Yahoo has indicated that when they role out their new overture/yahoo ad system, it WILL contain a quality score.
If you moved your spend to yahoo, be prepared. No idea whether it will be as dramatic or be calculated in similar ways.
That will leave you with MSN, which, at the moment, is showing between 80-100% of ads (on terms I search on) it displays as fake directories, other MFA type sites, and other no content material.
Yahoo has indicated that when they role out their new overture/yahoo ad system, it WILL contain a quality score.
We have nothing to worry about - as long as their quality score has anything to do with quality.
Yahoo doesn't have this luxury so I suspect that their quality score is going to be much less impactful than Google's. Not to mention the fact that they are struggling to simply release their system by Q1 07 - my bet is that the Yahoo QS doesn't get fully baked in until at least Q2 or Q3 of next year.
Yahoo doesn't have this luxury so I suspect that their quality score is going to be much less impactful than Google's.
Could be. I wouldn't bet my livlihood or business on it.
It'll be interesting. Google has such a huge theoretical lead on creating a quality network over yahoo (and it's a light years lead over MSN).
Yahoo has to address quality or end up as the "less quality" ad system for both advertisers and publishers. How and when and the impact is only speculation.
If they don't get it together, they will be like MSN is today. Completely swamped by junk ads to junk sites. I mentioned it's the equivalent of Castro sending all his criminals and drug addicts to the shores of the U.S.
The google junk is starting to move because it has no choice, so it's now the msn and possibly the yahoo junk.
Anyway, junk sites are slated for complete obliteration by the Vogons by mid 2007, so if you have a junk site playing in the shadows, I'd suggest investing in a towel.
Nice thing is it's so clear this is "coming" eventually, that it's possible to plan for it, and go legit, or get out.
Anyway, junk sites are slated for complete obliteration by the Vogons by mid 2007, so if you have a junk site playing in the shadows, I'd suggest investing in a towel.
Question and a comment. First, what is Vogons? It sounds like some far-flung race from Star Trek.
Second, I generally agree with you that there are a lot of "junk" sites that probably should be eliminated from Google/Yahoo/MSNs rankings.
That being said, I have problems with a system of getting rid of the junk sites that a) does not explicitly explain why a site has been penalized; b) has no formal appeals policy; c) appears to be over rather than under inclusive.
Here's a comparable analogy: local governments have the right to condemn property if it is deemed unsafe. Of course, the local government can't just send you a notice saying "congratulations, your house has been condemned!" There are clearly defined laws that explain to homeowners the factors that could lead to condemnation. And once the government initiates proceedings, the homeowner can go through an appeals process to argue his case.
Imagine what would happen if the government could kick you out of your house, simply because a few officials thought your house was "junk." When you complained, the response was "we took a lot of factors into account, and we came to our conclusion." You certainly wouldn't be happy about it.
So, right now, a lot of AdWords advertisers aren't worried about Quality Score because it doesn't impact them. They see MFA sites getting inactivated and they say "well, serves them right. They're junk sites." The problem is, if it happens to you, and you think your site isn't junk, and there's nothing you can do to get your site live again, you won't be happy.
I'd like to see Yahoo and MSN take a more open and fair approach than the Google Quality Score (and of course I'd like Google to do the same).
I'd like to see Yahoo and MSN take a more open and fair approach than the Google Quality Score (and of course I'd like Google to do the same).
The Yahoo QS sounds as if it's going to be a lot more transparent. Supposedly, you will be able to see what your QS is going to be per ad-group (or however it is that they are going to break it down). On top of that, although I suspect they won't give you the exact formula, they are meant to be giving proper guidelines on how you can improve your QS so there's none of this 'black box' rubbish that we have to content with at the moment.
To me it sounds great, although I hope it will be a lot more reliable and less clunky than their current implementations :)
I just don't expect it, but the truth is, it's fairly transparent to ME, and since we develop content rich sites, and build sites to provide value (often for free) to visitors, is probably one of the major reasons we didn't get hit, except for one day, by QS.
Next. Google and government are completely different things with completely different obligations. Bad analogy.
Next. The sites I've looked at from people on this forum, who claim they sites are wonderful (QS wise) ALL have problems in terms of value, perception, etc, when viewed from a perspective other than the owner. One guy submitted his site to a directory that had a public review process, and the comments (valid, probably) were MFA, deceptive, no content, and on and on from about ten different people who reviewed his site. He, of course, simply argued. And then got hit with QS.
Next, my understand the Yahoo QS will be more transparent in terms of informing the owner of a rating or number. I'm not aware that any specific information as to WHY the rating was assigned will be available (it might be, but I think Yahoo would be foolish to do so).
Finally, transparency (so that they provide real information that can be used by webmasters, specifics) is great, but the truth is the more information they provide, the more that the system will be gamed. It's pretty obvious from comments here that some webmasters simply want to "get around" things.
That's not good for anyone except the webmasters who want to sneak around things. Not good for advertisers, visitors, google, yahoo...
Nobody.
I don't think you are going to get what you want, so it will do you any good. Maybe a few more general hints and tips.
QS is a black box. It's not as much of a black box as it was originally, and the bottom line if you want to understand it, and be treated well by it is look at your site from the point of content quality and originality, areas of possible appearance of deception, and other things that regular visitors look at.
It doesn't take genius to understand that a site that has no privacy policy, not contact information, is registered anonymously, has no way of knowing who runs it, bids on thousands of terms, has no content that distinguishes it from the other million sites in the nich, has the max number of ads on each page, and on and on has much less value than other sites to visitors, and hence to google.
When I end up at such a site, I won't buy from it, and I don't even bother reading the limited material. I go where I can trust owners who are WANTING to be visible, and seen as reputable.
Google has said all this in one manner or another, sometimes veiled, sometimes more direct. If people don't know how to run reputable businesses, use their brains to do so, I don't see it as google's function to help them figure out three things to get around quality and value requirements.
If you want to know why companies like ebay and amazon get all those ads shown, there's a hint. They ARE providing value (even if their ads, the ebay ads particularly) are a scourge, IMHO).
