In February, Google famously punished Overstock.com for being too good at link building. Seriously. Overstock provided educational discounts for students and faculty. These higher ed institutions, with fabulous PR (pagerank) scores linked to Overstock, making Overstock’s site go link crazy in value. Which Google didn’t like.
Let’s be clear here. Google can do whatever they want. It’s in Google’ best interest that their users be able to quickly find the best information/provider they need. So, Overstock.com ranking high for…everything…wasn’t good for business. So, they got slapped. But as of today, they are out of the penalty box, and free to resume being link smart once again.