Are Invisible Links Always a No-No?

a non-profit question

[myrrh]

I'm using AdWords to drive traffic to landing pages on my < not-for-profit website > with the intent of attracting visitors to < a live event >. I want the reader to be captive on that landing page with the exception of a "learn more" link at the bottom.

I want to maintain the look & feel of the rest of the site, but I need to do something with the nav bars on these landing pages.

A) I could make the nav bars' text invisible but my concern here is would Google see hidden text as spam and not rank the landing pages well/at all for organic search?

B) I could get rid of the nav bars completely but my question here is, would getting rid of those make an AdWords slap more likely?

<Sorry, no specifics.
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[edited by: tedster at 1:13 am (utc) on Mar. 12, 2007]

[Robert Charlton]

myrrh - I would always avoid hidden text and hidden links.

If you're using the same landing page for organic search as well as for ppc, then the page needs to be fairly well integrated into the site to rank well.

I'd recommend that you perhaps remove some, but not all navigation on the page, but keep what you have visible... and, more important, that you make your "learn more" link very prominent, perhaps even a graphic button up near the top.

[dickbaker]

And, if you get to ranking well for those hidden links, and I'm your competitor, you can rest assured that I will report your site to Google, and you'll be banned.

Don't try to trick Google. Just do it the right way.

[tedster]

Your PPC landing pages can be dedicated exclusively to that purpose and excluded from the regular index via robots.txt or meta tags.

[londrum]

why not remove the anchor tags, but still leave all the buttons and text in place.

you could grey out all the buttons, or fade down the links or something, so people can still see them but will know they're not clickable.

[lfgoal]

"I would always avoid hidden text and hidden links"

Could we get a definition of hidden text versus hidden links? Hidden text is obvious. But what about visible text on a page that includes a link but is not underlined as a link. It functions as a link and the text is visible. Is that a hidden link?

[reprint]

It doesnt have to be underlined to be a link nor do the search engines require it to be underlined so no, it is not a hidden link.

[lfgoal]

Thanks reprint. That's what I thought but its nice to hear even the basics confirmed by someone else.