Five-Page Test Shows Pure Spam Backlinks Pushed Page-4 URLs Up Two SERP Pages

Why would pure spam backlinks still move pages if Google is reportedly shifting toward "linkless" ranking graphs?

Kyle Roof reports that a five-page field test by fellow SEO Martin contradicted industry claims from late last year that links no longer matter after raw spam blasts pushed page-4 URLs up two full SERP pages.

Martin took five test pages — URLs one, two, and three sitting completely unranked, and URLs four and five on page 4 for their target terms — and blasted the entire set with "the grossest links you can imagine" to see how the spammiest backlinks would register.

Specific link-building tools and exact link volumes are not disclosed.

Rather than discounting or nullifying the low-tier link signals, Google's algorithm rewarded every page in the batch: all three unranked URLs entered active rankings, while both page-4 URLs jumped two full pages to page 2.