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not for PageRank, because as I stated, page rank is only links, but for relevancy yes, it wont be relevant. You could also be importing problems with the domain along wit the PR,

Hi, I can't comment on the Google+ part as that is something I know little about, however I can comment on your localization setup. I would definitely spend some time on this to make your contant local available and in the right languages. You could greatly benefit from this in the long term trying to rank for specific terms in specific countries you're working in.

If i was you i would consult with a company face to face before hiring and also see if you can do some things on your own. Social media and blogging is something that someone in house can do and they also have first hand knowledge of the business.

Feel free to inmail me your url and I'll look at it more closely. Best... Mike

As Marie and Gary have said, there are a lot of legitimate reasons why a site would acquire a high number of new inbound links naturally. Even if those sorts of links prompted Google to manually have a look at the backlink profile, this sort of activity isn't going to hurt. What Google is looking for with backlink acquisition is unnatural patterns, so if you were to add 1,000 links to a backlink profile of (say) 1,500 links, with no discernible media attention, content creation or seasonality, you'd be breaking a pattern of link acquisition (or the lack thereof) and possibly trigger attention. Google is incredibly good at pattern recognition, for obvious reasons. If a pattern changes, there has to be a reason for the change. If they determine that the change was manipulative an unnatural, that's where you run into trouble. Echoing what others have said about link building using directories - I can't endorse that as a link building tactic at all. Get listed where appropriate for reasons other than SEO (are you a local hairdresser in Everett, WA? Getting listed on a site about service providers in Everett is absolutely fine). The sort of directory-based link building that was common and fairly useful for "volume" in ~2009 is no longer a good idea. You'll show up on sites like these without effort (people seeking to fill out directories they run), and shouldn't worry too much about those sorts of links, but it's not advisable to seek them yourself.

Hi, Marie is right - we can't provide you with numbers like this. The last time that this was possible was 2009 / 2010 (in my experience). You knew that if a well-ranked website had 1,000 inbound links and 50% of those had commercial anchor text, 5% of which was from a certain type of website, then those were good numbers. Not necessarily to copy, but successful numbers nonetheless and a framework for what was working at the time. Now, as Marie says, Google is far better at determining what is real and what isn't, so even if you stick to someone else's numbers in terms of where they get their links from, your attempt at copying that may not have the same results because it does not look nearly as natural or high-quality. I also have to point out that you have mentioned directories and social media: social media links are almost invariably nofollowed, so if you are acquiring them, you should be thinking about these links for other reasons besides SEO. A natural, high quality backlink profile will include social links, so don't forget about them, but they are not technically a source of inbound followed links anymore (for the most part). Directories are often low-quality / spammy and often require payment for inclusion. I would only have a site listed in a directory if I was doing it for other reasons than SEO nowadays too.

Assuming that those are the only unnatural links the site had, there's a good chance that when Google refreshes the Penguin algorithm again the site will once again look clean in the eyes of Penguin and be able to rank again. However, if Penguin refreshes soon, there is a chance that not much will change as Google needs time to revisit each of the offending linking domains and recognize that they are no longer linking to you (even if it is through a 301).  This is why some sites need to sit through two refreshes before they see a recovery. Keep in mind as well that the site has to have good links in order to see a recovery.  If the previous rankings were only supported by the equity that came through the 301 (prior to getting affected by Penguin) then you might not see much improvement once Penguin refreshes. Gary mentioned that the next Penguin refresh is probably going to be in the next two weeks.  I don't know that anyone knows that for sure...I'm thinking that this is a guess as it has already been seven months since the last refresh and historically the longest Google has gone between refreshes is 6 months.  I agree that it makes sense for Google to do it soon, but it still could be several months if that's what they decide to do.

Is this still the case? because in the Moz 'learn' it talks about connecting with you customers who have blogs and get them to put links on the sites. http://moz.com/beginners-guide-to-seo/growing-popularity-and-links *Manual "Outreach" Link Building *Get your customers to link to you.

ahrefs.com is another one, I think that finds backlinks a little faster. I generally check ahrefs, majestic seo, and OSE.

Hi Luis, Since the launch of the Penguin algorithm in 2012 (and for some time before that), over-doing anchor text has been dangerous. It still works for some sites, but the likelihood of being penalised is greatly increased when commercial or non-brand / non-miscellaneous anchor text outweighs brand / miscellaneous anchor text in a backlink profile. Directories were a popular way to build links in "the old days", pre-2009 or 2008. Many people had stopped using directories before then as well. As Richard says, too many links from irrelevant directories is a bad thing. It's super easy for Google to notice and either ignore or penalise. I would be very selective with my choice of which directories I wanted to be listed in and would take a very white-hat approach to directories in general. That is, don't get listed in one that you wouldn't want to be listed in even if you received no link or a nofollowed link. Some say that directory links should be nofollowed for safety - I'm not sure that just being listed somewhere with a followed link is really that dangerous, but it's safe to say that using directories for SEO purposes is not a good tactic in 2014.

Hi Gavin, Agree with Martijn here - links from 404ing pages are very unlikely to either help or hinder a website, just as inbound links to pages on your site that 404 also don't help / hurt. You probably do not need to do anything about these links. However, if they were very good links in the past and you would like them back, you could consider contacting the webmasters of the sites with the broken pages and asking them if they are aware of their errors and / or would consider updating. Cheers, Jane

We don't have the same crawl capabilities as Google, so it could be we're just not crawling those pages with the links. What types of pages are you getting links?

Link directories adds almost no value today. It is our experience. Years ago they were a great ressource.

Safest bet is to do internal linking from as many pages as possible, that are related to the keyword.  Depending on the keyword, external linking may actually hurt your SEO if you over do it.

Go to different conferences and meet other people from your industry. It is the best way no matter if it is gambling, betting or other topics that your website is about. Another thing you can do to build links is trying to create something that ONLY can be found on your website. I know a few that have had great success with infographics in the gambling niche.

I base myself almost exclusively on google seo.  I start a Little bit of adwords and some articles, press releases, web hosting and dedicated server listings and directories.  I am also present in social media but without too much action. It seems like its a full time job for each aspect of SEO. I would need 3 or 4 employees working exclusivelly on that to start competing with the big guys

Why go to buy a cheap premium proxy for this kind of task? You can add 20 links per proxy but you had a lot of proxies. Check this guy http://www.premiumproxylist.com/

You should use proxies, especially when using seo software to avoid Google red flags.

The answer really depends on what type of penalty you have, but in most cases, your whole site will be affected and the new content will likely struggle.  There are some cases where only a certain part of a website or even certain keywords are affected by a penalty and new content could still thrive, but that's not as common. Still, if you can add good fresh content then I would continue to do so!  This can be a sign of good faith to Google that you are actively working on improving your website.  You can even link to this content in your reconsideration request to show Google that you are doing all you can to make your website as helpful to users as possible.

Using Majestic historic link function