So, I recently have read about Google warning against advertorials. I can imagine that the line between what is an advertorial and what is an honest blog post that points to other outbound links is a very thin one. What are you doing to avoid penalization from Google based off your linkbuilding strategy which is usually crucial to gaining a high ranking on Google. Any thoughts on this? I have some ideas, like cloaking the article with a slightly wider range of links and doing whatever you can to make it look like a regular non-paid post.
All you need to do is use rel="nofollow" attribute in all external links... Google warns against paid for adverts or links that (and I quote here) "pass PageRank". If you use rel nofollow these links do not pass any PR, hence you wont get penalized. If you are not sure; www.qubot.com.au has a free external/outbound link analyzer when you assess any webpage URL. It is worth noting that external links have been a regular cause of many webpages to drop out of the Google index, *especially* if the content they link to is an unrelated topic. IE: you cant openly link a website discussing bicycles to one discussing philosophy. Many link builders and sellers are against this for obvious reasons, but Google is just gonna keep putting its foot down harder until all the unnatural links are dead...
**** Google! Who are they to tell us we can't host paid for promotional material I have people waiting to pay me $50 a time to host high quality original articles they write, in return for including a live keyword hyperlink in the article content Just got to build the sites, to match the articles, and get traffic and pagerank - and Google threats won't stop me
You are welcome to host paid for promotional material, just don't expect that page to get into the index, further if you have too many internally linked non-indexed pages, expect your homepage to get penalized or de-indexed too... (like what happened to interflora) Google has been rolling this out for some time now, if your website is not yet affected, it will be soon. Each link source content and destination content must have a topic 'relationship', that applies to internal links too! If you have a site with two totally different topics, you must have a category page that separates them, all part of good internal link structure. If your external links structure is abused, expect knock on effects on your internally linked pages too, because the other pages on your site then openly link to a non-indexed page, which in Googles eyes is equivalent of a dead-link/duplicate page/not selected page...
Pass, not my type. It's their search engine, so they can make their rules. You don't have to follow them, just understand that you might get penalised (or de-indexed) from their search engine. Simple as that. (FYI, Bing has a similar policy.) It's up to you what you have on your site and if you care about getting traffic from them. You have people ready to pay for articles on sites that don't exist? LOL! Good for you.
I got rid of all my sites when I just couldn't take any more of Google's crap Been a couple of years now, and I'm bored, and I'm ready to get back into it I've got people waiting for me to build some new sites Word gets around in the finance sector, and they contact you when you have a track record of creating authority sites
These are pro writers, just that they don't work for newspapers and magazines - they write promotional articles for the web, in order to promote financial services These articles do get top rankings, but I know what you mean - I've seen promotional crap that doesn't deserve any rankings
I agree with all of you for the most part. I mean even Google has paid links set up on other sites like blogs. So it's a double standard, however I'm sure they wouldn't mind penalizing their own sites, as they have in the past. However, it is easy for a multi-billion dollar industry to ban 1 of their many sites that people already know how and where to find, but it's another thing for a small business to be wiped off the face of internet space for trying to compete in their market. I just wanted to hear your thoughts on ways you know people go around this. My idea is to make the posts look as "organic" as possible. Any other insights?
Only other thing is to never use Google stuff like adsense, Google analytics, Google webmaster tools, Gmail, etc. when putting paid content on a site - don't leave footprints, and stay under the radar - in fact try and stay invisible!
Any time Google has engaged in paid links it has penalised itself, so it's not really "double standards". It could just blame the companies it paid to do marketing, or some idiot trainee, and not bother penalising itself, but applies its guidelines instead and penalises itself. On the other hand, most website owners, SEOs, etc, who do this and then get hit just cry instead, rather than face facts and move forwards. As for your question about manipulation - well, a pattern is always going to emerge, never mind how organic you try to make it. If you're dealing with sites known for posting paid links, you'll be caught out quicker. Big companies have done it and got caught out, John Smith and his crap blog tried it and got caught out. So what's the point? What a surprise, you're a tinfoil hat as well as a black hat. If you want to "stay off Google's radar", block them with robots.txt or .htaccess. Or don't engage in practises that will get you banned/penalised if you rely upon them for traffic.
I've never really felt comfortable with advertorials... They are just plain misleading sometimes, and i would stay away from those.. It's just safer that way, there's plenty of other methods to make money online Best Regards, Marc
There are ways to make money online, but what about those link building to increase their site ranking? How will Google know whether or not your post was paid? It certainly looks like an advertorial...
There are so many ways to understand, code an algorithm to detect. Blog networks stuck out like a sore thumb. Various domains with lots of posts appearing frequently on different topics. Meteoric rise of crap sites just due to links from these networks. The blog networks and "money sites" (as black hats call them) might as well have put up a giant flag with "I participate in paid links". Directories - if a directory is taking every link (free or paid, i.e. it's full of crap/spammy links) then there's no editorial overview, it's a big red flag, too. So if you have a paid link there, how can it be taken seriously? The same essentially applies to blog networks and every other source. Of course, there have been examples people buying links on a site and Google only knowing after a site owner reports them, so it's not always easy to detect. The recent advertorials were obvious though. Otherwise, place of link on a page - maybe located in a sidebar, footer, header, in between a paragraph, etc. Kind of odd to suddenly have a keyword rich link in such places. So very obvious. Are the links paid, exchanged, etc? Either way, it's some kind of manipulation, even if it's not 100% clear if it's paid or not.
Indeed. And it is manipulation, but anyone doing anything to actively enhance their SEO is engaging in "manipulation". I'm all for giving everyone a fair chance.
You could view it that way, but that's quite an extreme view. It really comes down to intent. If you want to fool people (e.g. your product is crap and you want to give the impression it isn't, put up fake reviews, etc) then that is manipulation. What you do on your site, as long as it's for the user experience, is honest, doesn't involve spam tactics, etc, is not manipulation. That isn't trying to fake popularity. The bigger concern is offsite. Paid links, spamming links or whatever for the purpose of influencing ranking is manipulation.
Here's a big shocker that most people don't know tho... Even "high authority" companies such as majesticseo & seomoz participate in paid links & manipulation. Just study their link profile, and you'll see really quickly That's assuming you know how to read a link profile tho haha... But if you do, i challenge you to take a peak, and you be the judge yourself... If the big shots are doing it, I really don't feel bad doing it myself. Just as long as my intent is helping humanity with a great product, and not swindling money, i guess i can somewhat justify it? lol To Each His Own I guess ... Best Regards, Marc