Buying text link's to websites

[frank]

Do people actually do this in the UK ? I know it worth money in the USA and people are mad for it but what about here ?

And if so what would be an average figure for the following 1 way link from a site with the following page rankings ?

PR5
PR6
PR7
PR8
PR9

Thanks
Frank

[andrew1810]

I've sold a couple of links from one of my PR4 sites before and was offered $30 for each link (which of course I accepted)

Hope this helps a little

[frank]

Hi Andrew,

Was that a $30 one off charge or per month ?

I have heard that you can charge a figure per month for keeping a link on your site ?

[MarkPearson]

I have used text link ads many times, great for seo.

http://www.text-link-ads.com/?ref=44904

they also have a UK websites section

[frank]

I have used text link ads many times, great for seo.

http://www.text-link-ads.com/?ref=44904

they also have a UK websites section

Thanks for that Mark, I will probably use them actually !

One question, I notice that the link you gave me was an affiliate link. Now I have nothing against this at all, and will use your link if I choose to go with them as I know how important affiliate links are as I am an affiliate enterpenur lol

Just one question I have for you which is off topic - Do you make much money through being an affiliate for this company ? pm me if you would prefer to talk that way, as I have been looking for a site that will enable me to offer links / sell links as an affiliate, so you have helped me out in a different way so thanks for that !

Frank

[MarkPearson]

Hi Frank,

Firstly, I highly recommend text link ads, they are the best company I have found for that kind of purchase.

I have spent a small fortune myself with them buying text links as its partially the key to great search engine rankings.

I sell on many of my websites text links via the text links ads program.

I recommend them to a lot of people and do make some good commission from them.

I would not recommend them here to mostly people I know or people who know me if I did not think they are worth looking at.

[andrew1810]

Hi Andrew,

Was that a $30 one off charge or per month ?

I have heard that you can charge a figure per month for keeping a link on your site ?

Just a one-off fee, seemed ok to me considering it was an old website I haven't updated in about 4 years!

[The Printed Bag Shop]

What are text link ads ?

[temi]

Text link ads is good, used to be quite cheap, the company was recently sold, the new owners seem to have doubled the prices of links. You can also use other sites such as textlinkadsmarketplace.ukwebmasterworld.com , you can buy or sell links for free.

[An Oasis]

Or have a look on Digital Point forum loads of link sales going on there along with some interesting banter about...

[linkspub]

Actually any type of advertising for your site will help you. Marketing is a never ending process for any business.

When it comes to internet businesses and websites, the only way people and search engines know u exist is by links.

A site with no links to it will never be found to anybody other from someone who knows the url.

Links just like television ads, banner ads or any type of media advertising, sort of seep in slowly.

Take Wordpress for example. People visiting Wordpress Blogs, see the tiny little link to Wordpress in the sidebar or footer. After seeing it many, many times, on many different sites, it sort of makes it's place in the subconcious mind.

[3rigena]

I just sold 3 text links for 6 months for 1015$
easy money if you are in the right area.

[Little Nut Tree]

Currently being banished to the sandbox and now pretty tooled up on search engines after having read all the googlehead blogs, I personally would not buy into any text-link schemes or directories, unless I felt a site was directly relevant to my products.

I think you its throwing money away and in the longer term, doing more harm than good. :)

Cheers
Richard

[lyonssolutions]

Whenever you are buying a link please make sure that the link is relevant to your website. If you have a computer shop and have a link from a butcher it will be worth nothing ;)

[An Oasis]

Absolutely thank you

This subject drives me mad, think out of the box people buying links is dumb there are many ways to get to the same point... buying links is just dumb. Worst still the SE's are trying to target bought links. :eek:

[RayB]

I would very strongly recommend that:

1. If you have or are considering buying text link ads for Pagerank - STOP!

2. If you have or are considering selling text link ads to assist a websites Pagerank - STOP!

Matt Cutts - who is the head of anti-spam at Google has this week posted on his blog (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/how-to-report-paid-links/) that Google is actively working to neutralise the artificial benefits of buying links for pagreank which is simply "gaming" the Seach Engines.

If you have got a spare 3 or 4 hours you might want to read all the posts on this thread! You heard it here first.............

You have been warned :)

[RayB]

Hi Richard,

Did you submit to Yahoo and DMOZ - this is actually suggested on the Google Webmaster Guidelines (http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769)- straight from the horses mouth! Agree - DON'T BUY TEXT LINKS :eek:

Currently being banished to the sandbox and now pretty tooled up on search engines after having read all the googlehead blogs, I personally would not buy into any text-link schemes or directories, unless I felt a site was directly relevant to my products.

I think you its throwing money away and in the longer term, doing more harm than good. :)

Cheers
Richard

[welshnoonoo]

What are text link ads ?

Text Ad links are pieces of text that are clickable links pointing to a 3rd party website using a specific phrase which are then displayed on your website for a fee.

So for example, if you were trying to climb search engines for the terms "printed bag" - your text link would be printed bag (http://nosuchdomain.co.uk)

Hope that helps!

[An Oasis]

1. If you have or are considering buying text link ads for Pagerank - STOP!

2. If you have or are considering selling text link ads to assist a websites Pagerank - STOP!


Woooooooowa there boy!

I think there is a lot of smoke and mirrors with this story as there are with many of MC little snippets.

Consider this, two smallish companies produce the following products:

Askismet – spam filter for blogs, activate it it’s 99.99% accurate
Mailwasher – email filter, a little training and it is hot to trot

Google – the worlds largest search company + largest database + largest snooping capacity…, they can’t spot paid links!!!!! NO sorry I don’t buy into this one. There is a hidden agenda here. :mad:

[superman]

I am quite interested in text links, I have worked for companies before who use affiliate window and similar affiliate programs very successfully.

I had a look at http://www.text-link-ads.com/?ref=44904 (http://www.text-link-ads.com/?ref=44904) but it was an American company is there a British equivalent?

We just want more traffic to our website, we use PPC etc but also want to investigate other sources…

[Tin]

It's inevitable that text links will, at a point in the not too distant future cease to be relied upon to the degree Google and other engines place on them currently because of clear and obvious abuse.

In 2003 it took just 32 external text links to get George Bush's Biography site to rank at #1 on Google for the keywords;
miserable failure & failure which really highlighted how easy it was to "influence" Google data. It's been widely known for a very long time that links assist rankings, links can be bought and it just boils down to the depth of a pocket at the end of the day. Everyone knowns about it and so does Google, which is why it's been above radar at GooglePlex for years.

PR went the same way. Cracking idea at the time until Google realised shortly afterwards that PR too bore an un-healthy relationship between rankings and the depth of an individuals pocket which forced Google to look into ways of identifying sites believed to be blatantly selling PR for the sole purpose of artificially inflating other site rankings.

It's not just organic listings they've been looking at in detail, since last July they've been hammering away nicely at Adwords abusers.

At the end of the day, sites that are 'solely' reliant upon links for their rankings may be in for a surprise.

My 2 cents worth.http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/images/icons/icon7.gif

[RayB]

I agree with Tin,

I see PR9 ranked pages selling links via the known brokers for $2500 A MONTH at the moment. This is blatant gaming of SE's and I guess very easy for them to detect these days.

Thats expensive, especially for a link that won't count soon.

Better to spend your money on strict white hat SEO in the long term in my opinion - but hey, what do I know - spend your money as you see fit :)

[SteveGibson]

Some interesting comments from Ray B and Tin.

While I'm no SEO and I can't say what google are doing with their algo, from a business/marketing strategy perspective, it seems to me that the Google empire will stand or fall on their ability to continue to provide the highest quality and most relevant set of results.

an un-healthy relationship between rankings and the depth of an individuals pocket

Fortunately (for google users like me), Google's search engine pockets are deeper than anyone else's.

So, I know who'll end up on top in this fight.

And my guess - and remember I don't know the SEO industry - is that the future of SEO won't be artificial linking strategies, it'll be aligning with google's goals and suplying the sort of on-page content google wants to share with their users.

(or, at least, what "looks" to their bots like "quality content")

Just my 2p, feel free to disagree.

Steve

[RayB]

Woooooooowa there boy!



Hi Richard - ok then!

[An Oasis]

Hey Ray ;)

Further thoughts

The move is unethical, let's just take on example paid listings in directories. Anyone who runs a business of that kind has just lost a company and all their employees are looking for jobs.

Devalue links sure but G are also asking for people to report paid links, if they can't detect paid links I'm a pink fairy.


Q. What's the difference between paid links and using Adwords?
A. Google would rather you did the later.

My 1/2p

[An Oasis]

Big thread here (http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/3313974-6-30.htm)

[mattk]

Yes, I do buy text links.

Yes, I do think they are value for money, both in driving traffic and in gaining "reputation" for your site.

Yes, I have seen what I consider to be a direct improvement in search engine rankings due to links that I have bought.

Personally, I buy my links from the forums at DigitalPoint (http://forums.digitalpoint.com/forumdisplay.php?f=58). There are some very imaginative people on there selling links in very ingenious ways. If you are thinking about buying links for your site I'd suggest you start off with some low costs links, learn what seems to work for your site and build from there. Now is also an idea time to buy, as most people sell in $s and the exchange rate makes them excellent value for money.

Just my 2p!

[RayB]

There are some very imaginative people on there selling links in very ingenious ways.

Yep Google will never rumble these "ingenious methods" - unless it crawls those pages :eek:

Might as well walk up and down outside Google HQ wearing a sandwich board saying "links for sale here" :D

[SteveGibson]

since last July they've been hammering away nicely at Adwords abusers.

My take on the changes to adwords (the so-called "googleslap"s) is that Google realised the dangers of poor quality post-click content.

If people kept clicking on PPC ads and ended up at spammy, poor-value sites or kept getting the same page via different ads (because of multiple affiliates), they'd start to become innoculated against the paid listings.

And this would slash Google's PPC income.

So, they took a long term view and decided that the RH side of the page should offer a similar quality and relevance to the organic listings on the left.

I think it was a smart move and will make google a lot of money in the long-term.

Steve

[Tin]

Might as well walk up and down outside Google HQ wearing a sandwich board saying "links for sale here" :D

I think that'd work wonders for you Ray as long as the colour of your sandwich board isn't the same colour as your suit, Google may see it as sandwich board spamming!:D

Ray

[RayB]

Google may see it as sandwich board spamming!:D

Ray

Do they still make Spam - I used to like Spam sandwiches when I was a kid. It comes in "Tins" too :D

[Calypso]

What are text link ads ?

saved me asking, thanks.

Dean

[Tin]

I used to like Spam sandwiches when I was a kid. It comes in "Tins" too :D

Nice one Ray:D:D

[Aspect Investments]

Google wants to take over the world.

They are totally obsessed with making money.

They are putting more and more restrictions on organic results to encourage more people to use adwords.

If Google had its way it would make its entire search facility adwords.

This is their ultimate goal in my opinion.

[JustOneUK]

Google wants to take over the world.

They are totally obsessed with making money.

They are putting more and more restrictions on organic results to encourage more people to use adwords.

If Google had its way it would make its entire search facility adwords.

This is their ultimate goal in my opinion.

I agree.

I am already in the process of removing the promotion of adwords from my sites.

If Google wants to bite the hand of those who feed it, so be it. :)

I don't think they can possibly stop searchengine manipulation or the sale of links for SE improvement. They have to rank sites SOMEHOW. They can't possibly switch to content only and that just makes spam inevitable and we are back to the old days of text stuffing. The only reason they would try to indroduce changes would be to try and further increase thier sales of adwords, as if they were the only place to advertise on the entire web.

It could open the opportunity for Yahoo to become the no1 search engine..... if only they could get their bloody finger out and get their publisher network worldwide. No wonder they announce 11% decrease of revenue this quarter. :|

[Aspect Investments]

It could open the opportunity for Yahoo to become the no1 search engine..... if only they could get their bloody finger out and get their publisher network worldwide. No wonder they announce 11% decrease of revenue this quarter. :|

I do think that there is the possibility of another search engine taking over from Google. It would have to be a brand new one though, something a little different that catches on quickly.

Googles success was built on the fact that it was a no frills, no ads, relevant search engine. That is not the case anymore, and the door is open for another one to step in.

This is why google is buying up the world and launching different products, because they know that their time as the top search engine may not last.

[JustOneUK]

It will be hard because there are a lot of webmasters to convince.
Obviously ranking well on Google is the priority at the moment, changing that will be hard.

http://search.yahoo.com/

http://uk.search.yahoo.com/

[RayB]

I think this is getting a bit harsh on Google. There is a lot of hysteria in the web community at the moment - all Google is trying to do is eliminate as far as possible the SE gaming and slewing of results by buying links for Pagerank.

I have seen a PR9 homepage link for sale @ $2500 per month.

If I had deep pockets and bought it - and it blew an honest webmaster out of the water - is that fair? No!

So - I think what thet are doing is great.

Lets have SERPS more honestly earned and level the playing field.

[JustOneUK]

I have seen a PR9 homepage link for sale @ $2500 per month.

If I had deep pockets and bought it - and it blew an honest webmaster out of the water - is that fair? No!
.

Of course it's fair, if you have deep pockets you can rank no1 on adwords by paying the most per click. It's the same. They don't give it to you for nothing! want to be no1 for the term Property?, pay Google. :|

I have seen advertising space on The Times that costs a lot (PR9), or there is always your local paper (PR1)! :)

Every website is like a small newspaper, and you should be entitled to make money as you see fit.

[Aspect Investments]

I dont think buying links from a page rank 9 site will help you rank number 1 on google

Buying high pr links is only a benefit if you have a high pr site. For example if you have a pr4 then dont buy links from a pr9, as google will know its a paid link.

What pr9 site would genuinely link to a pr4?

Go for quantity over quality if you want to get on the 1st page of google :)

[DuaneJackson]

They are totally obsessed with making money.

The gits! Carrying on like that anyone would think they're a commerical organisation with shareholders to answer to!

[SteveGibson]

Every website is like a small newspaper, and you should be entitled to make money as you see fit.

Doesn't google have that right too?

It's their websites and they're the ones that have earned the traffic they bring to those websites (google.com, .co.uk, .fr etc).

So, what they do with that traffic is surely their choice.

It's a public listed company, owned by shareholders and, like any other public listed company, the job of the directors is to run the company in a way that will make money for its shareholders.

And they don't owe a damn thing to webmasters who are dependent on free traffic from their sites.

Nor is it their job to help the SEO industry by allowing them to manipulate rankings.

So, as a user of google, I'd be happy to see them "level the playing field" (to use RayB's words) as it would improve my search experience.

Or, to put it another way, the reason I do almost all my searches on google rather than yahoo is that google presents me with far more relevant and meritorious results.

But, if they lose that advantage, my brand loyalty will be zero and I'll be off using whichever SE can offer me better results.

Steve

[JustOneUK]

can't take an SEO seriously if they have to run their site from a blog.

Google wouldn't know it was a paid link, they may just like you ;)

(just my 2p)

[SteveGibson]

Damn!

Duane got that point in ahead of me.

Curse my slow typing!

(and the fact the cat wanted fed mid-post)

Steve

[JustOneUK]

So, as a user of google, I'd be happy to see them "level the playing field" (to use RayB's words) as it would improve my search experience.

care to explain how you think that will occur? :)



Or, to put it another way, the reason I do almost all my searches on google rather than yahoo is that google presents me with far more relevant and meritorious results.

for fear of posting the same line twice...Um,
how do you think that occurs? :D

[RayB]

Of course it's fair, if you have deep pockets you can rank no1 on adwords by paying the most per click. It's the same. They don't give it to you for nothing! want to be no1 for the term Property?, pay Google. :|

I have seen advertising space on The Times that costs a lot (PR9), or there is always your local paper (PR1)! :)

Every website is like a small newspaper, and you should be entitled to make money as you see fit.

But google are saying it's ok to buy links for traffic - as long as there is no editorial vote attached to skew PR - by using a "nofollow".

There is no PR vote with adwords.

To use you analogy - sure its fine to but an ad in the Times - but buying a link for PR as opposed to relevant traffic is like paying a graffiti artist to paint your ad on Buckingham Palace - paid for - but wrong!

[JustOneUK]

But google are saying it's ok to buy links for traffic - as long as there is no editorial vote attached to skew PR - by using a "nofollow".


Or, to put it another way, the reason I do almost all my searches on google rather than yahoo is that google presents me with far more relevant and meritorious results.

OK, then lets use both of the raised issues using Steve's post as an exapmle.

He uses Google because it returns more relevent results, the reason why (which he is still figuring out) is because links (and the text that is in them) IS THE MAIN PART of Google's algorithym. The results come based on the links pointing to a webiste, so if as you say, the links get discounted using the no-follow tag... where do you see it heading? back to keyword stuffing? back to only what is on the page? or design?... do you not think there are a lot of webmasters that can outstrip you on page design/content and layout?

[SteveGibson]

care to explain how you think that will occur?

Sure.

I believe Google will continue to refine their algorithm so they are more effective at:

(1) understanding when on-page content is "natural" (written for the visitor) rather than "artificial" (written for bots).

(2) evaluating the "honesty" and "relevance" of in-bound links.

Steve

[JustOneUK]

Sure.

I believe Google will continue to refine their algorithm so they are more effective at:

(1) understanding when on-page content is "natural" (written for the visitor) rather than "artificial" (written for bots).

(2) evaluating the "honesty" and "relevance" of in-bound links.


Nope,
As mentioned, they have shareholders now. They need to refine the algorithm so that THEIR ADS show the relevent results... not the search results. They need the clicks now.

They cannot possibly be improving search results if they start disallowing links and anchor text to count as a vote for a website and it's content.
The reason your website would rank well for the term "greater profits" would be from the links you have pointing to your site, you want them all discounted now?

You can buy an ad from me and I will gladly put the NO-Follow tag on it if you want. :)

[SteveGibson]

They cannot possibly be improving search results if they start disallowing links and anchor text to count as a vote for a website and it's content.

I don't see where I or anyone else is saying they want google to ignore the value of all links.

I like the "link vote" idea - I think it was genius.

If I were to go to the Cal Tech website and was reading a paper on electromagnetism and there were "further reading" links at the end of the paper, I think the sites listed should get a boost from that.

However, the reason why I think they should get a vote is that Cal Tech has an international reputation for excellence and integrity and the links from their site are (or at least I believe) genuine votes based on the merit of the sites they link to.

However, that's not what we're talking about on this thread. We're talking about paid links.

I happen to believe that paid links are not a vote for a website. They're sold to the willing bidder and are therefore a vote for the cash they receive for putting up the link.

That's why I'd like google to ignore them in their algo.

And, if they did, I don't see why it would, in any way, lower my google search experience.

Let me ask you a question:

Do you believe that use of "nofollow" in blogging software (for guestbooks/comments) has lowered the quality and relevance of Google's search engine results?

Steve

[JustOneUK]

Let me ask you a question:

Do you believe that use of "nofollow" in blogging software (for guestbooks/comments) has lowered the quality and relevance of Google's search engine results?

I don't search for viagra online, so I can't answer that question.

With regards to Cal Tech, and the "further reading"...
If you found out those sites had actually paid for those links, in order to support the hosting/bandwidth costs of Cal Tech, would it make a difference and make you hate those sites? should they be penalised?
Maybe Cal tech would close without their support.

With blogging/forum sigs etc, I think that the web is so saturated with links that nothing will make a difference in either dirtying or cleaning search results apart from an algo change from the search engine owner, it really depends what you are searching for.
I couldn't care less whether they allow those links or not.
The reason they were disallowed is someone hacked an automated method to get 100,000's of links in 5 minutes. The same with MySpace.

Submitting to PAID links is bloody hard to hack :D and actually provides the most relevent results.

You wouln't pay for a link that had absolutely nothing to do with what your site does would you?

[An Oasis]

From my point of view things have got out of kilter G has become too big.

G is only successful because we allow it to be. Imagine if everyone banned the G bot from their websites, what would happen? G as it now would be out of business, their SERP's would not exist and they would then become a 2 bit ad selling machine.

So it is a two way process we bend over and occasionally get shafted but in the main play the game, because if we play the game we get rewarded. Now we are being told what to do, the game is shifting, if you give in at this point, then what happens next?

[SteveGibson]

Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveGibson

Let me ask you a question:

Do you believe that use of "nofollow" in blogging software (for guestbooks/comments) has lowered the quality and relevance of Google's search engine results?

I don't search for viagra online, so I can't answer that question.

Ok, I'll try another question:

Do you think that someone visiting 100 blogs and posting:

"Like the blog,

John

www.myspamsite.com (http://www.myspamsite.com)"

Means that these blogs are "voting" for www.spamsite.com?

And should those guestbook comments raise www.myspamsite.com in the google rankings?

As a google user, my own answer to both questions would be "no".

If you found out those sites had actually paid for those links, in order to support the hosting/bandwidth costs of Cal Tech, would it make a difference and make you hate those sites?

Firstly, I never talked about "hating" sites. That seems a strange thing to hate.

If a link is there because someone paid for it and it wouldn't have been there if money didn't change hands, then I don't regard that as being an honest vote for the linked-to site.

I regard it as a vote for the money the linker wanted.

It's a bit like parliament: if an MP voted for a motion that helped a big business and it turned out that he'd received money from that company, would you trust the integrity of his vote?

Would you believe him if he said he would have voted that way anyway but asked for money from the company as a "thank you", for his vote?

(or, instead of an MP, how about a jurer who votes "not guilty" after receiving money from the defendent?)

I think most people would think the whole thing stinks.

should they be penalised?

I don't think the site that receives the link should be penalised. I just think the SEO value of the link should be set to zero.

i.e. it's not a vote, so it shouldn't count.

However, I don't see any reason why a paid link can't exist (like an ad). Or why sites should be punished for sending traffic to each other with reciprocal links.

I just wouldn't give it any SEO value.

nothing will make a difference in either dirtying or cleaning search results apart from an algo change from the search engine owner

I agree.

While it's good that google has given some power to these "community" type sites, really significant action would have to come from google changing the way they evaluate links.

Submitting to PAID links is bloody hard to hack and actually provides the most relevent results.

This is where we differ in opinion.

IMO, a paid link is not in any way a sign that the recipient site has anything worthwhile to offer its visitors.

And I'd go a lot further than just bought links.

I'd also look at things like forum signatures which are just indications of someone's willingness to post in a forum and don't mean the poster's site is worth serving up in the SERPS.

I think there's a lot of stuff that google currently accepts and rewards which contradicts the original point of using links to rank sites.

(that point being "one page recommending another")

And, while I don't expect google to ever get to 100% link purity in their algo, I think there's probably a number of changes they would make to clean things up and make the results more organic.

Steve

[darren atkinson]

Hi all,

Thought I'd wade into this discussion, albeit a little bit late on.

1. Google results pages are currently regarded as the best, SEO's currently try to game the results, obviously to some degree of success or they would all be out of business, therefore my opinion is that gaming the results and SEO actually aids Google's results.

2. Let’s say I am an eTailer with a new website which I want to market. I spend thousands of pounds on TV and magazine ad's, in an attempt to get some brand exposure. Gradually some bloggers / website owners see my ad's visit my site and like it enough to decide to provide a link to it.

If enough of them do this my site gets pushed up the Google results and I get more and more SE traffic.

In reality, all I have done in a cash and time expensive way is to buy some links.

I realise the argument here would be that the people providing the links are not paid directly so therefore the link / vote is perhaps worth more and should be counted as more by Google. But the fact remains that if I hadn't spent the money on advertising then these link providers would never have found my site and therefore would not link to me.

3. This point is really a follow up of point 2. If Google removed the value of paid links in a search ranking scenario then how would they ever rank sites?

I could write an article today and pay for it to be put up on another website, how would google know that I had done this? The simple answer is that they never would.

If they move from links to some other determining factor to rank websites then I'm really at a loss to think what it could be. Purely page and site content does not work and has been proved so.

People talk about how Google will measure visitor interactions with sites to see how long they stay on a site and rank by this factor, however how would this work for a new site? If nobody could find a site initially then Google could never manage to track interaction.

My opinion is that Google cannot move away from links to rank sites, and any type of link can be bought either directly or indirectly. I'm certain some sites will lose their ability to pass on link value if they are know sellers, but if this process was scaled up by Google, then it would affect results pages far too much which is too big a risk for them.

My thoughts on the matter.

Regards

Darren

[SteveGibson]

Darren

You make a lot of good points that give a explanation of the problem that google faces: telling a "genuine link" from one that is "financially motivated".

My opinion is that Google cannot move away from links to rank sites, and any type of link can be bought either directly or indirectly

This is true, but certain sites - government sites, academic sites, BBC etc i.e. "trusted authority sites" - are far more difficult to buy or bribe links from.

And, if I was in charge of google, I'd be increasing the value of links from "known and trusted" sites while significantly downgrading links from less trusted or more easily manipulated sources.

It wouldn't be a perfect solution: plenty of artificial links would slip under the radar and other links would be unfairly downgraded/ignored.

However, IMO, it would improve the search engine results.

Steve

[JustOneUK]

Ok, I'll try another question:

Do you think that someone visiting 100 blogs and posting:

"Like the blog,

John

www.myspamsite.com (http://www.myspamsite.com)"

Means that these blogs are "voting" for www.spamsite.com? (http://www.spamsite.com?)

And should those guestbook comments raise www.myspamsite.com (http://www.myspamsite.com) in the google rankings?

As a google user, my own answer to both questions would be "no".

Blog links are free and therefore not part of the discussion/problem.

I have no interest in blog spamming, I don't care if it is added to the Gogole results or not as people only spam crap stuff on blogs (which I happen to never search for)
Blog spam is currently unrestricted apart from a few that have started to use the no-follow tag to alleviate their own spam problems.


If a link is there because someone paid for it and it wouldn't have been there if money didn't change hands, then I don't regard that as being an honest vote for the linked-to site.

I run a seperate directory that costs £1 to list your business. I get 200 spam submissions per day which don't get listed as they don't pay.
You cannot escape the payment mechanism. If I remove it, all 200 spams would get added.

Payment stops spam, which (as Darren also said) keeps the search engines clean by raising the NON-SPAM stuff to the top.

Should I run my websites for FREE?
I will tell the wife there is no mortgage money this month :)

[SteveGibson]

Blog links are free and therefore not part of the discussion/problem.

I don't agree.

Firstly, as I see it, how google deals with paid links is part of google's overall approach to linking.

As Darren pointed out, it's often difficult for google to know when a link is paid for.

And, because identifying paid links without a lot of manual intervention is so difficult, I've been putting forward the suggestion that, instead of trying to split links between "paid" and "non-paid", they could split links between "trusted" and "non-trusted".

Secondly, I used the example of blog spam because it is clearly of no value and clearly doesn't represent a "vote" by the linking site.

You cannot escape the payment mechanism. If I remove it, all 200 spams would get added.

As I said before, I'm not suggesting that people should be punished for buying or selling links.

I simply think the SEO value of those links should be set to 0.

If you still want to sell links and people still want to buy them, that's fine in my book.

Should I run my websites for FREE?
I will tell the wife there is no mortgage money this month

Again, your websites are your own and you're free to do whatever you want with them.

However, if the only reason you're making money from them is because you're effectively selling links that are exploiting a loophole in the google algo, then you shouldn't be surprised if that loophole closes and your business model no longer works.

Payment stops spam, which (as Darren also said) keeps the search engines clean by raising the NON-SPAM stuff to the top.

Again, I differ here.

I regard "SEO motivated" paid links AS spam.

As far back as 2005, Matt Cutts of Google wrote:

"Google (and pretty much every other major search engine) uses hyperlinks to help determine reputation. Links are usually editorial votes given by choice, and link-based analysis has greatly improved the quality of web search. Selling links muddies the quality of link-based reputation and makes it harder for many search engines (not just Google) to return relevant results."

(see http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/text-links-and-pagerank/)

Which suggests that Google feel the same way and are looking at ways to stop/undermine the effect paid links have on google rankings.

Steve

[darren atkinson]

Hi all,

Steve, I understand your point and in Google's ideal world nobody would buy or sell links. Unfortunately for Google people do, and as I think we all agree on, there are certain paid links which are hard if not impossible to detect.

If Google did come up with some way of stopping the SEO value of every paid link on the Internet, then as a website owner, apart from traditional marketing methods, how would I attract visitors to my site?

The only things I can think of are:
- PPC (Im sure Google would love this)
- Writing and submitting articles
- Send tons of emails out to bloggers or site reviewers begging for a link
- Link exchange (already devalued, and really you are still paying, just not with money)

I genuinely think that this scenario would hurt Google more than help it as sites would not get many if any links to them, and it could lead to a relatively small handful of sites dominating the search results which would never be good for the results pages.

It goes back to the earlier discussion of Google using other factors to rank sites, of which I am at a loss to guess. (Google do have many smarter people than me working for them so you never know...)

My thoughts anyway.

Regards,

Darren

[DuaneJackson]

If Google did come up with some way of stopping the SEO value of every paid link on the Internet, then as a website owner, apart from traditional marketing methods, how would I attract visitors to my site?


By having quality content that people want to link to without being enticed to do so fincnaically? That was the whole premise of PageRank and it'd still be a very valid one if there were no paid for links and no linkspam.

[mattk]

Let's be honest. Google have a vested interest in discrediting the whole concept of search engine optimisation. Web site owners have two main options for exposure of search engines, SEO, for natural exposure or AdWords for sponsored. Google want Web site owners to feel that seo will be wasted money, so that they pick the AdWords option. My opinion is that organic ranking is for the long term and AdWords are strictly short-term, but some sites I know spend £££ every month on indefinite AdWords campaigns, when a small investment in seo would have paid for itself many times over compared to their monthly AdWords budget.

[darren atkinson]

By having quality content that people want to link to without being enticed to do so fincnaically? That was the whole premise of PageRank and it'd still be a very valid one if there were no paid for links and no linkspam.

I understand what your saying but I feel that it wouldn't really work that well in practice for 2 main reasons:

1. Only a small percentage of web users have the ability and know how to provide a link from either a site or blog that they own. While this is still a large number of potential link giving visitors, even for sites with fairly decent visitor stats it could be really difficult to attract links.

Also if you had your own website and or blog, realistically how many times would you visit a site to buy something then decide to write about it and provide a link? Maybe some would do it more than others, but even so its not going to be a full time job for somebody, which even further limits the amount of links available.

2. If I launch my new eStore how am I meant to attract those link givers? The best site in the world with high quality unique content still needs links to get any kind of ranking with a search engine, to get links in this new 'non paid for link world' I'm going to need to somehow attract enough visitors to get the small percentage who can actually provide a link to me.

I'm not trying to be funny, I feel these are the problems that Google faces.

Another way to look at it is as follows:

Lets say for my new business I decide to use TV advertising to attract visitors, now I could produce the best advert ever made, but unless I purchase a lot of high cost TV slots no one will hardly ever see the ad, and it will be highly un-effective.

The same goes for print media, a really smart print ad is worthless without good exposure.

An amazing website with great content, products, prices, copy etc... is useless without the visitors.

Isn't paying for links the same as paying for decent TV slot, or a prominent position in a highly circulated magazine or newspaper?

Again, my view is that Google needs these paid links to aid its ranking mechanism despite what they may say.

Regards

Darren

[SteveGibson]

If Google did come up with some way of stopping the SEO value of every paid link on the Internet, then as a website owner, apart from traditional marketing methods, how would I attract visitors to my site?

The only things I can think of are:
- PPC (Im sure Google would love this)
- Writing and submitting articles
- Send tons of emails out to bloggers or site reviewers begging for a link
- Link exchange (already devalued, and really you are still paying, just not with money)

Darren

This is a really interesting point and part of what makes this topic so fascinating.

I guess the answer is that you would have to use non-SEO marketing approaches.

But there are loads of business sites out there that are on page 20+ of google's "organic" results that get by without free SE traffic.

It's normal for a business to have to pay (whether it's money or time) to get in front of prospects. At least until they've built a reputation that leads to word of mouth.

But, once they've done that, and if they've got what Duane called

quality content that people want to link to without being enticed to do so financially

They'll be heavily rewarded.

Steve

[TheProblemConsultant]

Google may stop paid links, but I'd just expect that those with big enough pockets to buy links regularly will just start buying whole websites instead and the problem will just move up a level.

Regards, John

[RayB]

Google may stop paid links, but I'd just expect that those with big enough pockets to buy links regularly will just start buying whole websites instead and the problem will just move up a level.

Regards, John

Thats a great point!

Just off to google "websites for sale" :D

[JustOneUK]

That was the whole premise of PageRank and it'd still be a very valid one if there were no paid for links and no linkspam.
Not really, there are 1000's of free drectories out there, there are 1000's of forums, millions of blogs etc, these are all free and are as much of the problem. Paid links are not the problem.

Webmasters can game the SE's without paid links, the point is why run sites for free?
I can give out free links to your website from my PR4 directory... I just won't be able to sell them??? Makes no sense.

If you want to appear above the other sites listed why not pay a bit extra? you are not gaming the SE's any extra as you could have the link for free anyway:|

What it may do long term is make me force you to add a reciprocal link (or triangulate one) in order to get listed. General pain in the ass. :mad: