Keeping New Sites Out The Sandbox

[Michael Martinez]

I take your point and have removed my post. Was trying to helps those new to the industry but I guess your are right.

I applaud your desire to help new people. We always need that kind of generosity. But there comes a point where you have to consider the bigger picture, in my opinion. Some things it's okay for everyone to do. Some things are better just left unsaid.

Sure, that frustrates people in the short term but it helps guide them away from risky behavior that a more experienced person can better manage.

Matt Cutts just released a new video recently, answering a question with some specific link building ideas. There are no Earth-shattering revelations in his advice but this is the kind of long-term stuff that is generally better to share. It's harder to abuse these kinds of ideas.

YouTube - What are some effective techniques for building links?

Strider1973, Google confirmed the Sandbox Effect exists several years ago. They said it was an unintended side effect of an adjustment they made to the algorithm in early 2004. They left it in place because they liked the way things worked out.

It's really not as helpful as it once was because many methods of obtaining value-passing links have been developed since then. But I would not hold my breath waiting for Google to undo the change. There may be other reasons for why they seem to have left it in place.

[Strider1973]

Thank you ramchip and Michael Martinez for your statements on the sandbox effect, I've just learned something I didn't know.

[gooderpoker]

I dont fully understand these topics as I have never given another site a link unless I use their service or product or link exchange.
So are you saying it would be good to give a link to ESPN.com if i were doing a site about march madness?

[Michael Martinez]

I dont fully understand these topics as I have never given another site a link unless I use their service or product or link exchange.
So are you saying it would be good to give a link to ESPN.com if i were doing a site about march madness?

First and foremost, you should provide a link to your visitors because:

• You feel that the link will provide them with information or clarification that you don't include in your content
• You believe some of your visitors will be interested in the destination you link to
• You want to recommend that site to other people
• You want to be authoritative in referencing as many relevant sites on a topic as possible
• You want to provide your visitors with a selection of other sites to represent different points of view on a topic

In a competitive query space, where you're building Websites for performance, you want to link out to show the search engines that you're not a greedy little black hole that only wants everyone else to link to them.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but the biggest mistake people make in their search engine optimization is NOT linking out to a variety of other sites that are generally useful, trusted, and UNRELATED.

NATURAL Websites naturally link out to all sorts of content. Artificial Websites artificially link out to very narrow spectra of content.

Put yourself in a random surfer's shoes. Which Website will you feel is more useful to your life: a poker site that only links to other poker sites (all of which are affiliate sites), or a poker site that links out to sites about cars, cats, girls, elementary school, cooking, news, and government?

I guarantee you most people will find the second site to be far more useful to their personal interests than the site that restricts itself to poker.

And that principle holds true for every vertical in the commercialized Web, except possibly adult content. I'm not sure people visiting those types of sites are going to think, "Hm. I saw a link to a cute doll house on ReallyGreatGirlsGalore.whatever. I'll just go back there and find the link so I can buy my daughter that dollhouse for Christmas."

I just don't think that's realistic.

Otherwise, the more relevant a site is to the rest of the Web, the more useful that site will be to many people.

So I am saying that it would be good to give a link to ESPN that makes sense to your visitors even if your site is about chopping tomatoes for home salsa.

[CoolDog]

Michael, thanks for being part of this community and contributing the way you do. You certainly add a lot of real and valuable information.

[gooderpoker]

Michael, thanks for being part of this community and contributing the way you do. You certainly add a lot of real and valuable information.

+1

yes thank you

[CasinoKev]

Excellant information Michael. Thanks for taking the time to share it.

[Planet Mark]

Also wanted to add some thanks for MM here... we are certainly fortunate to have some great SEO thinking here!

Would appreciate clarification on one thing though - when linking to cats to keep me out of the sandbox... should I be targeting sites about the fluffy 4-legged creatures, or the Andrew LLoyd Webber muscial of the same name??

Thanks, Mark

[Randy Ray]

You should link to Old possum's book of practical cats - Google Books

[Michael Martinez]

Your outbound links are not what get a site sandboxed. They are what help a site look like a natural, useful resource (as opposed to what some people call "a thin affiliate site").

The Sandbox Effect comes from obtaining too few trusted links. A trusted link comes from a well-established site with a lot of search visibility, a lot of its own inbound linkage, and sometimes a very strict policy about where it links out to.

The logic behind Google's approach is rather circular: you want good inbound links so that yourself can become a trusted outbound linker.