are also exact or partial match domains (meaning they also have keywords in the domain name) - so you're roughly equal on that, although the exact match domain will have an advantage over you. Once you load up the keyword difficulty report, compare yourself on each metric reported for the other websites. Your PA and DA are getting there, but still likely too low compared to the other results showing up. Take a look at the link building being done by competitors. Try to copy any decent links, skip the spammy looking links, and think of way to get some links that they don't have. For your head terms (the shorter and more competitive terms you want to target), you'll need to build more links to have a shot. Long tail content for obscure keywords will be easier once you produce more ongoing content. Also, it appears you're trying to target 3 terms with the homepage: "Kratom capsules | Buy Kratom capsules |Kratom for Sale - Capsulekratom.com" - Try aiming for one keyword per page. The three keywords in your title tag should really be 3 separate pages - only one of which can be the homepage. If you're really taking a long-term approach to this site, I'd focus on creating content that your competitor's may not be investing in. Try soliciting "experience reports" from your buyers, similar to what is published on Erowid: http://www.erowid.org/experiences/exp.php?ID=58314. That's the type of content that people will want to read through before they try something experimental like this, and if you're soliciting that type of content from your existing customers you'll be producing lots of unique content. You might even offer to ship a couple extra capsules if someone submits a report of more than 200 words.

Sep 28 was the date of the EMD update but I'm wondering if your drop was actually Sep 27.  There was a big Panda update on that day.  The biggest culprit for Panda is content that is duplicated on other sites on the web or pages with thin content.  But, Panda has nothing to do with overuse of keywords. If you feel that this was because of overuse of keyword anchor text and the drop was not on October 5 then have a look at your webmaster tools to see if you've got an unnatural links penalty.

It looks like this site has a lot of backlinks for "custom t shirts" and I see them at #8 on Google.com for this term.  You'd think they would have been affected by Penguin. Here's my theory.  According to ahrefs they really started a linkbuilding campaign in September of this year. Now, Penguin refreshed on October 5th.  It's possible that at that time they didn't have enough exact match anchor links to trigger the filter.  (We're assuming that this is the major component to Penguin). My guess is that they'll decline with the next Penguin refresh. Now, Penguin doesn't necessarily pick up paid links, just unnatural linking patterns like gross overuse of anchor text. In many cases, to be busted for paid links a manual spam review would have to be filed.  Personally I would not file a spam report though.  I think what goes around comes around.  I'd spend the time working on my own site and see what happens with the next Penguin refresh.

Kris, decided not to buy the domain. Your info help me to conclude it was just too risky. Will see if I can negotiate a content link on the site instead. Thanks again for a great answer!

Hi, What is the url of the site ? Also some addon questions: Are you indexed and you don't rank ? You don't rank at all or just very low ? Do you have any impressions for the site ? (in WMT or Ga search engine optimisation tab) Do your pages have a reason to rank ? (vs competitors. do you have anything extra, better then your competitors) Cheers.

Yes, there has been a lot of confusion regarding what types of keywords are targeting. If you are targeting only targeted keywords, it is like playing Russian roulette. Your website might be enjoying top position until you are caught by Google Penguin update. Probably this is the reason why you might be still seeing low quality sites with questionable links ranking tops. _The ideal anchor text policy should be the right mix of branded keywords, targeted keywords and natural texts. But as you are playing it safe, you cannot expect that you will see dramatic improvement in the rankings anytime soon. _

I thoughs so ...just checking.  I get that the PR is only updated periodically.  I just frankly find is super hypocrytical to even index these sites.  In fact I will go further and say that if Google should either. 1. Just ignore links from sites like these as part a sites link profile. 2. publish a list like a wanted board an allow you to simple disavow. I know once again I think they should think like me and I know this will not going to happen....so off I go to play the game some more.  Expect it to become harder and harder for small or even medium sized business to play this game.  In a few short years page one will belong to the large companies. I am determined to fix the link profile of this site.  I found 52k backlinks..... Needless to say lots of them are old and the site no longer exists but at least once done I will have a cleaned up link profile.  A new starting point. Thanks again Ryan Signed backlink sloger jw