Matt Cutts Video Transcript on '301 Redirects'

M.Harris from New York asks: "does anchor text carry through all 301 redirects? Will there be a penalty for sites that do this as their only way of link building?"

Typically anchor text does flow through a 301 redirect. We do not promise the site will always happen.

So the question is does it carry through all? Not necessarily. We reserve the right to score not only links but the trust for links and also the trust that we have for redirects.

I can tell you that if you're so old method of link building is trying to get 301 redirects that is going to be pretty conspicuous. Because, we log all of the redirects that we receive just like we log all of the links that we receive. And so if all of your incoming anchor text is through 301 redirects that is going to appear pretty strange. Especially because whenever we go looking through our tools that would be a pretty abnormal thing to do.

So my advice is make a great site that attracts links naturally because it uses a fantastic resource and don't worry about "ah should I try to get some page ranked or get some anchor text in some way that search engines might not be able to catch or that other people might not be able to follow"... because if you give organic long terms sort of links that are given freely because you have a great resource and those are the links that typically last and have the most impact.