Have I created link spam.....

[RobertChapman]

Howdy fellow Mozzers....

Since Googles Penguin Update I am overly cautious when reviewing our link profile. I spotted 2 domains linking to us yesterday, 80+ links from each domain to our homepage. This looked superstitious, site wide links effectively.

At first inspection I couldn't spot the links....they turned out to be two individual comments, but as the site had a plugin with "most recent comments", 1 link became 80. The link is an exact match of the individuals name who made the comment. And is a result of filling out the comment form.

Name:

Website:

Comment:

By filling out the name and website the name becomes the anchor text for the link to the website.

Long story short...do you think this is penguin esq. link spam? Is it not? Or is it just not worth the risk and remove them anyway???

[irvingw]

It depends on a few factors

a) are the sites linking to you shady

b) do you have a good link profile already or is the site new with few links, it's all about passing a threshhold on Google in terms of number of bad links vs good.

c) are they easy to remove, if yes then i would remove them, sitewide links are dangerous

[JustinTaylor88]

I think your suspicion about the validity of this link answers your question.

Unless there is a good reason to keep the comment/link, i would delete it as it all sounds suspicious from what you have described.

[RobertChapman]

Irving, thanks for the feedback, in answer to your questions:

A)The 2 blogs are not shady in the slightest, both are long standing technical blogs created by respected individuals in their field.

The comments are technical response's to articles created by the individuals.

B) Our site has an extensive link profile with a domain age of 5+ years.

C) Yes, easy to remove the links. Agreed, 80 pages linking to 1 does not look natural. I will see if the comment can remain, its a good response.

[RobertChapman]

Hi Justin, thanks for the feedback.

I'm not sure I would have been concerned had it just been a couple of links from the sites.

The sites linking are credible well established blogs, with great content. And the response on the sites are genuine unique responses in the comments section to articles created.

It seems to be the nature of the comment form and the set up of the blog plugin that makes this look suspicious.

I believe I will see if its possible to keep the comment and just remove the link.