In this transcript from Episode 046, Mark discusses his plans for building affiliate sites in 2013, reviews two affiliate marketing courses, and provides a detailed answer to a listener question about link building strategy in the post-Penguin era.
What You'll Learn in This Episode
- What kinds of backlinks still work after Google's Penguin update
- What authority links are and how to get them
- The recommended anchor text percentage mix for safe link building
- Why low-end spammy link building stopped working
Episode Summary
Mark opens with an update on two affiliate marketing courses he has been evaluating. He plans to build 10 to 20 new affiliate sites in 2013 and track the results publicly, sharing statistics for each site without revealing exact niches.
He also gives a shout-out to Tim at The Awesome Podcast, where Mark appeared as a guest in episode 8, and shares his enthusiasm for the Steve Jobs biography on Audible.
Link Building in the Post-Penguin Era
The core of this episode is Mark's response to listener Chuck Brown, who asked three questions: what kinds of links are working, what anchor text percentages to use, and what authority links are.
What Stopped Working
Mark explains that the spammy link building tactics that once worked, including article marketing, link networks, and mass directory submissions, are no longer effective. His own data from sites built in the prior year confirms that low-quality PR0 links pointed directly at money sites are not producing results in the post-Panda, post-Penguin landscape.
What Authority Links Are
An authority link is a contextual link within the body of a post on a reputable, high-domain-authority site in a related niche. Contextual links carry the most weight because the linking site is essentially citing your work. Both domain authority and page authority factor into link value. The ideal authority link comes from a good page on a good website in a related niche.
Three Ways to Get Authority Links
- Buy them. Mark notes that people regularly offer to pay him for links on his site. He declines and does not recommend this approach.
- Create outstanding content that earns natural links from authoritative bloggers. This is difficult but legitimate.
- Guest posting. Write an excellent article and get an authoritative blogger to publish it. Despite being talked about less, guest posting remains effective. The more authoritative the target blog, the harder it is to land a placement.
The Tiered Link Building Strategy
For building multiple affiliate sites at scale, Mark describes the tiered approach popularized by Pat Flynn's backlinking strategy post. Create five or so subsidiary properties on high-authority platforms with four to five unique articles each. These properties link back to your money site. Then drive large volumes of backlinks into these subsidiary properties, which can absorb those links without penalty because they already have millions of backlinks in their profile. The link juice passes through to your money site.
Social bookmarking and other indexing tactics ensure Google discovers the links to your subsidiary properties.
Anchor Text Mix
Mark keeps exact-match keyword anchor text well under 20 percent of his link profile. The remainder includes LSI keywords (synonyms and related terms), natural language phrases like “click here” and “check this out,” and bare naked URLs at no more than 20 percent. The key insight: Google's Penguin update penalizes over-optimization, which means sites with less aggressive anchor text optimization actually rank more easily now.
Key Takeaways
- Spammy, low-quality link building directed at money sites no longer works after Penguin
- Authority links are contextual links from reputable, related sites with high domain authority
- Guest posting remains one of the most effective ways to earn authority links
- Keep exact-match anchor text below 20 percent of your link profile
- Tiered link building through subsidiary properties on high-authority platforms insulates your money site
What's Changed Since This Episode
Mark recorded this in February 2013. Link building has continued to evolve dramatically.
Tiered link building and link wheels have become riskier. Google's algorithms have grown far more sophisticated at detecting artificial link patterns. The subsidiary property strategy Mark describes, using platforms like Squidoo and WordPress.com, has been largely abandoned. Squidoo itself was absorbed into HubPages in 2014. Modern SEO focuses on earning editorial links through genuinely valuable content, digital PR, and relationship building.
Guest posting evolved and then faced its own crackdown. Google's Matt Cutts declared the “decay and fall of guest blogging for SEO” in 2014. While genuine guest contributions on authoritative sites remain valuable, mass guest posting for links is now treated as a link scheme.
Link building has shifted toward content-driven strategies. Creating linkable assets, original research, comprehensive guides, free tools, and data-driven studies are the primary modern approaches. Digital PR and HARO-style journalist outreach have replaced manual link building at scale.
Anchor text diversity remains important but the specific ratios have become less formulaic. Google's understanding of natural link profiles has matured. The best approach is to let anchor text occur naturally rather than engineering specific percentages.
Resources Mentioned
Listen and Subscribe
Listen to Late Night Internet Marketing on Apple Podcasts or subscribe at latenightim.com/internet-marketing-podcast/.
