Can I be an affiliate of a link farm

[getxb]

I launched a directory at the end of 2005 and its doing pretty well in the major search engines. Recently I received an email from a 'link farm' asking me to be an affiliate. They have given me a very good offer. In return they are asking me to place their advertisement at the top half of every page as they say chances of conversion increases if I do so. The link will look something like http://www.example.com/?referrer=11157 What I fear in this case is this link will be considered as a 'bad link' (bad neighborhood site) by the search engines especially google. OR my directory may also be considered as a link traders. Am I right? Please suggest.

Regards,
getxb

[edited by: martinibuster at 4:26 am (utc) on Mar. 23, 2006]
[edit reason] examplified url [/edit]

[jimbeetle]

I think since you used the words 'link farm' and 'bad neighborhood' in the same question, well, you've answered the question for yourself.

[designaweb]

Yup - stay away from them. Even if all would work as you would hope - don't you feel it's your duty as a webmaster "to make this WWW a better place"?

[sugarrae]

>>>don't you feel it's your duty as a webmaster "to make this WWW a better place"?

No, but I'd stay away from them anyway ;-)

[getxb]

Thanks all of you for your comments. So its better not to be an affiliateof a 'link farm'. If I had been an affiliate of a 'link farm' smart webmasters would have opted not to submit their sites in my directory for the same reason and it would have stopped my directory from getting expanded. I have already mailed them siting the reason for my declination.

Regards,
getxb

[SuddenlySara]

What type of affiliate program would a link farm have? Are you sure they are a link farm?
Not that they sound like a good idea anyways needing to contact you out of the blue.
And telling you to put the banners on top of all pages because they convert better. Oh will they really?:)

[designaweb]

No, but I'd stay away from them anyway ;-)

Hmm... Guess you're one of those MFA millionairs then eh?

[getxb]

Hi SuddenlySara,

Hope I could have posted the details of the program! Anyways its a link farm for sure and a link farm can have an affiliate program of their own. But yes I am now least interested about the program and is thinking of some alternatives .. may be something like an adsense program to start with. What do you suggest?

Regards,
getxb

[sugarrae]

I actually do very little Adsense as far as percentages of totals go. ;-) No one said I didn't create good sites. I just said I don't feel it is my duty to make the web a better place. LOL. I'm not a big enviromentalist either, but that doesn't mean I toss trashbags on the highway. ;-)

[goodroi]

don't litter on highways or the information highway
or at least don't get caught or admit to it :)

If you do want to join a questionable affiliate program be sure you are comfortable enough that it will not risk your business plans and that you will actually make profit from the venture. As for linking out to the affiliate program, there are several ways you can hide those link from the spiders so they never see it.

[getxb]

Hi goodroi,

Thanks for your comments.

I agree that there are several ways to hide links from spiders. I do rely on JS and Flash a lot. But I am not very much comfortable in risking my new site .. I heard about that there are quite a few human crawlers who might visit your site anytime and check for anything (!). How shall I hide my links from them I have no idea. So I will stick to something like sponsored ads or some day I may launch paid inclusion schemes. My main moto is to be build an online community oneday and I am preparing myself for that. Is PHP Nuke the best option for that? Please dont think myself as an expert in this field .. but I am learning as far as I can.

Thanks to all for your comments and suggestions.

Regards,
getxb

[designaweb]

I actually do very little Adsense as far as percentages of totals go. ;-) No one said I didn't create good sites. I just said I don't feel it is my duty to make the web a better place. LOL. I'm not a big enviromentalist either, but that doesn't mean I toss trashbags on the highway. ;-)

Point taken :)