V7N Contextual Links Getting Publicity

[John Scott]

Cool beans

[lizza]

Hello John,I just sign up as a publisher.
Good luck to this new launch program

[John Scott]

Thanks, Lizza!

[Richie_Ni]

Originally Posted by Aviva

Got some foreign coverage too:

http://www.dutchcowboys.nl/search/9205

Cool!
The post got some good responses too,but I can hardly understand it!

[kiviniar]

Well i just signed up...Great stuff John

[vangogh]

John and Jeff now that I can see how the program works do you mind a few questions?

I'm curious if advertisers have any control over which sites end up including their link or if there's any control over the anchor text that gets used in the link?

Similarly do publishers have the option of which sites they link to? Would publishers have a list of sites to choose from when adding a link?

Are there any controls over how many other links would appear on the page or where within the content the paid link would need to be. Does it have to be in the first 'x' paragraphs? Can there only be 3 other links on the page? Things like that.

Sounds like a good program and hope you don't mind the questions.

[John Scott]

I'm curious if advertisers have any control over which sites end up including their link?

No. Right now we send it out to the most relevant and most clean blog with PR3 or better.

if there's any control over the anchor text that gets used in the link?

Advertiser specifies the anchor text.

[John Scott]

Similarly do publishers have the option of which sites they link to?

Publishers can and do reject sites.

Does it have to be in the first 'x' paragraphs?

No.

Does it have to be in the first 'x' paragraphs?

No.

Can there only be 3 other links on the page? Things like that.

No.

No rules that would create a footprint that Google could detect.

[vangogh]

Thanks John. I had a feeling about the answers, but it's always good to ask. I think you hit on a really good idea. It's one of those ideas where as soon as you hear it you slap yourself on the head, say d'oh, and wonder why you weren't smart enough to think of it first.

[John Scott]

I gotta say, it is an awesome program. I wish it was available years ago. Instead of spending thousands of dollars every month renting links I could have done this and got permanent links.

[Forsh]

Congrats on such a successful launch Mr. John Scott in Japan . Sounds like this is going to be a huge thing. Now you make me wish I had a blog.

[Will.Spencer]

I just put $1,000 into the pool. Let's get this party started!

[Aviva]

Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

I just put $1,000 into the pool. Let's get this party started!

Thanks Will!

Blogged about by Peter (well, the other Peter):
http://www.petertdavis.net/231-google-killer/

[asshur]

I will want to join it soon, John.

[kagemusha]

Matt Cutts has his eye on your network, John.
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/undetectable-spam/

Any response to his statements?

[John Scott]

http://www.internet-marketing-blog.c...-should-chill/

[Will.Spencer]

These links might be pretty easy for Google to detect. Here's (roughly) how:

• Google identifies a site which they believe is buying links. Remember, the only criteria for guilt is that Matt Cutts doesn't like you. You have no rights. You are guilty, period. You don't see the charges against you, you don't get a trial, you don't get an appeal.
  
• Google identifies all links pointing to that site.
  
• Google identifies a second site which they believe is buying links.
  
• Google identifies all links pointing to the second site.
  
• Google maps the inbound links to those two sites which are common and makes that a list of suspected link sellers.
  
• Google then takes that list of suspected link sellers and find all of the sites they link to. Those sites then go on a list of suspected link buyers.
  
• Google makes a list of all common links into the sites listed as suspected link buyers.
  
• For every common outbound link, Google adds one point to the sites "link selling score."
  
• For every common inbound link, Google adds one point to the sites "link buying score."
  
• Google sets a threshold at an arbitary number of points. If a site crosses the link selling threshold, Google removes it's ability to pass PR and relevance. It a site crosses the link buying threshold, Google penalizes it's PR and SERPS.

Google could even do this with just one seed site, but the results would be less reliable.

Remember -- Google doesn't give a damn if they penalize a thousand web sites accidentally to catch one SEO. There is absolutely no penalty to Google for penalizing a site incorrectly. They are truly "above the law."

[John Scott]

Search engines can guess, but they cannot know.

[Aviva]

Will, that's a thoughtful post. It's the first time I've seen someone try to explain a mechanism precisely - everyone else just uses handwaving.

Thanks for making this list. However, I'll play the devil's advocate.

I don't think that this will work. Here's why:

Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

These links might be pretty easy for Google to detect. Here's (roughly) how:

• Google identifies a site which they believe is buying links. Remember, the only criteria for guilt is that Matt Cutts doesn't like you. You have no rights. You are guilty, period. You don't see the charges against you, you don't get a trial, you don't get an appeal.
  

• I'll play Google for this. I believe http://www.seobook.com is buying links. (OK, I don't really, I'm just using this as a test site).
  
  

  Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

  Google identifies all links pointing to that site.
  

  Google identifies a second site which they believe is buying links.

  OK, let's choose http://www.seomoz.org for this. (Again, I doubt they're buying links, this is just as a test).
  
  

  Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

  Google identifies all links pointing to the second site.
  

  Google maps the inbound links to those two sites which are common and makes that a list of suspected link sellers.

  Common inbound links:
  
  http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/blog/
  http://www.copyblogger.com/
  http://www.internet-marketing-blog.com/
  http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/
  
  Etc.
  
  All obvious link sellers...
  
  

  Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

  Google then takes that list of suspected link sellers and find all of the sites they link to. Those sites then go on a list of suspected link buyers.

  All those sites link to Google. Google is now a suspected link buyer!!!
  
  

  Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

  Google makes a list of all common links into the sites listed as suspected link buyers.

  Now Yahoo!, MSN and Ask are in on it too.
  
  

  Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

  For every common outbound link, Google adds one point to the sites "link selling score."
  

  For every common inbound link, Google adds one point to the sites "link buying score."
  
  

  Google sets a threshold at an arbitary number of points. If a site crosses the link selling threshold, Google removes it's ability to pass PR and relevance. It a site crosses the link buying threshold, Google penalizes it's PR and SERPS.

All these link sellers and many more link to Google. That's a pretty high link buying score. We better penalize Google so they don't benefit from all this link buying.

[Will.Spencer]

And now it turns out that Google Video is Selling PageRank to Advertising Partners.