The process of
link checking can be a daunting task. The sheer number of links alone can be frightful in some cases, so it helps to know exactly what to look for when manually checking your backlinks. This guide will explain how to quickly and effectively determine whether a backlink is giving your website value.
Methods of discounting a backlink
There are quite a few methods of hiding links, either from a robots view (search engines and such) or that of human visitors. Here's a rundown of the different methods used to commit
link fraud. Next I'll describe how to check for each method.
- HTML comments
- Javascript code
- iFrames
- CSS or HTML styling
- Robots.txt file
- Page cloaking
- Internal page redirects
- The rel="nofollow" tag
That's a rather comprehensive list. Seems like it'd take forever to check each link for all those methods, right? Without an automated system it would be a major time drain. Backlinks Builder can automatically (and reliably) check for many of these methods, and a good strategy when obtaining backlinks will prevent most of the others from ever being employed to begin with. Let me explain what each involves first, and then I will explain how to check for the methods not covered.
Links placed in HTML comments
HTML commenting a link involves exactly what it says: putting the link code within HTML comments. This will keep it from being counted when a search engine scans the page, and it will not display when users load the page. This is used mainly to fool link checking programs that are not very robust. Backlinks Builder reliably detects this type of link fraud.
Links placed within Javascript code
Sometimes this one can be an "honest mistake". Luckily it's one you can easily avoid. Search engines will generally not index links within javascript code. In some cases they will, but it's best to assume they will not because in many cases they will definitely be confused and ignore the link. Backlinks Builder reliably checks against links placed within Javascript code.
Links in iFrames
The general rule of thumb is: if it's in a frame, search engines are likely to miss it or discount it. The reason behind this (especially pertaining to iFrames) is that frames are often used as a method for cheating referrer lists, creating invisible link farms, etc. Backlinks Builder reliably checks for links placed within iFrames.
CSS or HTML styling to obscure links
Using styling code can obscure a link from the users view. For instance, if we place a link on a white background and insert code which makes the link white, not only is the user going to be unable to see it, but search engines have advanced enough in their fraud detection to recognize the link is bogus. This method can be achieved by "wrapping" the link within any number of different HTML tags, and the use of external style sheets (CSS) only complicates the process of automatically (and reliably) detecting this type of link fraud. For that reason Backlinks Builder does not check against this method of link fraud. Luckily this is an easy one to check for manually.
Robots.txt link fraud
Using the robots.txt file a webmaster can essentially make search engines blind to certain pages, or even certain links. The good news is this is easy to identify, and there's no reason a webmaster would use this on exchanged or purchased links unless they were intentionally trying to prevent the link from being valued by search engines. Backlinks Builder does not check against robots.txt currently.
Page cloaking
This method is popular among dishonest webmasters. For our purposes, page cloaking involves server-side code that gives a search engine one page, while giving a normal user a different page. This is usually done by scanning the user-agent part of an HTTP header when a request for a webpage is made. Backlinks Builder detects page cloaking.
Internal page redirects
By using internal page redirects, a webmaster can essentially send the value of the link to an internal page, which then redirects to your page. Simply put, if the value of the page the webmaster puts the interal redirect link on is a 10, and the value of the page redirecting to yours is a 2, the most you can gain from the link is a 2 - and the odds that you'll gain nothing are good, because if a webmaster has gone to that much trouble they've probably also inserted a Disallow into their robots.txt file that keeps the redirecting page from being crawled. Using proper
linking strategy will prevent this problem.
The rel="nofollow" tag
This is a relatively new tag that can be inserted within an HTML link, and major search engines have publicly stated they will respect it. Basically the rel="nofollow" tag says "This link might be spam, do not count it towards that website's link popularity." It was devised as a method to counteract comment spam.,which is the automated spamming of a website's comment forms and guestbooks with irrelevant links to junk websites peddling all sorts of affiliate programs. Robots have been written (just like a search engine crawler) that will hop from site to site looking for a form. Whenever the robot finds one it spams the form with these links. Again, using a proper
linking strategy will prevent this problem.
How to do a manual check for worthless links
By using Backlinks Builder's comprehensive scanning ability and utilizing a smart link exchange policy, the field of available scams has been vastly narrowed down. The only things left to check for are robots.txt fraud and wrapping the link in style code to make it invisible.
Checking for robots.txt fraud
To perform this check, you will load up the website in your browser. When the website is loaded, add robots.txt to the end of the URL. For instance, if the website URL is http://www.example.com/, you would make it into http://www.example.com/robots.txt, and proceed to load that page. If there is a robots.txt file, it should load. You would see entries like: "Disallow: /directory" or "Disallow: http://www.example.com/page.html". This tells a search engine "Do not index anything in /directory" or "Do not index this page". If your link is contained on one of those pages, or within a page contained in one of those directories, it will not be counted by search engines. If a webmaster is REALLY sneaky, they could even employ page cloaking on the robots.txt file, so regular users looking at it would get a different version than search engines. This would be going to an extreme, but it's something to think about anyways. If you use Mozilla Firefox, you can install an extension called the User_agent switcher. This allows you to change the header information sent when you request a page. Put simply, it allows you to pretend you're a robot requesting the page, and you will get the content being served to robots if page cloaking is being employed.
Checking for hidden or obscured links
To perform this check, all you really need to do is load up the webpage in your browser and look for your link. If it's set to be the same color as the page background, you may have to highlight all the text on the page to find it. You can do this by pressing Ctrl + A, or by using the menu bar at the top of your browser (Edit >> Select All). It's also possible using CSS, Javascript, and other programming tricks to overlay one object or group of text on top of another. By viewing the source code and using Find (again via the edit menu), you can search for your link in the HTML source. If it showed up in the source and you couldn't see it when your browser displays the page, obviously it's being hidden or obscured by another object.
Successful link checking
You've learned all about the different methods used to discount links, and how to safeguard your link building efforts from falling victim. If you're using Backlinks Builder to automatically scan for problems, you're as well-equipped as you can be to perform successful link checking.