Link exchange with nofollow return

[NoahGlaser78]

I own a gaming site and a common practice with gaming sites is to link with other sites that post about similar game franchises.

I noticed that some sites do this and they put nofollows on their links back. What is your thought on this?

Should I remove their link if they do that? Should I keep it up and just be glad to get thousands of nofollow links in return for some dofollows out of my site?

[SimonCullum]

Hi Noah, (Apologies for the lack of paragraphing here, doesn't work on an iPad). ~ Recipricol Links aren't that beneficial anyway, one-way free followed relevant inbound links with good anchor text from reputable websites is the way to go. Gaming sites often find it tough in search as there is so much dodgy link work going on. 'My advice is to Only Link Out to another website if it's a valuable link for your visitors to follow'. If not, don't link out. There are plenty of great websites around that do provide Follow links, often within different though related industries (Gaming is leisure, so non-gaming leisure sites will often be good sites to get a link from). Try producing some great new content, an idea could be an Infographic on the History of Gaming, include a text link in the infographic. Distribute this well, other sites would love to be able to provide their visitors with this type of content. In return, you'll get some great PR and likely a number of good inbound links. Hope that helps, Regards, Simon

[NoahGlaser78]

Thanks for the response. I create a lot of content and get a lot of links that way. But when I do use link exchanges like mentioned above then what do you think aboutthe nofollow situation

[SimonCullum]

Link Exchanges are a high risk strategy, Google actively seek out and penalise sites that participate in some of them. ~ A nofollow link is usually worthless from an SEO perspective as the spiders will usually not follow the link. So poor quality links (which links from exchanges usually are) that are also nofollow are rather pointless. ~ A few good quality links will be of much more benefit than many many links from a link exchange.

[NoahGlaser78]

Thanks