[AJ007]

One of my friends in the mobile space told me about some app doing this, but I don't know if AppGratis. At least one mobile app was offering a free app of the day and charging thousands of dollars for the placement.

Not my strong area, but I will point out that the rest of the blogger's post is fantasy. If you are correct, then nothing he wrote is right.

- Paid links is not blackhat SEO. Blackhat SEO involves building links though browser exploits and spam & getting referrals from hijacked pages that rank well. Major newspaper brands sell paid links. No one would call them or their customers blackhat. In fact, buying links is considered whitehat SEO.

- Paid results absolutely do not take in to account a user's satisfaction. Google has a list of prohibited types of ad customers some of which is strictly enforced (things that are illegal under federal law) and other parts that are not enforced at all.

- Studies have shown a large % of Google users do not even understand that the top ads are ads. Take a look at it some tip on an older LCD screen with a poor viewing angle and you will notice the pink background color is imperceptible. This is intentional.

- Google's job is not to provide the best results. It is to provide the results that benefit them best. ( http://www.benedelman.org/news/011212-1.html )

I'm not sure who the original author is, but it is a bit disturbing to me that there are people in this industry that have swallowed Google's propaganda in its entirety, and then are applying those concepts to the world at large. Assuming he is not a Google employee, I think he may be in for a shock on how brutal, inconsistent, and cut throat this business is.

[dools]

Couple of points:

Paid links are black hat SEO. If you sell links you should be putting rel="nofollow" on them.

Also Google does do a pretty rigorous job of combatting paid ad spam. They have many ad text and landing page policies designed to weed out sneaky affiliate deals and the like. They also reward advertisers that provide more popular user experiences through their quality score mechanism which is a direct (and very significant) factor in cost per click.

It could be AppGratis was just as rigorous in their evaluation of offers - I also don't think its a very valid analogy nor do I disagree with you generally save for those 2 points.

[jacquesm]

> If you sell links you should be putting rel="nofollow" on them.

Is there a law that states that you should do that?

Is this 'best practice' without which clients no longer function?

[dools]

It's one of Google's guidelines. If you buy or sell links without doing that you risk being penalised by Google. Whether or not that matters to you depends on your site/business.

[Matt_Cutts]

"Paid links is not blackhat SEO"

Of course it is. Blackhat SEO is SEO that violates search engine guidelines. Here's the link that documents that paid links that pass PageRank violate Google's guidelines: http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&...

[jacquesm]

Paid links are simply ads.

That you happen to rely on links for your rankings and that you can't distinguish between paid links and non-paid links does not make every paid link blackhat SEO. Blackhat implies malice. You'd have to distinguish between a paid link that is an ad versus a paid link that is there just to improve search engine rank.

Good luck with that.

I can see why google has a problem with this but let's face it: short of looking at the books and being present during meetings you'll never know whether a link is:

(a) paid (b) not paid

(c) just an ad (d) an attempt at increasing search engine rank

[dools]

It's not the same as ads - the guidelines only refers to paid links which pass PageRank (ie. Without nofollow on them).

Doing something to achieve an SEO benefit that is in contravention of the guidelines of the search engine you are optimising for, because you assume you can't or won't be caught (for example because they can't look at your books and weren't present during the meeting where you sold the link) is the definition of black hat SEO.

It may well be the case that Google lacks the ability to enforce certain aspects of their guidelines at some points in time, but as we have seen in the past couple of years when they do figure it out it can be a business closing event for some.

Much better to just follow the guidelines don't you think?

[lnanek2]

> - Paid results absolutely do not take in to account a user's satisfaction.

I think he was referring to how the clicks on your ads are tracked and you have to pay more to get an ad in if it doesn't attract many clicks (and it doesn't place as high, and you may not even be eligible). This is a feature of AdWords advertisements.

E.g. You can say that if someone searches for cheese, then sees your ad you setup for that keyword, then doesn't click, then that ad was not good for them.

Google's write up is here: http://support.google.com/adwords/answer/2454010?hl=en > Having a high Quality Score means that our systems think your ad, keyword, and landing page are all relevant and useful to someone looking at your ad. ... > Higher Quality Scores lead to lower CPCs. That means you pay less per click when your keyword has a higher Quality Score. ... > Higher Quality Scores lead to higher ad positions. That means your ad can show up higher on the page when your keyword has a higher Quality Score.