Are there any "legitimate" paid links in Google's eyes?
-
The news about paid link campaigns is so frequent, that I have to ask the question....does Google allow any paid links?
Aside from SEO, paid links can have visibility value. Much like an exit sign on the highway, the paid link says "Get off here"
-
Good response Barry. According to GA, some directories perform better than others. We assign a two-tiered cost index (cost per visit vs. cost per action). We obviosuly cull the directories that don't perform well.
Most of these are small regional sites that get significant local TV exposure and are quite cheap ($25). The group that makes the cut (see paragraph above) perform quite well.
Good point on the no-follow, but many of these probably don't have the sophistication to understand no-follow.
-
Do you mean that you'll be paying for sponsored listings, that these directories require payment for submission or that these directories require payment for review of the site?
If a sponsored listing, I'm pretty sure they should be nofollowed as it's technically an ad.
If they require payment for submission (ie, no cleverly worded terms of acceptance) then you shouldn't really be buying them.
If payment for review of your site, technically that's fine (though in reality very few sites will ever reject a paying site).
Ultimately, unless you're on some very shady directories, Google's not going to be able to tell what you've paid for and what you haven't.
Are you sure any of these directories actually get any sort of traffic anyway? I know as SEOs we all use them, but as a web user I've not looked at a directory since 1990.
-
Let's think more broadly. I have a client who wants to target brides to be. Obviously, a great source of visibility would be wedding related directories. It would be of great value (perhaps even greater than search in some cases) to have listings in these directories.
However, I certainly wouldn't want to be blacklisted.
In this instance, I would be using paid links to boost my online visibility in general, not to game SERPs. How can Google reconcile that?
-
As EGOL said, there are some paid for directories that are accepted (even authoritative) by Google.
Yahoo business directory, BOTW, Business[dot]com and JoeAnt to name a few.
That said I almost never use any of them now, the value isn't there to be in a page 12 levels down with no links in.
-
In addition to directories that charge for editors reviews or an approval process deeper than "pay and get listed", I think there are a few others. Any group like the BBB that give members a page or a link on their site are legit too. You aren't paying them for the link, but to be a member of their organization. Some of these sites are very similar to directories but a lot aren't.
A lot of charities will also give a link to donors, although this starts to get a little fishy with abuse.
-
Right.... If I started a directory under the "pay me for a review" basis and gave people followed links I bet that Google would bust me.
-
I always thought Google's policy towards the Yahoo Directory was strange. However, perhaps it teaches us that if the directory charges for something other then placement (i.e. pay us and we'll expedite adding your listing to our directory) then the paid link is "legitimate".
-
does Google allow any paid links?
Google is the biggest seller of paid links on this planet.... Adwords... lol
The Yahoo! Directory is a white hat place to pay for a link.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Links on Brand Banners
Hi, For one of our ecommerce clients, we have brand banners on each brand page that links to their most popular product lines. Some of the banners just have a column of links, and some are paragraphs with copy and anchor text. Example below: Brand Line 1 Brand Line 2 Example 2: For the utmost in quality, performance and comfort, purchase Brand Line 1 . Brand Line 2 offers the perfect ease of use for beginners while not compromising on quality. Obviously these are just examples, and there are several links (more than 2) per brand, but I was wondering if this harms SEO in any way because of keyword stuffing? It makes sense to have the brand name in the link, otherwise the name of the lines might not make much sense (an example of this is one of the lines is called 849.. so without the brand name that doesn't mean much and looks weird) Do you think it would be better to have the links in just columns in the first example, or in paragraph format?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AliMac260 -
Pinging Links
Interested to know if anybody still uses the strategy of pinging links to make sure they get indexed, there are a number of sites out there which offer it. Is it considered dangerous/spamy?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | seoman100 -
Google Finance Filled with Spam
Not sure if anyone else does anything with Google Finance. In the last few months, I have been noticing a lot of spam sites filling the search results in Google "ticker pages". In this example you can see 4 or the 5 top results are from the same blog network with spun low quality content.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | SuperMikeLewis0 -
Canonical tags being direct to "page=all" pages for an Ecommerce website
I find it alarming that my client has canonical tags pointing to "page=all" product gallery pages. Some of these product gallery pages have over 100 products and I think this could effect load time, especially for mobile. I would like to get some insight from the community on this, thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | JMSCC0 -
Why don't I outrank this site?
Hi Mozzers, I'm mystified. Why doesn't our site www.bosphorusyacht.com (ranked 15) outrank this site www.bosphorustour.com (ranked 5 and 6) for the keyword "bosphorus cruise"? Particularly for US based searches. We have far more links, shares, higher DA and PA and more related unique content on topic. Somehow they are even appearing with double listings in this search. Why is this? Am I missing something? Any ideas or suggestions appreciated.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | emerald0 -
Has google done well with these search results?
I am struggling to grasp the new logic behind google, my understanding was that they wanted to return more related searches so that the search matched the results giving people exactly what they are looking for from trusted suppliers. However I work in the vacation rental niche and I have found that the individual long tail searches have started to become less valuable as they are no longer giving the exact property. Here is a screenshot of the top 10 results for the key phrase "10 bedroom villas in quinta do lago" Position 1 & 2 are good results and would be expected however the next 7 positions are completely not related to the search, yes it is quinta do lago. But I am looking specifically for a 10 bedroom villa, none of these pages offer 10 bedroom villas. I actually found my listing outside the top 20 and mine is a 10 bedroom villa in quinta do lago. Does anyone have anything that can enlighten me on this? Thanks Andy 0bqdRJi
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | iprosoftware0 -
Secretly back-linking from whitelabel product
Lets say a company (provider.com) offers a whitelabel solution which enables each client to have all of the content on their own domain (product.client.com), with no branding by the content provider. Now lets say that client.com is a site with a lot of authority, and to promote the launch of product.client.com, they put a lot of links from their main site to the subdomain. This can be very valuable link juice, and provider.com would like to be able to take advantage. The problem is, that client.com wouldn't like it if provider.com put in links on their whitelabel site. Suppose the following: All pages on product.client.com start to have a rel="canonical" link to themselves, with a get variable (e.g. product.client.com/page.htm -> product.client.com/page.html?show_extra_link=true) When the page is visited with the extra get parameter "show_extra_link" a link appears in the footer that points to provider.com My question is, would this have the same effect for provider.com as placing a link on the non-canonical version of the pages on the whitelabel site would?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | seoczar0 -
Link Building: Location-specific pages
Hi! I've technically been a member for a few years, but just recently decided to go Pro (and I gotta say, I'm glad I did!). Anyway, as I've been researching and analyzing, one thing I noticed a competitor is doing is creating location-specific pages. For example, they've created a page that has a URL similar to this: www.theirdomain.com/seattle-keyword-phrase They have a few of these for specific cities. They rank well for the city-keyword combo in most cases. Each city-specific page looks the same and the content is close to being the same except that they drop in the "seattle keyword phrase" bit here and there. I noticed that they link to these pages from their site map page, which, if I were to guess, is how SEs are getting to those pages. I've seen this done before on other sites outside my industry too. So my question is, is this good practice or is it something that should be avoided?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AngieHerrera0