Matt Cutts Says It's Illogical To Penalize Sites For Buying Links?

[mvandemar]

Recent comment by Matt Cutts on SEOmoz:

Originally Posted by Matt Cutts

To say "page A shouldn't rank at this position because it has paid links" commits the logical fallacy that it's the paid links that cause page A to rank, as opposed to the other links to page A.

So... according to this statement, Matt has come right out and said that just because a site buys links is no reason to think that it shouldn't rank well.

I blogged more about it here:

http://smackdown.blogsblogsblogs.com...-buying-links/

Very interesting, especially considering his post on paid links here:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/sellin...pass-pagerank/

He talks more about how links like that just shouldn't be counted, and not how sites should actually be penalized for it (which is what most people have assumed was going on).

-Michael

[ssandecki]

The point he was trying to get accross is simple, just because a site is buying links doesn't mean it shouldn't rank well in SERP, just that the site that the link was brought from should have 0 weight SEO wise.

[zangief]

We are entering the "shock and awe" phase of the google attack.

[Wealdie]

It is perhaps logical - they are saying we will penalise the site selling the links but not the site buying them:

So the buyer has wasted his money - because he has not gained a benefit

And the seller has gained - a penalty.

It is a clever pincer movement designed to slowly suffocate the links market over time IMO - by removing the incentive to both buy and sell

[busman3000]

clever, very clever...

[vlad230]

Originally Posted by ssandecki

The point he was trying to get accross is simple, just because a site is buying links doesn't mean it shouldn't rank well in SERP, just that the site that the link was brought from should have 0 weight SEO wise.

Agreed...so the webmaster who sells is going to be hanged, not the one who buys

[Mia]

Originally Posted by mvandemar

Recent comment by Matt Cutts on SEOmoz:



So... according to this statement, Matt has come right out and said that just because a site buys links is no reason to think that it shouldn't rank well.

And it is equally illogical to assume that a site that has paid links should not rank well as a result...

[rehash]

this means google's algo relies too much on backlinks, so they now use the "fear" tactic to prevent this

[ssandecki]

Originally Posted by vlad230

Agreed...so the webmaster who sells is going to be hanged, not the one who buys

The buyer is getting hanged too, the investment they made is gone, they no longer recieve seo weight or pagerank for where they bought the text link

[DLGx]

If they penalized link buyers it would be possible for webmasters who compete against eachother to get their competitors penalized by buying a lot of cheap crap links for them.

[RobertD]

Originally Posted by ssandecki

The buyer is getting hanged too, the investment they made is gone, they no longer recieve seo weight or pagerank for where they bought the text link

well, at least not from Google, not necessarily true for all search engines.

[ssandecki]

Originally Posted by RobertD

well, at least not from Google, not necessarily true for all search engines.

If Google is penalizing the seller the effects also hurt the buyer

[The Stealthy One]

I am still not even sure as to why you would penalize link sellers. Who cares? If they have a high PR, let them use it for what they want.

[samantha pia]

Originally Posted by vlad230

Agreed...so the webmaster who sells is going to be hanged, not the one who buys

hung well by google.
our blog network of 350 blogs was selling links, all blogs were pr3/4 and google took all pr and de-indexed all 350 blogs for selling links.

Originally Posted by Mia

And it is equally illogical to assume that a site that has paid links should not rank well as a result...

our 350 blogs are still making $300 a month on adsense lol TY Google

Originally Posted by ssandecki

If Google is penalizing the seller the effects also hurt the buyer

smart buyers know that yahoo supplies more search results than google does, yahoo supplies other major search engines with the results, so buying links on our network today, with no pr, is still popular as yahoo and msn still give back links and your page still gets the traffic

[qwestcommunications]

It makes sense because these days there is so much buying and selling going on in this regard that it would be impossible to say whether someone bought a link or not. How do you distinguish (unless its blatantly obvious) whether a site got a link naturally or bought it.

I guess, in the case of TLA and other similar sites, you would know because it would be trackable.

[Sem-Advance]

Originally Posted by mvandemar

Recent comment by Matt Cutts on SEOmoz:



So... according to this statement, Matt has come right out and said that just because a site buys links is no reason to think that it shouldn't rank well.

I blogged more about it here:

http://smackdown.blogsblogsblogs.com...-buying-links/

Very interesting, especially considering his post on paid links here:

http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/sellin...pass-pagerank/

He talks more about how links like that just shouldn't be counted, and not how sites should actually be penalized for it (which is what most people have assumed was going on).

-Michael

You are amazing!!! posting old news we all knew already....


Besides anyone with a scintilla of intelligence knows Matt C is a google puppet and lies purposefully to keep all the wanna be webmasters so confused they'll never know whats the truth....

anyway great job relaying really old news......

[live-cms_com]

Originally Posted by The Stealthy One

I am still not even sure as to why you would penalize link sellers. Who cares? If they have a high PR, let them use it for what they want.

They are using it to allow people to purchase search engine rankings. Google wants to display relevant results, not results which pay for their links.

That is a perfectly logical reason to penalize link sellers (unless they add nofollow).

[live-cms_com]

Originally Posted by samantha pia

smart buyers know that yahoo supplies more search results than google does, yahoo supplies other major search engines with the results, so buying links on our network today, with no pr, is still popular as yahoo and msn still give back links and your page still gets the traffic

Google has the highest search engine market share. Yahoo has more traffic in total, but not to the search engine section of their website. Google gets far more searches than Yahoo does.

[n-james]

Originally Posted by The Stealthy One

I am still not even sure as to why you would penalize link sellers. Who cares? If they have a high PR, let them use it for what they want.

Paid Links = Better search results

Google wants to show relevant results to its users not webmasters trying to SEO terms such as "money" "business" etc for sites not even related to pwn the search engine traffic.

[Sem-Advance]

Originally Posted by live-cms_com

They are using it to allow people to purchase search engine rankings. Google wants to display relevant results, not results which pay for their links.

That is a perfectly logical reason to penalize link sellers (unless they add nofollow).

Youre very bright but do not fall for BS put out by Google..

Check the PR of this hugh link seller.......

http://www.text-link-ads.com/

PR 7

Yeah there's a penalty for selling links..

..it's called

PROFIT!!!!!!

F Google.. they lie worse than pinocchio