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Page Rank and Linking

There is some confusion among the average webmaster over whether or not linking to other sites will hurt your Google Page Rank. Because a incoming link from another site with a high Page Rank will boost a site’s Page Rank, webmasters fear that by linking to other sites they will “give away” their Page Rank. If you link to another site, will you diminish your own site?

The short answer is: Not Normally.

In fact, it can actually help raise your Page Rank. Linking to other content-rich sites can help raise your Page Rank, if those sites are relevant to your own site. So go ahead and link to your references (not only is this good practice to avoid charges of plagiarism, but it encourages others to do the same for you.) You can even offer “further reading” links without fear of sending your own site into Google oblivion.

Link-Exchanges (where two sites agree to link to one another) also work well when both sites have similar concepts.

However, it can hurt you if you link to too many non-relevant sites or sites on Google’s blacklist. You don’t want to be a link farm (a site that has no real content, only links to other sites) and Google may penalize you if it thinks that you are “selling” links to other sites for the express purpose of raising those site’s Page Ranks.

That’s not to say that you can’t offer advertising on your site. In Google’s eyes, that’s not the same as providing links to a less well-known competitor for a fee.

If you are balancing out your out-going links with rich content, linking to other sites will not be detrimental to your Page Rank.

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