Reciprocal link building a bad idea?

[Nightwing]

Reciprical Link Building or one way traffic?

Good  morning from 8 degrees c but very sunny wetherby UK

Regarding link acquisition ive had it in my head that the best idea is to secure inbound

links only i.e avoid reciprocal link building so that when your source links to you you

dont give them a link back.

But is this no longer valid when targeting inbound links to increase rank? Is it ok to link back or will that "leak SEO juice" or whatever we decide to call it this week.

[Matt-Williamson]

Hi - take a look at this previous Q and A in relation to reciprocal linking - http://www.seomoz.org/q/are-you-careful-about-linking-back-to-sites-that-link-to-you

I think a few well chosen outbound links to other sites that are natural are a good thing for making your link profile look more natural. This may include a few reciprocal links if they are in relation to some content on your site and a site that is linking to you would provide more depth, for instance if you gave a link in the appropriate place. However you don't want to be exchanging links purely for links in my opinion this is a dangerous practice.

[RankStealer]

To be frank I have heard alot of different ideas about this subject few with any conclusive evidence to support their theories.  I would suggest if you are link building then you dont want to link back.

However if you are writing an article and mention an authority about what you are talking about, i.e you are writing a review on a phone don't be afraid to mention and link back to the manufacturer. Linking back shouldn't be viewed as a bad thing in the correct context.

The way I view link building is my site is an empty glass and every link I get pours some juice into my glass to fill it up, the more juice in the glass the more powerful (authoritive) my site is and therefore the easier it is for me to rank.

[Maximise]

Nice answer. If your thinking about creating a reciprocal link ask yourself if the link would be beneficial to your users. Search engines want to see you linking to closely related and useful content, this is how the web is "supposed" to work. If you're thinking of just slapping a random link in your footer then don't bother.