Ranking on the first page of search engines is no longer a walk in the park. With competition from an ever increasing amount of ads and other distractions at an all-time high, building organic authority takes time, significant resources, and patience. Because of this high barrier to entry, many site owners and SEO specialists look for shortcuts to bypass the “grind” of natural growth.
One of the most powerful and under used shortcuts in the industry is the use of Private Blog Networks (PBNs).
In this guide, we will break down what PBNs are, the role of expired domains, why they are used, and the significant risks that must be avoided in this not so white-hat strategy.
What is a Private Blog Network (PBN)?
A Private Blog Network (PBN) is a collection of websites created for one specific purpose: to link back to a primary website, known as the “money site.”
The logic is simple. Search engines view backlinks as votes of confidence. By creating a network of sites that you control, you can artificially manufacture these “votes” to pass “link juice” (authority) to your money site, boosting its position in search results.
While this sounds like a clever workaround, it is important to note that PBNs strictly violate Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. It is considered a link scheme intended to manipulate PageRank.
The Role of Expired Domains
You cannot simply register 10 new domains and expect a PBN to work immediately. New domains have zero authority. To get around this, PBN builders utilize expired domains.
These are domains that were previously owned, built up authority and backlinks, and then were allowed to expire. By purchasing these domains, SEOs “inherit” the existing backlink profile and authority.
Tools like Domain Hunter Gatherer are often essential in this process. They allow users to scrape the web and auction houses to find high-metric expired domains that already have trust flow and authority, saving the PBN builder years of link-building effort.
How PBNs Work
The mechanics of a PBN are designed to trick search engines into thinking the links are organic.
- Acquisition: The owner finds expired domains (often using tools like Domain Hunter Gatherer) that have good metrics.
- Content Creation: Content is posted to these domains. To avoid detection, the content is usually niche-relevant to the money site and written to look like a legitimate blog.
- Hosting & Footprints: To prevent Google from connecting the dots, PBN owners use different hosting providers and unique IP addresses for every site in the network. If all sites shared the same IP, Google’s algorithm would instantly flag the network.
Why Do People Still Use PBNs?
Despite some risk, PBNs remain popular in certain SEO circles. Here is why:
- Control Over Links: unlike legitimate outreach where you have to beg for a link, a PBN gives you total control. You choose the exact anchor text and the exact page the link points to.
- Quick Results: Because you are leveraging the accumulated power of expired domains, PBNs can move the needle in SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) much faster than white-hat outreach.
- Cost-Effectiveness: Compared to high-end PR campaigns or paid advertising, building a network can sometimes be cheaper in the long run—provided the network isn’t caught.
- Competitive Advantage: In cut-throat niches, a PBN can provide the extra “juice” needed to outrank competitors who are relying solely on standard SEO practices.
- Relative Safety: Much is made about the potential risks with using PBNs but if you are setting everything out with a veiw to remove potential footprints, they can be very safe and even bring in their own passive income while boosting your main money sites.
The Risks: Are PBNs Dangerous?
While the rewards can be high, in the worst case, the risks are equally severe. PBNs are a violation of Google’s terms, and the search giant is constantly updating its algorithms to detect them.
Much of the warnings of PBN use is overblown and when done considerately, the PBN sites will just look like a regular website with content. You are just building out websites and putting a couple of links on them, it is hardly hacking or anything immoral.
With that said, it is important to note the potential risks
1. Google Penalties and Deindexing
If Google identifies your network, the consequences are immediate. Your money site may receive a manual penalty, plummeting in rankings, or be deindexed (removed from Google) entirely.
2. Ignored Links
Sometimes Google doesn’t penalize the site but simply “neutralizes” the links. The algorithm recognizes the unnatural pattern and decides to ignore the link equity. In this scenario, you haven’t lost your rankings, but you have lost your entire investment of time and money in building the network.
3. Ethical and Reputation Costs
Using black-hat tactics compromises the integrity of your digital presence. If you are building a brand for the long term, relying on manipulated signals puts your business on a shaky foundation.
Mitigating Risks of a PBN
If you decide to proceed with a PBN, the only way to safeguard your network is to eliminate any “footprints” that could identify you as the single owner of multiple sites. This requires a strict commitment to diversification. The golden rule is simple: no two sites in your network should look like they are owned by the same person. If Google’s algorithm detects a pattern—whether it’s in the server settings, the design code, or the registration details—it can pull the thread that unravels the entire network.
To achieve this, you must vary every technical and visual element. This starts at the foundation: use different domain registrars for your URLs and ensure every site is on a unique hosting provider with distinct IP addresses. On-site, avoid using the same CMS setup, theme, or template across the network; if one site uses a standard WordPress layout, another should look like a custom HTML blog or use a different platform entirely. Even your monetization needs to be siloed; while you can monetize these sites to recoup costs, never use the same AdSense or affiliate account ID across the network, as a shared financial footprint is the fastest way to get caught.
Commonly Overlooked Footprints (The “Forgot-to-Change” List) Even careful SEOs often get caught because they forget to scrub these specific details:
Image Metadata: Strip EXIF data from images before uploading them, or use different sources so you aren’t using the same camera/software signature.
DNS & SOA Records: Many people change the IP but forget the “Start of Authority” (SOA) record in their DNS settings, which often contains the owner’s email address by default.
Analytics & Verification Codes: Never use the same Google Analytics ID (UA/G- codes), Search Console verification tag, or Facebook Pixel on multiple PBN sites.
Legal Page Boilerplate: Do not copy-paste the exact same “Privacy Policy” or “Terms of Service” text across all sites; generate unique legal pages for each.
Plugin Stacks: If every site on your network has the exact same five plugins installed (e.g., Yoast, Akismet, Contact Form 7), it creates a recognizable software fingerprint.
Username Patterns: Avoid using “admin” or your own name as the author. Create distinct author personas with unique bios and stock photos for every site.
Permalinks & URL Structure: Vary your URL structure (e.g., use /post-name/ on one site and /2024/category/post-name/ on another).
Content System: Most sites use something like WordPress but that doesn’t mean that it’s a good idea to base all of your PBN websites on it. You can even use AI to create entirely unique sites from simple prompts now, we don’t need wordpress for everything anymore.
Common Myths About PBNs
There is a lot of misinformation regarding private networks. Let’s debunk a few common myths:
- Myth: PBNs are undetectable.
- False: A lot of the PBNs that sell backlinks are quite detectable and it is likely these will not last forever. If you plan your PBN out correctly you should be able to stay under the radar
- Myth: PBN links don’t work.
- False: They do work, and very well too. That is why people use them. A good PBN will be used privately and appear like genuine websites, these are one of the most powerful ranking signals
- Myth: Any group of interlinked sites is a PBN.
- False: legitimate media companies often own multiple sites that cross-link (e.g., Disney linking to ESPN). The difference is the intent to manipulate rankings versus legitimate branding.
How to Spot a PBN (Footprints)
Expert SEOs try to hide these, but here are the common signs of a Private Blog Network:
- Identical WHOIS Data: Multiple domains registered to the same person on the same day.
- Hosting Overlap: Multiple sites hosted on the same IP subnet.
- Thin Content: Articles that exist solely to house a link, offering no real value to a human reader.
- Link Patterns: An unnatural amount of exact-match anchor text pointing to the same money site.
White-Hat Alternatives: The Sustainable Path
If you want to sleep well at night and build an asset that grows in value over time, consider these ethical alternatives:
- Guest Blogging: Write high-quality content for real websites in your niche.
- Digital PR & Outreach: Connect with journalists and bloggers to earn links through valuable contributions.
- Resource Pages: Create a resource so good that other industry sites naturally want to link to it.
The above methods are great for long term ranking benefits. If I were building out a PBN, I would still be utilising other more white hat methods as well as this will help to round out your backlink profile and will be more sustainable for the long term.
What If Your Site Has PBN Links?
If you conduct a backlink audit (using tools like Ahrefs or Semrush) and find suspicious PBN links pointing to your site from low quality websites that you didn’t ask for:
- Contact the Webmaster: Ask for the link to be removed.
- Use the Disavow Tool: If you cannot get the links removed and you believe they are harming you (or you have received a manual action), you can submit a disavow file to Google.
- Note: Use the disavow tool with extreme caution. It should generally be reserved for cases where you have a manual penalty or a massive influx of spam attacks.
The above are good steps if the links are definitely damaging your reputation but Google is pretty good as automatically disavowing bad links and will, most of the time, just ignore them.
Final Thoughts
PBNs utilize the power of expired domains to manipulate rankings. While they offer speed and control, they carry the heavy risk of penalties that can destroy a business overnight. For long-term viability, focusing on high-quality content and genuine relationship-based link building is always the superior strategy.
We have painstakingly built a PBN Guide series of videos on our Domain Hunter Gatherer Youtube channel. These are a great series of videos that will explain everything you need to know to start building your first PBN, with full examples on how I find expired domains for using in a PBN, right through to checking a domain is usable and clean and even extending to recovering the old website content and moving forward from there. There isn’t a guide that is as in depth as that, going step by step and showing exactly how I do everything.
We also post our video guides to our expired domain video guides page, you should check that out.