Competitor using "unatural inbound links" not penalized??!

[bjs2010]

Since Google's latest updates, I think it would be safe to say that building links is harder. But i also read that Google applies their latest guidelines retro-actively. In other words, if you have built your ilnking profile on a lot of unnatural links, with spammy anchor text, you will get noticed and penalized.

In the past, I used to use SEO friendly directories and "suggest URL's" to build back links, with keyword/phrase anchor text. But I thought that this technique was frowned upon by Google these days.

So, what is safe to do? Why is Google not penalizing the competitor?

And bottom line what is considered to be "unnatural link building" ?

[Mike_Davis]

I know that it gets aggravating when you're doing the right thing and your competitors are cheating with seemingly no repercussions, but trust me when I say that they will get swept up eventually.  Here is a list of unnatural link building tactics.

<a>http://www.searchenginejournal.com/10-types-of-unnatural-link-building-tactics-10-quality-alternatives/44287/</a>

If they are doing any of these, they will get sodomized by Google (probably sooner than later).

If you want to be proactive there is a Spam Report Form that submits websites to the Google Web Spam Team.  I can't say how well your Karma will do afterwords, but go for it if you want.

<a>https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/spamreport</a>

Sickem!!!

[TakeshiYoung]

With Penguin, you want to keep keyword anchor text links to below 30-40% of your total link profile, or you might get hit with an unnatural link warning. Directory links are still fine, as long as you use them in moderation.

In general, the stronger your link profile, the more tolerance Google will have for spammy links. Every large site is going to end up with thousands of spammy links pointing to them, through no fault of their own. The question is whether you have enough authoritative links to counteract these negative links.

[bjs2010]

Thanks Takeshi!

I guess my next question is how do I obtain authoritative links? Thanks!

[bjs2010]

Thanks Mike!

Would love to fill out that spam report - but I think I'm gonna go with the solution below - the domain in question has a lot of natural links, but no keyword specific links in directories - whilst the other site is built solely on directory links -

Hopefully a few directory links will push the balance in our favour!

[TakeshiYoung]

Here's a pretty comprehensive ideas of various link building tactics you can try:

http://pointblankseo.com/link-building-strategies