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Do Backlinks from Blackhat Gulch Work?

Updated on March 13, 2011

Backlinks From Blackhat

The quest for a good SEO backlink strategy finally landed me in Blackhat Gulch. How I arrived there is Goggle’s doing.

Google instructs us that it weighs its ranking system heavily toward backlinks. These backlinks help determine where your page lands and ranks in a Google search. Here’s Google’s logic:
If your site is packed with relevant content, tons of people will link to your site.

Ding-ding-ding! Wrong.

People working in the web trenches know that’s not true. The system can be scammed and spammed to land a useless and crappy web site on the first page of a Google search. We have example after example of Blackhat operators using backlink spamming tricks to gain instant Google credibility and page rank to earn cash.

The result is that Google has thrown us all in the same boat together, Blackhats, whitehats, greyhats and a zillion web page owners, paddling after backlinks, more backlinks, and still more and more backlinks.


Blackhat Gulch Built for Backlinks

This pursuit of backlinks has built Blackhat Gulch. Why?  Because people want easy solutions to earn backlinks.

The journey to Blackhat Gulch starts like this: You do your keyword research and then check out your competitors.

You discover OHMYGAWD!! my competitor for my keyword phrase is No. 1 on the page and he has 5,000 backlinks. How do I get 5,001 backlinks?

You recall the Google warning: Get “good” backlinks, not “bad” backlinks.

Blackhat Gulch Waits for Us

But you hear the wine, whiskey and song of the good life. The temptation is there.

Blackhat Gulch waits for us. Let’s ride in to see if there’s an easy way to get 5,001 backlinks.

Blackhat SEO has about 10 dozen definitions depending upon your like or dislike of Blackhats.

This one fits: Black Hat search engine optimization is defined as the use of unethical techniques to make your search rankings go up.

Let’s use that.


Scrapebox Built for Blackhat Gulch

After riding into Blackhat Gulch and looking around, I ran across a blackhat software contraption titled “ScrapeBox.” At the blackhat forums, the outlaws sitting around the SEO bar were extolling this trickery as a great way to generate thousands of backlinks to their web sites.

Apparently, you plug this software gizmo into your Blackhat computer and it spins out thousands of keyword targeted URLs where you can leave comments and earn backlinks. What’s so bad about that, you ask? From these URLs, you pick which blogs to submit comments. In turn, you earn a backlink.


A Spin and Spam Machine

Blackhat isn’t called Blackhat for no good reason. Here’s why. After the URLs get spit out, the Blackhat cranks up the old article spin and spam machine.

This spinning of comments allows a Blackhat to automatically generate hundreds or thousands of “unique” comments to the URLs harvested by Scrapebox. After the comments are spun, Scrapebox gives you the tool to spam thousands of blogs and sites.

This automation gives a Blackhat time to do other important work like stealing articles to paste into crappy blogs or web sites.

While there, I exercised one of my finer qualities: frugality. Yes, I’m cheap.

Crocodile Tears on Google

No way would I spend $97 on Scrapebox to see if it worked or how it worked. So instead, I opted to read what other people said about it.

First, I learned that spamming blogs for backlinks can get you banned from Google.

Deindexed.

Memorize that word, Blackhat rookies. You can hop over to the Google forum blogs and swim in a river of crocodile tears from all the tricksters who tried to spam and beat the master gamesmen at Google.


Deindexed Means No Money

In two words, deindexed means no money. No dollars. Zero cents. Your hub disappears. Poof! There one second, gone the next. No cash from people clicking Google ads on your hub. You might even get banned from Google and HubPages.

If you’re lucky and the Google wizards feel merciful, your site might get buried in the Google sandbox. The sandbox is web purgatory, where your site may or may not be resurrected one day if Google determines you’re contrite and have suffered enough.

Let’s look at the Blackhat spamming operation.

Spinning “Unique” Content

After you sift through these thousands of URLs, you next feed comments through spinning software. Spinners tumble your words in an effort to generate “unique “ comment.

After you “spin” your content, the paragraph above might look like this:

“This URL this thousands of you leads and after hitting with the body, you lead and the software which rotates obeyed the next comment. Spinner degradation " " where is only; Your word which creates a comment.”

(I “spun” the content by using Babel Fish, first translating the target paragraph from English to Korean and then from Korean back to English. I suppose you could make the above paragraph readable by editing for a few minutes, but I think it’s faster editing a paragraph manually, dropping in synonyms and adding or subtracting phrases and sentences as you go.)

Zombie Text

Here’s an example I pulled from a Blackhat forum of what the black art practitioners consider “good” spun comment to submit to hundreds of targeted blogs and web sites:

{Excellent|Great|Super|Outstanding|First-class|Top-notch|Cool|Awesome} {post|article|news|info|information|share|story} {indeed|it is actually|it is really|it is surely|it is without doubt|it is definitely}. {I have|I’ve|We have|We’ve|My boss has|My teacher has|My friend has|Friend on mine has|My girlfriend has|My father has|My mother has} been {looking|waiting|searching|seeking|awaiting} for this {information|info|content|tips|update}.

This, apparently, is the structure of spun content that’s submitted. It’s vague, general, non-specific, bland and tastes like pablum.

I don’t know what spinner software the “writer” of the above paragraph used, but he’s pleased as a clam with his zombie creation. The author claims this spun content will pass muster on moderated sites.

The Risk of Spun Content

Blackhats at the forum recommended targeting blogs that accept unmoderated comments. I’d think that’s a bit risky. Your comment could be mixed with other comments pushing porn sites, Nigerian scams and pump and dump stock swindles. Do you really want to be on a site where government investigators hang around?

Anyway, if you’re getting vague comments like the example above, you might be getting hit by spammers looking for link juice.

Your hub. Act accordingly.

Backlinks With No “Juice”

Scrapebox can also be used to load hundreds of “comments” on your blog to make it appear popular, important and relevant. How nice is that!!??! Must make other hard-working and legitimate bloggers feel great.

Users of these backlinking programs, including Linxboss, complained that many sites found by the program consisted of backlinks with little backlink juice, meaning a page rank of 0. Some of the URLs returned are stone-cold stupid.

Do a Google search for scrapebox. You’ll find web pages crammed with literally thousands of URLs returned from Scrapebox and the like, all free for your use.

I found URLs for Russian blogs like “Zoo Good.”  Then there’s a ton of 404s. A ton more of “not found.” A bunch of redirects for domain name sellers and dating sites. Pop-ups galore, too. Then there were sites on “Zombie Sharks, How to Get a Girl Exposed, They Got Babe Orgy and Drink Ourselves to Death.”


Waste of Time

I’d stay away from these scraped “blogs” if for no other reason that some number of them are probably diseased with viruses and malware.

Waste of time, were comments I saw. Scrapebox and other spam software did little to significantly move a page up in SERP. One person noted that the targeted page moved up just a few notches after all the work.

“All in all – a great idea – but poor quality sites makes it a no-go for me,” wrote one person.

Site Coding Errors

To be fair, some Blackhats found Scrapebox wonderful provided you used the “right” method. Where have we heard that before?  Some of these Blackhats are affiliate sellers for Scrapebox and similar spam software. So take the phrase “right method” with an appropriate measure of salt.

These URL generators also had a giant flaw in site coding errors. Errors would return telling the user that “sign-up box not found” or “URL not found.” That meant the user had to return to specific sites and fix each error message - “every flipping time I wanted to use it,” complained another user.

Beware of Retarded Blogs

Very few links returned, said people. So you may submit content for 200 links, but only 10% may be of any use because many of the blogs are “retarded.”

Retarded blogs? What’s that? Generally, they’re blogs with titles and posts that make no sense. They’re blogs crammed with keywords. The titles and comments aren’t logically connected. Finally, your anchor link is dumped at the end of the post, making even less sense.

No Easy Street at Blackhat Gulch

My visit to Blackhat Gulch convinced me that it’s better to do the work, write the comments or articles and know where and what types of backlinks you’ll get.

“Sometimes you have to forget about ‘automation’ and just blatantly do HARD WORK,  producing unique content and submitting it to quality sites,” wrote one visitor to Blackhat Gulch.

Scrapebox might have value to locate URLs with keywords you want to target. On the other hand, a Google search for blogs and sites with the keywords you’re targeting might prove just as fruitful - and it’s free.


Don’t Waste Time and Money

In the end, my ride into Blackhat Gulch for backlinks convinced me of this:

1) Don’t use a tool of questionable value to find junk sites to spam with spun content in order to get backlinks.

2) Sometimes, automation is a waste of time and money.

What’s that word you need to remember?

Deindexed.

working

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