# Link scheme

Category: [Link Building & Off-Page](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/category/link-building-off-page/) › [Link spam & risks](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/category/link-building-off-page/link-spam-risks/) · Also known as: Link Scheme

A **link scheme** is a pattern for creating links mainly to influence search rankings. Google's current documentation uses the term link spam for this, and defines it as creating links to or from a site primarily to manipulate search rankings.

## What counts as a link scheme?

Google's spam policy names examples such as these.

- buying or selling links for ranking purposes, including money, goods or services in exchange for links
- excessive link exchanges, for example "link to me and I'll link to you"
- links created with automated programs
- paid advertorials or native ads with links
- widgets spread across many sites with keyword-rich or hidden links
- forum comments and signatures with optimized links

Advertising and paid placements are allowed when the link is qualified with `rel="sponsored"` or `rel="nofollow"`.

## Example

A company sets up five blogs that only link to its product pages, all with the same anchor text. That is a typical link scheme. A three-way exchange, where site A links to B, B to C and C to A, is a variant meant to hide the reciprocity.

## Related terms

- [Link spam](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/link-spam/index.md)
- [Link building](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/link-building/index.md)
- [Link exchange](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/link-exchange/index.md)
- [Buying links](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/buying-links/index.md)
- [Link farm](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/link-farm/index.md)
- [Private blog network (PBN)](https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/private-blog-network/index.md)

## Sources

- [Spam policies for Google web search (link spam) – Google Search Central](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/essentials/spam-policies)
- [Qualify your outbound links to Google – Google Search Central](https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/qualify-outbound-links)

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Last updated: October 7, 2026
URL: https://seo-geo-glossary.com/en/glossary/link-scheme/