Well I am not fearing the Big G ... I am still selling links on my blogs even though the PR degraded. On one of my blog where the page rank increased I started using my own plugins for banners and now I do promote banners and text links are kept only in blogroll..
The interesting thing is that very few of those who were purchasing have stopped. I'm glad to see that many are looking past the rumors and concentrating on results.
If you are an SEO then why you need to buy links. If you have a skills for getting backlinks then i think no need to buy links for getting links.
I used to buy some, but after the PR update, I stop buying any. Some links used to by PR6 but now it is PR2. Useless.
I've seen a few people mentioning they won't buy links as you can get them for free. Sure, you can get some links for free but you can get better ones, and more of them, if you pay. Depending on what your site is about it can be very hard to get people to link to you. I've emailed people asking for links before, and they've basically said since my site is commercial and selling actual products they wouldn't link to me for free, even though it would have been a great link up with their sites. Also, if you buy links then you get them exactly as you want them - perfect placement and anchor text.
We agree on something! +rep Pagerank is really useless in my eyes, it just takes your mind of the correct goals of your website.
Sure you can get links/traffic for free. But this involves time (producing content, submitting to directories, sending out news tips, other marketing) Time = Money So it is not really free. I still get most of my links & traffic free - but there comes a time when I want to boost my traffic, or get traffic more quickly. At this point money can be a good shortcut. Why do you think adwords is so successful?
Ya, you can listen to him about and cheat your way to the top Remember, text link buying is cheating.... period. You can pretend in your mind it's ok and not breaking any rules. You are manipulating SERPs and Pagerank when you pay for your links, which is against the Google TOS as it always has been. Don't give me the directories sell links line, they sell fast inclusion service, not paid to get listed. Only crappy run of the mill charge for inclusion and are a waste of money. Example, if you actually read the Yahoo! Directory $299.00 fee information you would see it is for fast review only doesn't mean you will get listed. Also, adwords does NOT boost SERPs or Pagerank so it cannot be compared to text links, you can do the same thing Google does with AdSense. Get with it people... text links are cheating, period. :twocents:
I completely agree that its cheating, but what can we do? I dont feel bad about this at all. I'm working with a genuine business, I'm not trying to boost some garbage ebook page, spam affilliate junk, or crappy MFA site up the listings. I'm in an area of business that can generate a lot of money. I'm looking at my competitors, and they are all up to tricks with google. When I search on one of their url's they have hundreds of wordcloud links, links on sites that are clearly bought (in footers and in sites that couldnt be further apart content-wise), and recently they appear to have started to buy high PR domains and point links on those to their main domains. Its a battle to stay page 1, and frankly normal SEO tactics dont cut it. Nice guys finish last and all that I do hope google crack down further, as the tactics my competitors are using are easily noticable and incredibly spammy. People can argue whether big G can detect paid links or not, but I'm confident in my abilities and I want to see further crackdowns.
I am afraid to say we are on the tip of a new iceberg. Old SEO is out...you're right! A Few Things that are working for me: No duped content No kw spamming in articles (try to stay below 2-3%) Use expert verbiage as the search engines see it Quality ibl's from same KW theme Learn more about LSI and how it connects to other algos There's a ton more that I would call new SEO, but I am still learning how it all connects. Google thinks human now . My advice on buying links...don't waste your money. Find a way to get honest votes. Deals and propositions to the right audience can be a natural way to do this. Every website is different and would require a boatload of research to fare in today's se's organic index. H