I stole your link

and your ranking article

[wheel]

this is a bit more aggressive than I normally get. An affiliate (and a crappy one at that) got a link off a blog I have some connections with. The article is mealy mouthed nonsense, and I posted a comment noting this. The blog owner actually edited the post to address some of my concerns, that's how bad the article was. (the affiliate is an affiliate, not an expert in my industry).

Today for some reason, that article is ranking. So here's my email to the blog author:

Hey (blog owner's first name)

This article: {link to article} is an absolute mess. I'm not looking to tear down your content, but I do want to suggest that people reading that article are being done a disservice. You've ended up promoting a #*$!#*$!#*$!XX - they don't even have contact information on their website, how serious of a business is that really?

The article is ranking right now. I'm prepared to give you an expert level article with plenty of consumer tips - if you'll replace the existing article at that url with mine.

that's a bit of an aggressive tactic, but I'm assuming you've got no real ties to this guy. And if you're getting traffic on that article, you'll be far better served with an article I'll write for you.

Let me know - If you're amicable, I'd like to get this up this weekend while you're getting traffic to that page.

pwned. I'm pretty confident I'm going to have my article with link published on a currently ranking page.

[wheel]

I should point out that I'm careful with one thing - I attempt to show them why they care, not why it's good for me. The fact that it's good for me goes without saying.

[wheel]

Aaaaand sold. I have to write an article tomorrow, the blog owner is going to swap out the affiliate's article for mine. And since the article for some bizarre reason is ranking, that puts me on the front page in numerous spots again.

[ken_b]

Do you think swapping the articles will affect the ranking?

[Planet13]

Just so I understand...

The crappy page on Site A that ranks well was written by an affiliate, and links out to the Affiliate's site (we'll call it Site B).

And the owner of Site A gets paid a commission for sending traffic to Site B from that article, right?

So you will have to pay Site A commission for any traffic that comes your way from the article your wrote, right?

Or is Site A an affiliate of Site B, and Site A gets a commission for sending traffic to Site B?

[wheel]

Blog A published an article for affiliate site B. No commissions to Blog A, it's straighforward link building. Not the post links to me, again no commissions being paid.

Now my article will be up tomorrow. So at a minimum, it should rank until Google reindexes it.

No idea why Google has ranked this article. It's ranking on a pretty darn competitive term, almost at the top (it's beating me on one of my primary terms). And it's a crappy article. I have two quality articles published on the same blog already and they don't rank.

It will be interesting to see if the change affects the rankings. I fully expect the article won't rank forever anyway, it's bizarre that it's there in the first place, a crappy article on a pr3 blog.

I know bumping links of competitors is a tactic. I've never used it. But it sure worked this time, got me a link and got a competitor kicked out.

[Planet13]

Ahh... thanks for the clarification. When you had said "affiliate" I immediately thought of ecommerce.

But instead it looks more like a straight "exchange content for links" and I am assuming Site A monetizes their site via adwords or something along those lines?

No idea why Google has ranked this article... And it's a crappy article. I have two quality articles published on the same blog already and they don't rank.

Yeah, well, Welcome To Google SERPs 2011!

Your current articles that don't rank might be TOO helpful for visitors, or TOO well researched, or TOO articulate for google's tastes...

Wasn't there discussion in the google forum about the optimum grade level for content being 7th grade?

[wheel]

Well, my rankings don't really fluctuate - but clearly others do, and I know there's some weird stuff that gets thrown up into the serps sometimes. This is one of the weirdest examples I've seen to date. I've seen this stuff before, but this is on a competitive term - a trophy term. And it's ranking like #2. It's beating my site.

Possibly the affiliate has thrown a bunch of backlinks at that page that's causing it to rank. Certainly the blog owner hasn't done that. And I doubt it's ranking due to any type of user experience measurement, the article is actually garbage, a step above a poorly spun article.

[wheel]

Looking at the backlinks of the blog article was interesting.

There's a few links. Some of them seem to be almost run of site, but what's happening is that the post was linked to by other blogs - and the other blog seems to have a seperate page for each comment.

So blog B links to Blog A via a blog post B, but Blog B has a page generated for every comment posted on blog post B. So if there's 30 comments, then Blog Post B shows 30 pages with a link back to blog post A.

That's the first thing I noticed. There's also something to do a blog related service that I'm not quite clear on, that seems to be shovelling some links to the page.

Perhaps none of this makes any difference, but this post ranking is surely showing some very odd attributes that Google must be looking for.

[Planet13]

So blog B links to Blog A via a blog post B, but Blog B has a page generated for every comment posted on blog post B. So if there's 30 comments, then Blog Post B shows 30 pages with a link back to blog post A.

Are the one Blog Post and the 30 comments on Blog B (which are divided among 30 pages) actually valid comments? Or are they spam / spun comments?

(off the top of my head, having 30 blog comments on separate pages that all link to Blog A seems like a BIG RED FLAG to me. Don't know if google would really give that value...)

And any idea if Blog B was created by the same person who wrote the crappy article that appears on Blog A?

[ptmhanley]

Nice play Wheel! Thanks for sharing. :)

[tangor]

Let us know what results occur after the next index by SE (g or b). Content will have changed, of course. Will there be a sandbox or new content? A bonus? Or a loss?

[Planet13]

Any updates on this, wheel?