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The only request of his client is that the link doesn't stand out on the page.
Huckster chooses a tightly written, poetically versed "." and decides to use that as the text for his link... next to the client's "Privacy Statement" link. So now it reads "Privacy Statement." but it's actually two links.
Huckster is feeling pretty clever. Too bad he doesn't act the part.
Consequence? Anyone with an opinion? (lol!)
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This post brought to you by the Anti-Graybar Association (patent pending).
1. what if a visitor actually wants to see the privacy statement. It would seem that huckster doesn't much care if his client's creditability is cleverly reduced.
2. PageRank (and link pop) is no replacement for good SERP's, an anchor text to "something SEO something" or a graphic, would provide better ranking in terms of targeted queries. What is a . link anyway?
3. A couple thousand "." links may be good ego food, it will produce excellent Link Popularity, and PageRank, but it still comes back to...
Targeting the wrong keyword query "." and you have produced nothing!
Using a . as a link makes it stick out like a sore thumb, i.e. pagerank is what they are wheeling and dealing.
Maybe it would be a ton more credible (and legitimate) if it was just a normal text link, with, dare i say it, keywords that clearly explain the destination page.
Huckster's client was reading your posts and politely asked Huckster to remove the "." next to their privacy statement link.
Huckster is now getting inventive!
He's created a 10 X 100 clear graphic at the bottom of his client's indicia (again, on every page). The ALT tags reads "huckster keyword, huckster keyphrase, huckster, keyword, huckster, keyphrase".
Huckster feels that he's more clever than ever!
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So what happens now when Google dances? Does Huckster get penalized or does he jig?
Once upon a time, a text link was an advertisement. Maybe if I can claim ignorance to SEO, Google, Pagerank and everything else in here I can still innocently use text links for ads.
'tis not a publishers fault for google using pagerank to measure a site/pages importance, after all, text link ads have been around for longer ;)
But Googlebot will have done that already with "clear graphics" on every page leading to the exact same external site?
None of this will ever put huckster at number #1 for SEO, search engine opitimization, search engine positioning, search engine ranking which are the most common keyword phrases under what huckster is trying to achieve, and at the expense at his current clients.
Remember "if" huckster gets penalized, all the clients get penalized for voting for him. Will he... probably not, but I definitely wouldn't bet my clients websites and my livelihood on these tactics.
vitaplease, I'd be surprised if the automatic penalty caught the clear image, but if the process helps huckster to get ranked well under anything remotely competitive then he may get human review at some point anyway.
HyperGeek, I guess that huckster's client continues reading these posts and politely asks for the clear images to be removed. huckster might choose to include the link text but style it as normal body text.
It's no longer hidden, it just doesn't look like a link. Do we advise the client to ask for its removal?