Page 2 - This whole "buying links is bad" thing is really irritating

This is absolute garbage, think about it:

1): Adsense does not pass Linkjuice, its a paid link system for gaining click through traffic.

2): Google does not penalise any other paid link system for gaining click through traffic which uses nofollows to stop linkjuice from being passed.

There is no attempt to stop systems where people benefit from traffic they gain from a clickthrough on a paid link.

If it was an anti-competitive measure then the regulatory bodies would be down on them like a ton of bricks!

This is a really really simple concept to grasp.

I think that you can definitely debate whether Google's policies are good or bad. One could even argue that it's an Anti-Trust violation for them to forbid link selling and then make a fortune selling links.

The problem is that they never said that. They said you can sell links but they should be nofollowed if they are not editorially endorsed. Adsense links don't pass any juice so they are following their own terms in their link selling business.

Then you could debate whether or not it's fair for them to dictate that webmasters should use nofollow, but I think it's important to have an understanding of why they are chosing to combat link buying. If the search results can easily be manipulated then crappy sites will make there way into top results and users of the search engine will get crappy results.

I definitely expect high quality results when I search so personally I'm glad that Google spends time trying to keep spammers out.

I suppose that as long as links hold huge power over search results this debate will continue.

Adwords doesn't use nofollows, so then by their own standards they're cheating

Yahoo Directory is paid and does not use nofollow, ask has PPC and is not using nofollow....

There must be some special elitist list that Google has of people that can sell links but not use nofollow

For starters to see an adword in the serps you need to do a search, something a spider won't do, and i doubt very much that Google spider their own SERPs anyway. Secondly the adlink (and this goes for ads on the content network) are not direct links, they go through a redirect script first. No Juice is passed.




Yahoo have an editorial policy.

Ask PPC I would assume does something similar to Google..

At the end of the day for all we know links from Ask and Yahoo are maybe being devalued by Google, these are not Google sites, you can't blame Google for their actions!

The Internet was created with the idea that "the market would determine and regulate itself".

This is quickly turning into "Google determines and regulates the Internet"

Some of the coolest sites out there are flash based. What kind of natural Google listings do they get (especially if they don't buy paid links for SERP manipulation)? Don't you think the Google users would benefit from seeing those in the Google results?

I'm surprised this many people are even arguing with me? The nofollow was created for stopping blog spam, now all the sudden people selling links need to use it?

Don't give into what the bully tells you to do just because they're bigger, it will get us as an industry nowhere.

No it doesn't! Google don't aim to list the most successful moneymaking sites online (unless you search for that term - lol) they aim to list the most relevant.

Um, no! You just better hope you make a profit.

Absolutely... the most relevant result in terms of content should rank #1 irrespective of money spent on site design and advertising.

Then they'd be wrong too!
Re: the bolded bit: Sorry CD but that's cobblers... and (with respect) it's even more arrogant than you are accusing Google of being on this issue.
Here's a silly example:
I can build a website about me and spend nothing on it.
You can pay $1million for a designer to create a website about me...
Mine will still be more accurate/relevant 'cos you and your designers know nothing about me.

You seem to be looking at the entire internet from a business standpoint but billions of people add content to the internet with no thought of financial gain. Who are you to say that those who wish to give away their knowledge for free always know less than those who charge for it?


***
As you were adding that comment I was just editing my post to add:
On the plus side CD - you did make this a really interesting debate

I'm sorry, but i totally disagree with you.

Google are not stopping anyone from selling links, if you want to be in Googles index then you have to play by their terms of service, if you don't want to follow their rules then accept that you run the risk of being booted out.

I do not think that penalising links purchased for SERPs manipulation is a bad thing. If natural listings can be bought in this way then it means the person with the biggest budget wins, and I as a searcher would like to find the most relevant results at the top of the listings, not the site with the biggest marketing budget.

Google know this, and it's why they are combating it, if the natural serps become non-relevant through the actions of link buying for SERPs manipulation then they will lose their natural audience.

What they are doing is actually good for anyone in the industry who actually knows how to fully optimise a site and not just rely on buying thousands of links. They are actually making a positive move for the SEO industry.

As a new site owner with most my competition using paid links, this subject is very frustrating. I have written to many average related personal websites and gotten a reply to the effect of: How much will you pay, you know my sites a PR whatever. Even the average Joe is cashing in and understands the Value of a link.... and that people will pay.

Nothing's free (the creators/workers of everything free profit- facebook, wikipedia, open source, red cross, you name it).

You can have the MOST RELEVANT SITE EVERRRRRR!!! But that won't matter when 18 million people go there, and press the back button within one second and never even see any of that content lol.

I can't even understand the way you think which is why this debate is such a major surprise to me (I expected people to be like, "yeah, that's lame blah blah").

Do you think that there are seriously SEO's that spend their lives doing this so that they can show their friends and family their results or something? I mean, I'm sure there are, but they are also still living in their parents basement! This is a capitalistic economy, and sorry, but so is the Internet.

This isnt' THAT big of an issue, it's just a small cog in the wheel, but like I said in the title, it irritates me as someone who has always played by the rules, yet sees a whole lot of others (such as Google) breaking rules and making MILLIONS and even BILLIONS of dollars

As a new site owner you get the benefit of ranking higher then 90% of your competition without buying any links (for your intro period in Google). Take advantage of it, it won't last long!

No I don't. But SEO's don't create all websites and neither do companies/commercial enterprises.

No it's not!
First off - it's your economy, not mine... (You have gotta think globally dude)
As for the internet - it's simply a (relatively free) form of communication and primarily a source of free information. Do you really believe that most people who open a browser do so because they want to spend money?

Of course many commercial/capitalistic companies/organisations/people take advantage of it and so do many non-commercial/non-capitalistic people/organisations.

Google just wants to give everybody a fair chance, to make sure they return the best results for any given search query, no matter how much was spent producing/advertising the sites.

David,

I agree with you, nothing is free, I don't operate sites for fun, I do it to make money, I earn money by affiliate sales, so the users of my site get a free service (guides, tools, forums, reviews etc) and I earn from sales of products i refer.

Now I like to think that my sites are relevant in their subject areas because of the fact that I provide an information and community service to my site users, Google notices this relevance and ranks me well for the relevant keywords.

My site users win as they get my service for free.
Google win as they have a good relevant site to put in the natural serps.
My merchants win as they get qualified leads and sales (the links to the merchants are nofollowed btw)
I win as I make an incredibly good living out of it.


Now why should someone who puts up a crappy thin affiliate site that adds no value for the site user and then pumps thousands of dollars into link buying deserve to have a spot in the SERPS above me? There are more losers:

Site users get no tools, information or community
Google loses as their searchers get disapointing results
Merchants lose as they do not receive such qualified traffic meaning less sales
The site owner actually loses as they've chucked a fortune at paid links and neglected to build a site which will inform and help sell their merchants products.