Comments on: How should Search Engines treat Paid Links?

By: Joe Hunkins

Joe Hunkins — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 20:56:05 +0000

Jim thanks for this insight. I’m hoping (but not holding my breath) that we’ll see some breakthrough info on paid/traded/organic/whatever linking at SES this year. As far as I can tell Google is inconsistently punishing sites for paid links, less so for traded, and generally not at all for “friendly reciprocal” links which are the new currency of the web. Since most business owners (and even many SEO folks) do not understand all the link nuances, we see mom and pop websites getting killed off or downranked because their webmaster broke rules neither they nor he understood in the first place. Nofollow just seems to be an advantage for those currently ranked well - links are a LOT harder to get than they used to be!

By: Eric Enge

Eric Enge — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 13:52:20 +0000

Thanks for the commentary on the interview and article Jim. I have to admit when I spoke with Priyank that I was a bit surprised at the response. Given that Yahoo has normally been quiet on the topic, it was great to see them outline things the way that Priyank did.

By: Amin

Amin — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 09:38:58 +0000

When I’m looking for information I don’t actually care whether a link is paid or organic. I care whether it will take me closer to what I want.

And let’s face it, Google don’t mind shoving paid links in our face when we’re searching, as long as they’re the ones getting the bulk of the revenue.

That’s all Adwords is, paid links that Google make sure you see.

If a link is offering some kind of value to the consumer then who are the search engines to remove it from our view?

Of course that does open up a can of worms about how the search engines will define ‘value’…

By: Tony Tellijohn

Tony Tellijohn — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 12:44:22 +0000

At least someone in the SE world gets it. I always thought Google would have been the one to figure that route out, given their love of using technology to try to determine eveything.

By: Gregor

Gregor — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 09:40:03 +0000

That’s the most articulate and reasonable response I’ve yet heard about paid links.

Forget (or at least, don’t worry too much) about whether the links are paid for or not - focus on whether they’re giving the user value, whether they’re relevant and whether they’re in a sensible neighbourhood.

If a link ticks all of those boxes then give it the value that it deserves, regardless of whether it is paid for or not.