In the Google Hangout from earlier this week, John Mueller filled us up with yes and nos to is this a ranking factor or not, hence all the stories here covering that hangout. At the 19 minute 53 second mark into the video, John said that external links, links on your web site that point to outside web sites (or outbound links) are not a ranking signal.

Just to be clear, links are a ranking factor – but you linking out to other sites doesn’t help you rank better.

He said the content you use for the link anchor, is content, and content is a ranking signal. But the link itself is not a ranking factor.

The question:

The answer:

Here is the video embed at the start time:

We covered this exact topic several months ago over here but this time it is a bit more of a concrete answer.

Forum discussion at Google+.