Three Clicks to Spam: Google’s Hypocritical Link Selling Policy - Rmail
Posted by elveston priory at 8:22 pm
Bloggers are buzzing this morning about Google’s most recent updates to Page Rank, the system that determines how much weight your site gets in its index. Many popular blogs have seen their rank (which is on a scale of 0-10) take dramatic hits, with some reportedly even falling from PR7 to PR4 (Andy Beard has a good list of those effected). This is a very big deal; many of these sites depend on search traffic and the credibility a high page rank brings to keep their business of selling ads afloat, and a drop in score can significantly lower the flow of visitors.
For Google's part, the reason these sites are being slammed is because the company’s policy tells web publishers to "avoid links to web spammers or “bad neighborhoods” on the web." Do some of the effected blogs sell links to such sites? Perhaps; we'll let these folks defend themselves and their practices. But the real story is the hypocrisy of Google enforcing this policy on third-party publishers, when within their own engine they profit immensely by selling ads to spammers and so-called "bad neighborhoods."
Here's an example of just how easy it is to find link spam in Google's sponsored listings. First, do a search for “low cost airfare,” and then follow this path:
1. Go to page 3 of results. Under "Sponsored Links" click the link for CheapAirfareWorld.com
2. Arrive at CheapAirfareWorld.com. Click "lowest airfare."
3. If the resulting page isn't a web spammer/bad neighborhood, I don't know what is. The page is nothing but sponsored links.
The truth of the matter is that Google makes a good deal of money by allowing spammers to buy AdWords. These spammers in turn make money by creating pages with no value added content and instead using schemes to get people clicking paid links. Often, these paid links are AdSense, which puts even more money in Google's pocket. If bloggers are selling links directly to such people, they are in turn taking money directly away from Google, which, as a $200 billion corporation, isn't something Google is likely to be too happy about.
However, versus some of the companies Google allows to advertise in its search engine, many of those taking a Page Rank hit are producers of great content, and it's a total shame that this policy might ultimately drive them out of business. As the buzz grows over this, it will be interesting to see what kind of response Google has to offer.
User comment: By: aaronI'm fine with the policy changes, but it's very true that they should clean up their own backyard before doing this to webmasters. Maybe Matt Cutts or someone from Google will blog a response to this, because it's rampant within their system.
User comment: By: Adam OstrowThat is pretty much the conclusion I came to in the article, no? The "bad neighborhoods" quote is direct from Google's policy. Just thought I'd share their side ...
User comment: By: Michael VanDeMarAdam, Slight correction to your article. These penalties have nothing to do with linking out to "bad neighborhoods". They are about selling links, period. If Google was dishing out these penalties based on who you linked out to, then the problem would eventually self-correct, and would have nothing to do with whether or not the link was paid. As it is, they are trying to kill the whole link buying industry regardless of any other factors.
User comment: By: AliMy search engine traffic levels have remained the same. I actually feel quite honored to be slapped for this "invisible" reason to lower PageRank along with some of the top blogs and sites on the same day. I sell links to make money, shame on me! Bottom line, the future is clearly not tied together with Google for a lot of bloggers and websites from here on forth.
User comment: By: All My Posts Are Belong to Wordless Wednesday[...] Mashable speaks of the Hypocrisy of link spam and 'bad neighborhoods' found in Google's AdWords ads. [...]
User comment: By: JillWhy be surprised by that? Toolbar PageRank has never been a factor in the algorithm. Just because they made the PR APPEAR to be lower, doesn't mean real PR has been affected.
User comment: By: Jeremy LuebkeIt used to, but not so anymore. The PageRank you see in the toolbar is nothing more than an arbitrary number that has very little effect on rankings. I can rank a PR1 page over a PR6 page any day of the week.
User comment: By: Adam OstrowI'm surprised it's not impacting search traffic. If I search for "marketing" in Google, isn't Page Rank a major influence on which pages show up first?
User comment: By: Mark "Rizzn" HopkinsI knew at one point or another, Google used to change the ranking level and/or the price of the click based upon the quality of the site (which they determined not so much by the quality of the page behind the link but more by how compelling the ad copy is and what sort of clickthru ratio it had). Perhaps it's time Google made some modifications to their policy!
User comment: By: Andy BeardFor the majority of sites including my own this isn't affecting search traffic, but it does affect status and the chance of being looked upon as an authority site on a particular topic. There are many other methods to make a judgement for blogs with significant subscriber levels, but for many this is like pulling the rug out from under their feet. You might be interested to know my story was actually buried on Digg, and no story has yet to reach the front page. I wonder how many Google employees have Digg accounts
[...] Source:Mashable! Bloggers are buzzing this morning about Google's most recent updates to Page Rank, the system that determines how much weight your site gets in its index. Many popular blogs have seen their rank (which is on a scale of 0-10) take dramatic falls, with some reportedly even falling from PR7 to PR4 (Andy Beard […]Source:Mashable! Microsoft's Live Search product has rolled out two enhancements to try and better understand user input to return improved results: AutoSpell and Stemming. The AutoSpell feature recognizes common misspellings and returns them in the results, rather than the Google approach of asking you "did you mean McDonalds?" if you enter "MacDonalds" as your search […]Source:Mashable! In an effort to boost its growth abroad, Yahoo will be announcing a number of partnerships with wireless carriers in Asia, according to company President Sue Decker. The company has previously announced deals with carriers in South Korea, Malaysia, and Taiwan. Yahoo claims to have more than 25 million users in the Asia-Pacific […] Share and Enjoy: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
[...] Source:Mashable! Bloggers are buzzing this morning about Google's most recent updates to Page Rank, the system that determines how much weight your site gets in its index. Many popular blogs have seen their rank (which is on a scale of 0-10) take dramatic falls, with some reportedly even falling from PR7 to PR4 (Andy Beard […] Share and Enjoy: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
[...] one? If you want to sell links, Google would much rather that you use AdWords. And as Adam Ostrow notes at Mashable, Google makes a fair bit of money from link-farms [...]
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