Nada Collar

What is Google planning with regard to paid links? Matt Cutts has a post requesting people to report paid links using the webmaster spam report tool. The post has opened up a can of worms. Matt is stating that they would like the information to try out some new algorithm’s they are working on, but the writing is on the wall (on a side note: we need a modern version of this statement. “The writing is on the server”?)

• Either Google wants to remove paid links from their PageRank algorithm.
• or They want to rule the paid links arena with their new embedded link ads
• or all of the above.

Passing PageRank
Matt has basically said that you should not pass PageRank with any paid links. And while people have been calling Google hypocritical (since they essentially are the biggest paid link provider out there) I guess they are missing the point of passing page rank. Many large pay for a link networks out there are javaScript and hence don’t pass pagerank. They are all about the traffic. Text-link-ads and others are more about PageRank (and also traffic).

The response?
So far Text-Link-Ads have not made a comment about Matt’s post. Many people have commented on Matt’s post about the issues they see with it, but most are quick knee jerk reactions.

• Google is being Hypocritical. (yeah well, not directly but…. yeah)
• SEO’s will put out of jobs. (huh, I think not)
• April fools joke? (no)
• Penalize competitors by reporting them (since everyone does it)
• We are being asked to rat out others to help Google make money.

The less knee jerk reactions (but still negative)

• many site ONLY make money from paid links. And the links are relevant and hand edited. What are they to do?
• Google have said this is ok in the past.

And the positives:

• I’ve been waiting for this. Thanks
• Now the mom and pops can have a level playing field with big-budget stores.

Interesting Notes
The only real valid comment we can make right now is about the lack of information as to what is a paid link, how we should be using them, and what Google is planning to do with this information.

One commentor (Michele ) introduced the concept of rel=”paid” (to be honest I think it wasn’t something Michele would like, but it seems like a good suggestion to me).

Another commentor (Everett ) pointed out that hand crafted ads should be ok, but automated ones shouldn’t be. I like this, but from a algorithm point of view… ouch.

Conclusion
The idea is nice. It means that in theory relevant content is able to rank higher. But if you ask me the whole PageRank concept is broken now anyway. It has got to the point where things are popular because they are popular. Who will link to the brilliantly written page that nobody visits because its number 3000 on the SERPS? In my opinion blogs have taken off so well because of this problem. If you can build a readership by having unique opinions then you can grow, but in established markets where opinions count for less (and thus a blog won’t get a readership) it is starting to require significant time (and thus money) to get into the SERPs.

Given that, maybe Google are shooting themselves in the foot. Maybe PageRank ONLY works because of paid links. Someone who wants to get into the game can seed themselves by spending some money and then see how they go on the SERPs once they get seeded. Without the paid links they might never have bothered in the first place.

Interesting thought to ponder, but its way to big of a problem to ever really know the answer.

Update: I’ve been waiting for response from some bigger names on this one. Quadzilla has pointed out that everyone has joined his black-hat ranks. Maybe they are all sitting back to see how the ball lands.

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This entry was posted on Sunday, April 15th, 2007 at 9:55 pm and is filed under Paidlinks, Google. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.