In what ways would an affiliate site be okay with Google?
-
I know Google has slammed affiliate sites hard. But affiliate marketing can be a real business and had an idea for one, but I would like to know if ALL affiliate sites are looked at as evil in Google's eyes, or if it's just those with thin and duplicate content in the product descriptions.
I know they want brands to come up ahead of affiliates of that brand, and that makes sense. If I sold Acme Widgets products, Acme Widgets itself should come up ahead of my site. But what if the site sold widgets in general, with the term widgets not a branded keyword? If all product descriptions are unique and well-written content, on a site that is high quality, would it still be downgraded by Google just because there are affilate links in it?
I guess overall the question could be boiled down to, are affiliate sites hit because they have horrible content or because they have links to affiliate programs in them?
-
.....since "real" ecommerce sites don't run ads as well?
Sure they do. Haven't you seen ads on amazon.com? They are called "product ads from external websites" (look low on the page on right side). Ebay has lots of ads. Hayneedle stores have ads (look at bottom of page).
I run ads on my ecommerce sites and block ads from direct competitors. I vary their position depending upon how much I want to throttle my sales.
....I have a site now on precious metals which is high-content, low amount of adsense...
Adsense does better for me with precious metals content than affiliate links. But, then it will depend upon the type of content that you have. Some topics inspire shopping more than others. Of, course the PM sites will gladly buy links from you.... but I am not a seller.
I was thinking I might choose one metals broker affiliate link (like a Goldbank or someone) and place it in the sidebar. Would that small change screw up my rankings?
Probably not... if you nofollow the link.
And, "a site with a shopping cart operated by the affiliate program" I'm not clear on this. Why is that?
It makes you look like a retailer instead of an affiliate.
-
You said, "build a content site with a store, a content site with affiliate links instead of ads" Yes, I'm thinking I'd have many times greater pages with content versus product pages, and the product pages would have long, original content on them. You also said, "affiliate links instead of ads" So, having both ads and affiliate links indicates that I'm not that serious I suppose, since "real" ecommerce sites don't run ads as well? Interesting, this is unrelated to the site I asked the question about, but I have a site now on precious metals, which is high-content, low amount of adsense. I was thinking I might choose one metals broker affiliate link (like a Goldbank or someone) and place it in the sidebar. Would that small change screw up my rankings? And, "a site with a shopping cart operated by the affiliate program" I'm not clear on this. Why is that?
-
Affiliate sites get hit mainly because they are usually just signposts for someone else.
If you want to survive as an affiliate build a content site with a store, a content site with affiliate links instead of ads, or a site with a shopping cart operated by the affiliate program.
-
Affiliate sites are hard to rank because a great number of them are thin pages, scraped content and basically provide little value.
Affiliate sites in the pills, porn or casino niches will also be a lot more difficult to rank... but if you are opening up an affiliate site outside of those niches, and concentrating on providing useful content, then it should be just as difficult as any other site - depending on the competitive landscape.
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
-
UK Affiliate programmes as an advertiser
Hi, I'm looking into setting up an affiliate programme (as an advertiser). The company offers commercial mortgages for a UK market only. I was wondering if you had any experience with any UK affiliate platforms and had any recommendations? I want to test the water with a platform first as we don't really know whether it will work for us or not. We're looking at it for lead generation. Potentially offering payment on a completed mortgage or a lower payment per lead. I think it may be worthwhile offering both options. I'll have to work out the model, but we can make it work nicely for the publisher, I think. Thanks, Amelia
Affiliate Marketing | | CommT0 -
Affiliate marketing: yes or no?
Hello, A colleague recently asked me about affiliate marketing for our clients, and my answer for a few years now has been emphatically "no", because I had not seen it done in positive way. How does everyone weigh in affiliate marketing, and what companies and/or software would you suggest? For example, is http://www.admedia.com/ a reputable source? I see lots of bad reviews on these guys. Any thoughts, suggestions, etc would be extremely valuable. Thanks in advance!
Affiliate Marketing | | lfrazer0 -
Can 302 chains (affiliate links) from "toxic" sources hurt you? Or are you "shielded"?
Hi, I'm going through some affiliate links, which send visitors to our website via a chain of several 302 redirects Some of them are relevant links, others perhaps not so much. I know that Google doesn't pass PageRank on 302s... But are they still considered valid links that pass, let's say, "reputation", "relevance", "link neighbourhood" kind of signals? Otherwise put, is a 302 similar to adding the "nofollow" attribute on a link? Sort of? Not at all? More succinctly put, should I be worried about "toxic" sources separated from us by 302 redirect chains? By the way, yes I recognize that (Google's 302 redirect chain handling aside) associating our brand with perhaps what some might consider spammy websites is not in general a good move; I'm concerned with the technical SEO implications here however. In fact, this technical information may very well help drive decisions/policies on where we allow our affiliate advertising to appear. Thanks 🙂 PS - The affiliate company by the way is cj.com if that helps
Affiliate Marketing | | ntcma0 -
Linking from High Authority Sites
Dear Mozzes, We're running a property portal for real estate classifieds which receives around 300.000 visits monthly. PA 47 DA 37 Mozrank 5,3 MozTrust 5,8 PR 4 Apart from our real estate classifieds we are producing proprietary trends and statistic, a rare commodity in the country we operate. Luckily we are about to enter into a partnership with one of the leading newspaper portals in the Country, appreciating PAs in the 80-90s. In this coming partnership we will provide: 1. Market statistics, which we can imagine as a chart followed by our logo and a "Powered By", which shall link to our site. 2. An in-framed part of our site in their portal where we list properties for sale, that will carry affiliate strings. In order to for us to get the maximum link value of this high authority site, how should we build the integration and linking? We've looked at similar examples here http://realestate.money.cnn.com/ here http://realestate.money.cnn.com/NY/New_York/ or maybe like the Simply Hired logo here: http://money.cnn.com/ Advices here would be super appreciated. Thanks Eric
Affiliate Marketing | | PropertyPortal0 -
Using follow links on client and resellers site
Hi, i have a backup software product that I sell to business. I would like to create a badge that says something like "powered by x backups". This would be an image with a href url pointing back to my company site. I would intend to give the client a discount if they were to place the small logo in the footer section of their website. I would also like to offer this to resellers. For example "Authorised reseller of x backups" badge that could be placed on the resellers website. I would like to do this for two reasons: To promote my company to the visitors of the clients website To build link juice Would this be effective in building quality links? It this type of link building allowed by google? If not, how strict are they? Is there any variation of my intended promotion strategy that would be more effective? Thanks
Affiliate Marketing | | blakadz0 -
Is setting up affiliate marketing on website worth it for a small businesses?
Is setting up affiliate marketing on website worth it for a small businesses?
Affiliate Marketing | | seoukrsf0 -
In search of the perfect SEO affiliate ID'd URL
Hi, I'm building our own affilaite system. I want to make sure I get as much SEO benifit from affiliate links as possible so I am in search of the perfect solution. My thoughts after doing a bit of research are to do the following - using the # as my identifier: 1/. Use an ID like www.mysite.com/#A123 2/. Redirect via 301 these urls to www.mysite.com Any thoughts on this, or other things I should be thinking of with regard so building an affilaite system that has strong SEO benifits? Thanks
Affiliate Marketing | | James770