Do you feel like most backlinks are paid?

[Jason]

They're not supposed to be. Well, Google, and other search engines also probably, punish paid links with low rankings. Anyway, a big problem with spotting paid backlinks is maybe the sheer difficulty, but I don't think that's the case. In fact, I don't think most backlinks are paid, cause I think it would be found out. Do you all agree? What have you observed?

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I think a lot of them are paid in not so obvious ways.

I sell sponsored content on my blog. It includes do-follow links for the buyer. However, I'm super picky about who I sell it to. I reject 9 out of 10 requests even if that means I lose a good financial opportunity.

It has to be relevant. It has to be high-quality. It has to be valuable.

Or it doesn't get on my blog...

 

[Joeychgo]

Well, I have many thousands of backlinks, including one from the NY Times, and I have paid for zero of them.

 

[Shortie]

I believe that many backlinks are paid even though it is not made obvious at all.

I do know that search engines penalize for paid backlinks as I believe it is a form of what they call Black Hat SEO.

 

[cpvr]

Well, I have many thousands of backlinks, including one from the NY Times, and I have paid for zero of them.

Same here. I don’t see a point of spending a dime on a backlink that I can get for free and more than likely of better quality. I have links from various social media sites, other related websites and various other websites. I’ll continue to build backlinks the organic and cheap way.

 

[Jason]

Ideally, backlinks should come from other sites because the sites find your site awesome. However, of course, ha ha, that's a really powerful feat to obtain.

 

[cpvr]

Ideally, backlinks should come from other sites because the sites find your site awesome. However, of course, ha ha, that's a really powerful feat to obtain.

It’s not that hard if you’re building them on social media. You can easily build them on tumblr, quora, reddit and twitter.

 

[Tracy]

What is a backlink?

 

[cpvr]

What is a backlink?

It’s a pebble to a rock.