Why Links From A Word Cloud Sites Are Worthless

That's what the pixel people thought too. Now it's as dead as the pet rock.

 

I am not predicting future value of these links. I am talking about current value.

My replies have not been an argument in favor of word cloud sites. Basically all I am trying to point out is that if you can get several visitors a month to your site for only 50 cents a year you are doing good. This has nothing whatsoever to do with PR.

To be perfectly clear about my stance on the subject I do not think that word cloud sites are a "great" thing. I am not trying to promote my own cloud site here and I rarely ever buy links on these type of sites and would not recommend that anyone spend very much on them.

 

I am curious as to what kind of traffic you get from Word Cloud sites. For instance, is this how it works:

1. You search "Free Viagra" on Google
2. The Word Cloud site is ranked where?
3. And even if you somehow get to the Word Cloud site...then what? You search through 100 links to find what you're looking for?

Isn't the whole point of a SE to get you to the info you are looking for? Why would they take you to a Word Cloud site to start your search over?

As far as the number of visitors is concerned....does it really matter unless they convert? Lets say I get 1,000,000 visitors to my site tomorrow and they don't click on a single ad and don't buy a thing. Would that be a waste of money? Even if I spent $.50 to get a 1,000,000 visitors, I would still have a negative ROI if they don't make me any money.

But we're talking about 2-3 visitors a month who search Word Cloud sites instead of Google...I wouldn't count on them coming through.

If you maintain a Word Cloud site and continue building links to it...then I can understand the value of an outgoing link. But this rarely happens because of the flawed business model...it doesn't make sense to continue promoting the site in the long term since it would eat away at the limited profit.

 

I doubt seriously that there would be much traffic to a word cloud site from the SEs. I also doubt that a link to a general type website would see any traffic from such a link.

Most likely the traffic that arrives at a word cloud site is other webmasters looking for links. So if they are already looking for links and they click on a link in the word cloud to go to your directory etc then they may be likely to submit a listing.

 

But what if it isn't a directory? I can see your point and it actually makes sense for a webmaster going to submit links. But then the traffic would only be useful for webmaster related sites...and not others.

 

That is correct, in my opinion.

 

Thought I'd check in on this discussion as I am partially responsible for it starting.

When I started 500words.com, I was told that the site would NEVER get a pagerank.

Reeeally.

Go take a look now.

It's a PR 5

It still regularly gets traffic every day. Some days it is 50 visits. Some days it is 250 visits. But every day... without me doing a thing, it gets organic search engine traffic.

I checked a bunch of the links from the site. It appears a good many have PR of some kind.

Is that PR attributable to 500words.com? Who knows?

Makes for interesting discussion, yes?

Joel

 

You're still missing the point.

This is the same situation as with the pixels pages.

No one is disputing that this is good business for cloud page owners... while it lasts.

"There's one born every minute." ~ P.T. Barnum

What's open to dispute (apparently, although it shouldn't be) is whether the4 suckers... err... customers who buy these links are getting anything for their money.

 

"is whether the4 suckers... err... customers who buy these links are getting anything for their money." - They get to dream they are actually building their backlinks for a $2.00 investment?

 

Now you are missing the point.
If he gets 50-250 visits a day it will be damn worth the money. It is not all about PR and backlinks.........

 

It doesn't matter whether it's 50 cents or $50... throwing away money is still throwing away money.

As my mom used to say, "Take care of the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves."

No, sorry, you misread that. The link BUYERS are not getting 50 to 250 visits per day - the SELLER is getting those visitors. See above.

 

Yes but in the end the buyer may profit from those visits.......

 

Only if a human visitor actually follows the link to the buyer's site. And let's face it, that's not very likely, is it?

 

There might not be a lot of visits.
But as explained before it does not need a lot of visits to have 0,50 spended well does it ?

It might not be likely but I am sure people do click the links. In fact if a link on a other word-cloud site sounds appealing to me I follow it just to check it out.

 

See above. This is about time and not misleading yourself, not about the 50 cents.

That's because you are "in the business", so to speak.

The average website listed in DMOZ may be lucky to get 1 click a year from that listing. The only clicks I've ever seen from DMOZ are almost certainly from editors.

The average website is going to see even less traffic from a cloud page.

I'm not worried about how many people pay you the 50 cents, or even $50. I'm addressing the issue of "informed decision-making". If you want to spend your money on a pixel link or a word cloud link or a pet rock or a kilo of weed, knock yourself out. Informed decision-making means knowing what you are actually getting for your money and the downside as well as the upside to that decision.

 

Ah well we will never agree.

 

Actually, it happens more often than not. My stats show that almost every visitor to 500words.com clicks on a word and follows it to a sponsor page.

Joel

 

Novelty effect. Curiosity. Didn't everyone do that for a while with the pixel pages? To see what would happen? Did anyone actually stay on the page at the end of that link?

We've been through all this before, people. There is no sustainable traffic to come from these "latest great idea" sites.

You won't get any SEO benefit, or any you do get will be very temporary and extremely weak at best. You won't get any traffic, other than curiosity traffic.

It's the pet rock phenomenon. If you absolutely must have a pet rock, knock yourself out. Just don't expect this to have any discernible impact on SE rankings.

 

You say this with absolute certainty, as though you know beyond a shadow of a doubt. That's impossible, unless you are Google and know exactly how the search algorithm works.

With that said, no doubt it is a novelty.

However, I was told the site would NEVER get PR. It would always remain a zero at best.

It's a PR 5. FIVE. Cinqo. Cinq. IIIII. V.

Many people will kill for a PR 5 on any kind of site.

The site launched almost a YEAR ago and it still gets SE traffic.

I don't think there is a reason to be totally dogmatic about your position. That one link on the PR 5 site could be the thing that pushes a site from PR 3 to PR 4. We just don't know for sure.

The site DOES get traffic every day, is bookmarked by 30% of the visitors, and people do click the outbound links.

Is it a bright, shiny object? Perhaps.

I've seen worse gimmicks. Try the NY Times ;-)

Joel

 

You're still confusing the benefit to you, word tag site owner, and the benefit to the link buyer.

The pixel site guy made a million dollars, remember? I'm not disputing the benefit to you. I'm disputing the benefit to anyone buying those links.