Hi.............
My "reading" of link exchanges with sites (having some synergy with your own) is that the value of link exchanges may be limited, but still have some merit.
I get a lot of requests for links exchanges - and have noticed a distinct trend:
(1) many request links to their sites, but the link they offer to post in return post is on a "directory" (that isn't directly accessible from their home page)
(2) Many requests also offer to post to a directory (that IS accessible from their home page) but has a completely different URL than their "base" web site.
(3) many requests are totally irrelevant - product/service wise to my site's visitors
I thought that for an exchange to have any merit at all (generally speaking):
(1) it should be directly relevant to your own site visitors
ie: my site is about cake/candy making - a link to someone selling shoes is a total waste, and may in fact be worse than that (?)
(2) links to directories are generally a waste of time - most of the ones I look at seem to exist just to "collect" links, have bad layouts, not logically put together, and I can't imagine myself (or anyone else) going there to find something - doesn't 90% of the world use MSN, google, yahoo (?)
(3) links should be directly accessible form the "swapees" [(if that's a word :- )] home page, and the actual url of the "swapees" link page should reflect the same web site - not something entirely different
ie: if I were to swap links with a site called: cakefrosting.com then their links page should be (something) like this: cakefrosting/links.htm
However, there seems to be such a trend (in a different direction, as described above) maybe I'm missing something?
Am I just out of date?? 
Any comments are really appreciated!
Thank you.
Megan posted this at 14:05 — 15th February 2007.
She has: 10,288 posts
Joined: Jun 1999
The points you made are all good. However, I think the key is that any link exchange must be useful for human visitors not just search engines.These sites are trying to links just for search and yes, they are out of date (very out of date!). Search engines are working on identifying non-natural links (exchanges included).
For me, I think of this in a broader sense - of creating a relationship with the other site. You can work together rather to some extent rather than completely on your own. You have to genuinely like each other. Not too many people seem to be interested in that kind of relationship.
See our thread here for more on link exchanges:
http://www.webmaster-forums.net/showthread.php?t=36458
Megan
My web design blog
demopaul posted this at 08:10 — 16th February 2007.
They have: 114 posts
Joined: Sep 2006
And making link exchanges useful for visitors is probably linking to sites useful for them.