Last month, Google put out a Webmaster Help video about guest blogging, and its effects on links. Now, Matt Cutts (who discussed the topic in that video) has appeared in another related video. This time, he responds to the following question:

Currently, guest blogging is the favorite activity of webmasters for link acquisition. Due to its easy nature, lots of spammy activities are going on like article spinning etc. Is Google going to hammer websites for links acquired by guest blogging?

“It’s funny, because I did a video – another video recently about guest blogging, and it was sort of like saying, ‘Well, can’t it be an okay activity?’ and I was sort of saying, ‘Well, if you get a really high quality blogger it can, but this is the flip side,” he says. “And I want to sort of specifically address it as well. If you were doing so many guest blogs that you’re doing article spinning, and likewise, if you’re allowing so many guest bloggers that you allow things like spun blogs, where people aren’t really writing real content of their own, then that is a pretty bad indicator of quality.”

“If your website links to sites that we consider low quality or spammy, that can affect your site’s reputation, so the short answer is yes,” says Cutts. “Google is willing to take action if we see spammy or low quality blogging, guest blogging, whatever you want to call it. It’s basically just placing low quality articles on the site. And so, I would be cautious about using that as a primary link acquisition strategy, and if you have a website where you’ll just let anybody post, probably the kinds of links that you get embedded in those articles, as a result, might affect your site’s reputation. So, do think about that.”

See Matt’s previous video on the topic here.