Is it ok to ask for a non reciprocal link

[Anti-Alex]

hey guys, got mini discussion question. With rapgenius.com getting penalized today, it raises some questions about linking. What they did is definitely not ok. A link scheme involving their own affiliate network is against Google guidelines for sure.

So is it ok to ask for a non reciprocal link if there is no incentive involved and no money changes hands?

ie. Someone writes an article related to your article topic, or they reference you without a link. Then uou email the webmaster requesting a link... They add it. Is this against the guidelines?

[MarieHaynes]

"is it ok to ask for a non reciprocal link if there is no incentive involved and no money changes hands?"

It's totally fine to ask for a link.  However, in RapGenius' case, there was an incentive given.  Rap Genius emailed people and said that if they linked to RapGenius then they would tweet out whatever they wanted to their many Twitter followers.  They even provided the keyword rich anchor text for people to use.

[Anti-Alex]

Thanks for the info Marie.