Google ? Paid Text links ? Branding Concerns and Search Engine Optimization
Google just did one of their PageRank (PR) updates;?
PageRank: A proprietary measurement of Google?s proprietary ordering of pages in its Web index. PageRank is the most intense point of focus, speculation, observation, and desire in the Webmaster and optimization communities. More than any other single marketing factor, PageRank has the power to determine a site?s visibility. A high PageRank moves a page toward the top of any search results page in Google when that page matches the user?s keywords. Obtaining a PageRank high enough to break a page into the top ten is the primary goal of Google optimization. An approximate version of any page?s PageRank can be checked by displaying the page in Internet Explorer while running the Google Toolbar. Hover your mouse over the PageRank cursor to see the current page?s rank on a 0-to-10 scale.?
?A lot of website?s lost significant PR because they sell links on their website or blog. Google doesn?t want websites doing this because it ?artificially? increases websites PR and moves them up in the rankings. ?
Let me give you a hypothetical example. Blog ?Brand Experts.com? sells links. The blog is all about how big companies brand themselves. I?m a branding agency so I purchase a link (ad)?on the Brand Experts.com site and the anchor text is Branding Agency (that points to my site). That?s what we call anchor text or text links. Of course it makes sense for me to buy this text link ad?because we?re both branding firms. But Google in their wisdom doesn?t want any PR passed through. Huh? (p.s. if Google is reading this I?m only talking hypothetically now, please, please don?t crush me).?
?Now if I?m a branding company and I?m buying links on say a Vitamin website then I could understand the thinking of Google because it?s really not relevant to my industry. But to advertise on relevant websites and get no PR residual is perplexing to me. Furthermore nothing addresses the branding/advertising dilemma in all this.?
At Brand Identity Guru we build our brand through advertising on the internet in relevant websites and blogs. This increases our brand awareness and visibility in the search engines. It?s a smart business decision. Our philosophy is always the brand first, not about acquiring text links.
And here?s the real dilemma. When we buy advertising the owner of the site we buy from determines if the text link is clean and direct. Not the customer. We have absolutely no say in it. After all we don?t write code for the site do we??
Google in its wisdom is asking everyone to report this type of activity. The ultimate rat out session (anyone reporting to Google should be ashamed of themselves). They spread the word that if you see a website buying links report them to us (very Big Brother). And we may or may not penalize them for doing so. Huh? How does Google do that? They are going to penalize me for advertising on a relevant website? Since the purchaser has no control over the link how can they penalize me? That makes no sense and is very scary to consider.
Maybe Google wants to scare people from advertising on other sites so we just advertise with them??
We all know there is much abuse out there but there will never be a solution to this problem. All these people that lost PR will now adapt and start to sell links within the copy of their site or figure out another way to beat the system. Trust me, link sellers will figure out a way. And link purchasers will move their link budgets to sites that haven?t been affected.
Seriously do you have any idea of how many different options there are? Too many for Google to consider for sure. Basically all that happened is a re-shuffling of money from one link selling site to another. And when they get the PR slap they?ll move their money again. How will Google stop that??
These are confusing times and I think Google is going in a direction that is very bad. Being the link police of the world is not Google?s mission. Crushing little people (like John Chow) who write blogs is not Google?s mission. Google has a cult, evangelist following and I fear that as they become the dictator they are hoping to be they will lose the brand they have built. But hey, who am I to argue with the ruler of the world??
Please don?t crush us?.we don?t sell links ever!
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November 3rd, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Yes, I agree with you on almost everything. I think that it is all; very silly and that Google is trying to monopolise the field since they themselves do sell paid links and ads by way of ad words and ad sense.
They are trying to corner the market for themselves and if they do not watch out, soon someone is going to figure that what they are doiing amounts to unfair trade practises and sue them. I guess, in about a few mnths time we may get to hear the first of cases against Google on this issue!
November 3rd, 2007 at 1:18 pm
I must agree. Some big law firm ready to challenge Google on this issue could certainly make a name for themselves with a class action lawsuit. It would be interesting to see. But the law firm will need serious resources and big balls!
Google has crushed a lot of mom and pops. Seems very unfair. And Google is destroying thier brand image in the process. What’s more important to them?