Link industry "outrage" raises a smile.

[glengara]

Recent developments by one SE seems to have put paid link proponents in a bit of a spin.

They like to portray the SE as some kind of latter day Canute but in truth buying links is very much a minority sport, unless you're into Houston real estate, trying to flog little blue pills or maximise your AS revenue there's really no need for most of us to go there.

[wheel]

Keep saying that. It'll sound good until you get someone who's buying links walk in and own your SERPS. And you're spam complaints to Google go unanswered. Then link buying might start to look a bit more interesting.

If it works, and there's no real signs that it's going to change, then your choices are either to join 'em or carry on about being 'too white hat for that' as others own you.

I've watched two sites waltz onto the front page of some very competitive terms - sauntering right past my hard fought quality links from authority sites and .edu's pointing at my 5000 pages of original content. Despite Adam Lasik's suggestions in another thread here about developing quality unique content and interesting tools (which is what I've done), they can't tell paid links from squat unless they do a hand job. If I want to beat them I (and you) know how to do it. And to date I have yet to hear one real suggestion from anyone as to how Google can actually catch a decent paid link.Threats and bluster, but actual 'here's how they'll do it', nobody's got a clue that I've seen.

My attitude is that right now it's easier to rank than it's ever been. A couple of hand jobs to scare the easily frightened doesn't change that. Don't make it a knee jerk reaction, sit down and honestly evaluate the risks vs. the rewards.

[johnser]

to date I have yet to hear one real suggestion from anyone

I got it direct from Adam that they look at things like:

> surrounding text
> all footer links
> in a sentence
> multiple outbound links
> topicality of linking page
> & 1-2 more things

Whether it's true or not, your guess is as good as mine.
Something else he told me sounded ridiculous but when I checked it out, it was 100% accurate.

Basically, they're very aware of this.

They're going to hit it at some point. If you look at hotels & mortgages in 1 (unnamed) country you can see that 2 sites on top of the SERPs have thousands of rented links from a network of same-owner sites. These'll be the 1st to get hit. Guaranteed.

"Easier to rank than ever" as you rightly say Wheel.

We're advising all clients to look at this option because it's working currently. We're also keeping them fully advised of the serious risks involved. After that, it's their call. Who knows how long this'll last?
J

[Marcia]

> surrounding text
> all footer links
> in a sentence
> multiple outbound links
> topicality of linking page
> & 1-2 more things

I've seen all those being gotten around using paid links, and in markets not nearly as competitive as little blue pills - including more than 1 or two more things that would pass the sniff test on pages. And the sites doing the buying (plus a couple other things that are the current rage, but as yet unmentioned *anywhere*) are thriving. I've not seen those "other things" mentioned by Google, and not even on SEO message boards.

The problem I'm concerned with is that links that aren't paid for could be mistakenly construed as being paid links.

[edited by: Marcia at 11:59 am (utc) on Oct. 18, 2007]

[CainIV]

Actually, I've used paid links - the right ones - to an advantage SEO-wise, so if the majority of SEO / Marketers don't use them, this is probably an advantage to us who do.

Big difference between generic paid links and specially crafted unique paid links, generally crafted through ongoing personal discussion with site owners.

[glengara]

I never suggested paid/exchanged links didn't work, just that it's a bit rich to complain if you do get dinged for using them :-)

The latest PR hit is a hoot, you have all these "serious" SEO types who would normally denigrate the importance of PR suddenly up in arms.

I'm lovin' it :-)

[iamlost]

I'm lovin' it :-)

Me too. :-)

[Crush]

The latest PR hits were funnily enough on high profile sites. The Google spin machine at its best trying to scare of all the masses. I prefer to buy links for instant hits. I can achieve good results in weeks compared to months of link monkey work.

[KaloVast]

Yeah, if i'm going to pay for links it's going to be strictly based on Paid Search, not link building. I am taking the related links section off or our site and disseminating those links throughout the content of our site (where applicable). I am also going to start research sites a bit more heavily to find good places (not on their links pages) where our links would fit. This makes more sense to me than paying for links when i'm essentially already doing that for Paid Search.

I don't like the idea of paying a company to put my link on their page unless i'm getting significant visitor traffic from that link. Otherwise, i don't see the draw in paying for a link that won't yield any visitors, but instead serves to buck up my presence on SERPs. I just dont like the idea of paying for a link and not having any idea how well that investment really pays off for me. I could give you $50 to put my text link on your site, but i'm only going to feel i'm getting a return on my investment if visitors come over via that link. In my opinion it's pointless to pay for links if you're simply looking to increase your presence on SERPs because you don't have any idea how much an individual link plays into it.

[TimmyMagic]

In my opinion it's pointless to pay for links if you're simply looking to increase your presence on SERPs because you don't have any idea how much an individual link plays into it.

This is true, you don't know for sure. However it isn't pointless if you're given a boost in the SERPs and as a consequence make more money. That is the entire point!

I have several paid for links from a few selective websites. I don't do them purely for the SERPs, but because I think I may get some traffic from them too. Targetted traffic I should add. As long as the traffic brings in some sales, I can deal with them not breaking even if I think it is helping my ranking in the SERPs.

I won't buy any old link in the hope it'll help with the SERPs. I only buy if I think I'll get a bit of traffic AND think it'll help with the SERPs.

[jakegotmail]

The problem I'm concerned with is that links that aren't paid for could be mistakenly construed as being paid links.

Thats it. That is why we havn't already seen a link devaluation to date that google touts about.

I bet they have tried, and I can only imagine what the serps looked like on there staging servers. Craptastic to say the least.

[wheel]

I just dont like the idea of paying for a link and not having any idea how well that investment really pays off for me. I could give you $50 to put my text link on your site, but i'm only going to feel i'm getting a return on my investment if visitors come over via that link. In my opinion it's pointless to pay for links if you're simply looking to increase your presence on SERPs because you don't have any idea how much an individual link plays into it.

This is a bit oversimplified IMO. No, there's no specific dollar amount you can put on a link bought for SERP purposes. But it's not terribly difficult to get a reasonable estimate of what a link might be worth, based on a variety of factors. Age of the domain, quality of backlinks, content, placement, and so on. Know your market well enough and you can in fact put a dollar value that you're comfortable with on a bought link. I can certainly tell within about $20 what I'd be willing to pay for any given link.

Alternatively (this isn't my approach, I value links individually) it's as easy as noting that if you spend $5K on backlinks and you know that this will get you near the top of the serps, and that positioning will bring in $10K a month in business, well, I'd be happy to start putting a value on the links.

I think it's interesting that right now link buys are very much a 'buyer's market'. The amount paid out to buy good links in many cases is tied to the value to the seller, not the value to the buyer. It's not at all like PPC where there's a competitive market. You can get outstanding (and I mean outstanding) permanent paid links from places for $50 or $75 because that's good money to the seller for a fast link. There's no connection to the fact that the link might actually be really worth $500 a year. For you paid link buyers, I'd hope that the market doesn't become saturated fast enough for this to become an issue.