Paid Links and Losing Trust
Posted Wednesday, December 20th, 2006. Filed under Google.
There's a highly interesting thread going on at SEOmoz about what Google should officially say about the issue of buying text links. Rand started the thread with comments about the nofollow tag, suggesting Google should acknowledge that a relevant, high-quality link that requires financial compensation isn't necessarily a problem, but that they're good at detecting who's manipulating rankings with link schemes.
Danny chimed in noting that nofollow is a webmaster's way of telling Google "I mean no harm" when buying a link, though he acknowledged nofollow isn't a perfect solution and there's a ton of gray area in what counts as a "paid" link.
My own thoughts: if your site is selling a bunch of spammy links and you get spotted, you'll surely lose your ability to pass link juice. If you're buying links, buy them under the radar; if you're buying a lot of links from sites that are "over the radar," put a nofollow on them and figure your value is the traffic you get for the price you pay, not any Google juice.
Matt later gave Google's official stance: paid links should carry a nofollow attribute, and other choices risk losing trust with Google. Rand disagreed with the logic, arguing it's illogical to ask webmasters to nofollow links when the benefit of not doing so is high and the likelihood of being caught is relatively low.
Let me ask you: if you found a great, relevant page with lots of backlinks, and could get a paragraph of text added with your link embedded that would pass any human review as legitimate, but you had to pay for it, would you nofollow it?
December 20th, 2006 at 1:38 am
I think Matt and company would do a better job of finding spammy sites by looking at affiliate links and Adsense ads than trying to figure out what’s a paid link and what’s not.
December 20th, 2006 at 2:29 am
build your websites for users not for search engines … except of course when we don’t like it then you should care deeply that what you are doing makes it much more complicated for us and not listen to a thing we said …
December 20th, 2006 at 10:09 am
Regarding the Yahoo! directory question, there is a clear difference. As I posted in Rand’s blog on this topic, a Yahoo! directory link involves a human review by a trusted editor.
I believe that Matt has been clear that the problem that Google has with paid links is the lack of editorial judgement. It’s the editorial judgement that they are wanting to value when they see a link. A purchased link involving no editorial judgement is what they see as a no-no.
Whereas the Yahoo! directory reserves the right to reject your submission, even though you have paid. In addition, they will put your listing in a directory different than the one you picked, if they feel you recommended the wrong one.
December 20th, 2006 at 10:12 am
I don’t ever recall Matt/Google saying “paid links that have been reviewed are OK”….please show me where they ever made that clear…or even hinted at that.
December 20th, 2006 at 10:56 am
[...] The debate continues to rage on about link buying. Rand posted yesterday that he disagrees with Danny and Google, and Jim Boykin adds his comments early this morning. Clearly there is a lot of confusion over this. So here we go again … in this post, I will try to put forth what I believe the Google position is. Note that I am not a Google representative, so this is simply my interpretation of what I have heard. [...]
December 20th, 2006 at 10:59 am
Agreed that there has never been a public statement about this. My comment about the directory listings is just my opinion. But I have never seen a site that we have worked on suffer for purchasing a directory listing at Yahoo!, Best of the Web, or Business.com.
Yet they are obviously purchased links.
December 20th, 2006 at 11:49 am
“build your websites for users not for search engines” This statement is probably the worst thing I’ve ever heard. I guess 90% of the online business I ran into are the one I’ve never heard of before.
Thats the beauty of the Internet, information is available as long as you are connected. But the thing is, when your users HAS to search through SE to find you, you CAN’T just think about your users anymore.
December 20th, 2006 at 1:15 pm
[quote]when your users HAS to search through SE to find you, you CAN’T just think about your users anymore[/quote]
And that is the reality that we live in….Anyone who serves the search engines food will outrank those who are oblivious, or choose to ignor, how the search engines rank websites.
December 20th, 2006 at 1:17 pm
Jim - Matt just posted a comment in my blog related to my post about link buying (see the trackback 2 comments above): http://www.stonetemple.com/blog/?p=100#comments. Of particular note, he labels the directory review process as “paying for the review”, as a way of distinguishing it from paying for the link.
December 20th, 2006 at 2:27 pm
Did some research
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/seo-article-in-newsweek/
A guy named Josh says,
“Question: Generally doesn’t Yahoo’s directory require payment? “Isn’t that pretty much the same as getting a paid link? I might be wrong on that, its been a while since I’ve looked at them, just curious.”
Matt Says in Reply,
“Josh, with Yahoo, you’re paying for the manual review of a site by an editor–it’s not automatically approved by any means.”
Another interesting post by Matt on Link Buying
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/text-links-and-pagerank/
he says in a comment,
“one thing that Google and probably most search engines have developed is the ability to look at site-level linkage. So buying a ton of links from a lot of smaller sites can stand out even more than buying a link from a well-known site.”
And to answer your question Jim I would not add a no follow to a virgin site. But that is my opinion
December 20th, 2006 at 7:14 pm
If I recall, when the big three brought out the nofollow tag, it was primarily the result of blogspam - it allowed bloggers to stop all that casino/porn/insurance crap from getting links from peoples blogs.
Now you’ll notice that that’s almost *never* discussed anymore. Instead Matt Cutts et. al are forcing the community to dance around like puppets, blackmailing webmasters to use the nofollow tag or risk their rankings.
Think about it folks. We’re being herded like cattle. The SE’s have completely twisted the nofollow tag’s useage and intention away from helping to stop spam, to making YOU a human editor of inks for their benefit.
Matt Cutts (respectfully, not to single him out, but allow me to use his online persona as a whipping post ) et al. don’t even talk anymore about the real intentions of blog spam. They’re too bent out over buying links that they can’t hope to detect - and I’m pretty certain they’re having nightmares about reviewme.com and the like. Expect the frenzied propoganda from these folks to increase, not decrease, on this subject. That’s his job and that’s fine - but don’t let that prevent you from doing what’s best for you - including buying links for rankings.
You can smell the bullpucks a mile away. From the same mouth that comes ‘build it for the user’ now comes ‘add the nofollow’ even though the nofollow on paid links has absolutely NOTHING to do with user experience.
Nobody’s going to tell me I have to inform the SE’s about every single link I buy, no matter what the reason. Let them figure it out if they’re so bright.
December 20th, 2006 at 8:29 pm
“This statement is probably the worst thing I’ve ever heard. ”
In one sense, I agree (you can’t afford to ignore search engines), but if the posts on this blog sucked, you’d have a harder time getting new links.
Here’s the obvious: build for both people and search engines.
“I don’t ever recall Matt/Google saying “paid links that have been reviewed are OK”
According to Matt Cutts, you’re not paying Yahoo for the link. Instead, you’re paying for the review. Payment also doesn’t mean an automatic inclusion into their directory.
I personally don’t buy that. Business.com, for example, can say “we charge for the review, but the link is free”, and then list every submission. How can Google determine what people are paying for (review vs link) or what percentage of submitted links are being approved by just crawling a site?
It’s impossible to automate.
December 20th, 2006 at 9:33 pm
Halfdeck - Matt’s comment on my blog was pretty specific to the Yahoo! directory. If I expand upon this comment a bit, I would only guess that Google views that paying some sites to review your links is a practice that they would accept for a very short list of well understood and named directory sites.
I did not get any sense that Matt intended his comment to extend to web sites in general, nor that there was any intent to automate it.
I certainly can’t speak for Google, but my guess is that there is a very select list of directory sites that they trust, and paying for a review by them is cool with Google. Any where else is not.
December 20th, 2006 at 10:25 pm
Eric, it’s definitely worth noting Matt’s comments on your blog post at http://www.stonetemple.com/blog/?p=100
To quote Matt’s comments there:
Ah…it’s all clear now…so my emails I send should start with “I’ll pay you to review my link….and after you’re done reviewing, put it right there….” I’m not buying link…now I see…..I’m paying for the reviewing service everywhere I go.
December 20th, 2006 at 10:31 pm
….missing Stuntdubl….but can still hear his voice “Jim, stop it, don’t piss Matt off…under the radar Jim”….yea, yea….
December 20th, 2006 at 10:50 pm
“Halfdeck - Matt’s comment on my blog was pretty specific to the Yahoo! directory.”
Yeah, I get that Eric, and I agree. I’m just pointing out the fact that Matt’s statement implies to me the determination to penalize or allow paid links depends on a manual process, not an algorithmic one.
December 21st, 2006 at 2:03 am
How is Yahoo’s fee just for reviewing the site when you have to pay a renewal fee yearly?
December 21st, 2006 at 4:27 am
Yahoo! sells links, plain and simple.
Matt and other Googlers who pitch the “no paid links” policy are simply wrong on the whole issue because they are, in fact, threatening people with penalties if they refuse to do Google’s job for them.
The fact that some sites are given special exemption only makes the whole situation more infuriating for many people.
Now, I have always maintained that it’s Google’s search engine and they can do whatever they please with it. The SEO/Webmastering community just needs to accept that fact and move on. Because the Webmasters have the right to do whatever they please with their content.
It’s not up to Google to decide who gets to sell links and who doesn’t. It’s up to the Webmasters.
It’s not up to Google to decide who has to use nofollow and who doesn’t. It’s up to the Webmasters.
All Google can do is strip you of your ability to pass value, or delist you from their index. And once you’re delisted, life still goes on. There are other ways to get traffic. Anyone who depends solely upon Google for traffic needs to address their real problem: they have put all their eggs into one basket and need to diversify.
December 21st, 2006 at 6:15 am
“build your websites for users not for search engines” This statement is probably the worst thing I’ve ever heard”
I didn’t have enough time last time, but let me clarify this issue.
Lets say your are selling services/products from your site. So what do you do?
First, you set up a website (duah!!), about your services/products, you tweak the site and make it appealing for your potential customers. And now hos is the best way of tweaking the site? Well you put up nice bit of Flash, and make the menus and other stuff with JavaScript, (Just imagine how wonderful your site could be). And then what? You sit down and wait!
What happens is that after some time your realise that your site is not appearing in the SE. But why? You followed the guidelines from SE. Made a great site for your visitors etc… But still, there are many other sites that outranks yours, and their site is not as great as yours.
You start to look at the top sites for your keywords and discovers that “hey their site is not offering any great offerings to their visitors as Matts talks about” but still they are in top… You take a coffe or two and, and after many sleepless nights you figure out “Screw them.. I will make a site that gets me on top of the SE’s”
You redesign your site, buy great amount of links, and Voila! you are now on top. Isn’t that what most of us are doing?
When i talk with my clients, I try to explain how the SEO works. I explain that doing all the SEO work is needed to get to the top, but it is really IMPORTANT to think about SEO as a part of the Marketing as same way as advertising. Thats how I get my clients, not mainley because I can get their site on top, but because I combine it with my knowledge of Marketing and Branding.
A combination of the things as I mention above, is something I’m missing among other firms offering SEO.
“In one sense, I agree (you can’t afford to ignore search engines), but if the posts on this blog sucked, you’d have a harder time getting new links.”
Yes but remember why people visit Jim’s, Aaron’s and Matt Cutts blog and even refer to them with links. It’s not that what they are saying is so genius (Sorry guys, I really like to read what you write about) but because they have managed to build up a reputation online, due to their experience.
December 21st, 2006 at 10:50 am
As I’ve said elsewhere, I think the big problem with the argument is the presumption that all paid links are inherently poor quality.
I think everyone’s falling for an implied strawman in the Google statement.
Bottom line is - there are good quality links and poor quality links. You can buy both. But good quality paid links shouldn’t infer that the link or target site has no inherent value or relevance.
2c.
December 21st, 2006 at 2:22 pm
“But good quality paid links shouldn’t infer that the link or target site has no inherent value or relevance.”
Whether a link was paid for or not paid for implies nothing about the quality or the relevance of a target site. But a buyer wants Google to take a paid link as a signal of value just because, for example, a “trusted” directory links to his/her site. The site may or may not be relevant, but Google will never know by just looking at the link if it suspects the link was paid for because the intent of the link is ambiguous.
December 21st, 2006 at 2:34 pm
Everyone’s very concerned about ‘What if . . .’ we use nofollow, buy links, don’t, pay for reviews, or don’t. This is just a small ripple in the evolution of the SE’s. The power of the top ranking in Google is still formidable, but even that is diluting as they serve different results for different users in different areas and they implement customization. The future will require you to appeal to your visitors more. When your visitors add you to their on & offline bookmarks, when they suggest you to a friend, when they link to you from your blog, when they give out your web address on the phone & by e-mail, the value you offer will triumph. We all need to be looking further down the road.
December 22nd, 2006 at 7:38 am
As a matter of fact, folks pay to be reviewed, but not included in the Yahoo directory. Thus, it is not a paid link. It is a human-reviewed link, that’s what Google has always wanted. And it is recommended so in the Google guidelines (last I checked, that is).
December 29th, 2006 at 12:34 pm
Well when certain things a overused one has to come with unique tactics to avoid any kind of complications in future. Nowadays I think it is better too work smarter than working harder.If you are sure that you haven’t used any unethical techniques along with that you also need to take precautions for not getting punished by any search engine for that matter. It doesn’t matter what procedure you follow and how you follow, best thing to do is always play safe.
December 31st, 2006 at 2:15 am
What urks me about this whole matter is that there has never been any guidance whatsoever from Google. It has always come from matt, a “non-official” source.
They need to clear the air on this in an official manner
January 5th, 2007 at 12:34 pm
Your paid links information is a great resource as you said. The other great resource that I have seen when it comes to paid links is a web site put together by Jason Ryan Isaksen. Have you seen this one, is it o-k for me to post a link to the web site here, or is that against the rules? I think everyone here would greatly benefit by takeing a look at it.
Sirjesse
January 13th, 2007 at 5:15 am
Would i nofollow the link Jim?? ME?? well…um… yeah of course i’d slap a nice big red nofollow on the link. After all, I’ve learned alot from you over the years!
January 14th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
Yeah, this debate will go on, seems, forever… Why not really better to look for some more useful SPAM protection than rising all this mess around these paid links?..
January 20th, 2007 at 12:37 pm
Coming to this discussion late, but I was involved on Rand’s post.
I think paid links will all come down to trust and relevance.
If you contact a medical association, and recruit 1000 doctors to link to your new cool gizmo medical site (legit of course), it might be hard for Google to discount the links.
The sudden burst of links actually resembles the linkage after a trade show (great place to recruit linkage partners) - hell why don’t trade shows have link exchange pavilions?
The same doctors writing about garden fertilizer wouldn’t be appropriate.
There is so much linking by corporates between their various web fronts and sister sites, hell even Google does that extensively. There is a commercial relationship betwen those links.
Devaluing a link because of a financial relationship is.. “evil”
I discussed this more back in December
Paid Links- Hindsight gives perspective
May 30th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
Quote - I think Matt and company would do a better job of finding spammy sites by looking at affiliate links and Adsense ads than trying to figure out what’s a paid link and what’s not. - Peter Davis
I think they should use the Google results to find spammy sites. Their algo sure does seem to pick them out and rank them highly!
February 7th, 2008 at 9:24 pm
There has got to be a better way of finding paid links.
For the most part, Google should just look into the people who are paying outrageous AdSense… In my opinion, those are the culprits.