Hopefully by now you've come to the realization that the more links you have pointing to your website the higher it will be positioned on search engines. Getting links (or earning them) however is a time consuming and often complicated and costly undertaking - even for the most noteworthy professionals.

Having an SEO strategy is clearly important - despite the fact that Google and others frown upon any manipulation to improve rankings. SEO (just like running a business) requires some trial and error, meaning you'll need to experiment some if you intend to move up the search return lists and ultimately turn a profit. The result of relying on links as the determing factor is that search engines have forced many website owners to pursue links at any cost. One of those tactics gaining in attention is three-way linking.

Three way linking is a back link acquisition method. If you have two websites that want to share links and they directly link to each other, search engines may cancel out some or all of the page ranking power (two way linking: A->B and B->A - so it clearly looks like a reciprocal link.) But by linking three sites (A->B and B->C and C->A)  you can avoid direct reciprocal back links (and the supposed penalties that go along with it) and ensure all three sites are getting a link even though no site links back to the site that linked to it.

Here's the question - do you leverage a three-way linking strategy? If yes, do you fear you might receive a penalty (or have you already)? And if no, will you consider it in the future? Please share your thoughts with other Website Magazine readers in the forum now. Continue to the forum to discuss three-way linking...