Crowdsearch.me - Is this a legit approach?

[tcolling]

It seems like a less-than-white hat approach, and anyway I don't know whether or not it could work.

Does anyone have any advice about it?

Thanks!

[mcmrose2]

Thanks for the heads up, I was really unsure about this as well but really glad I saved my money by not buying into it!

Matt

[Arbeidslys.no]

Thank´s for this page, I have receive a email about this today for my webstore www.arbeidslys.no . I will not use money on something like this.

Preben Want
Manager
Arbeidslys.no

[momofactor]

Terry Kyle has a report on his results with CrowdSearch:

http://seotraffichacks.com/crowdsearching-work-seo-results-far/

[Ray-pp]

A nod from the wizard :0 - I'm counting this week as a good friggen week!

[tcolling]

Thanks, Rand.  It's kind of an honor to have you speaking up on my little question here!

It's probably predictable that someone (or more than one) would try to monetize this sort of trick, because of the Google pronouncements that you mentioned and the other articles that have appeared about CTR and time-on-site behavior.

Too bad.  I guess that we all have to actually earn all those visits and page views.  

[tcolling]

Thanks, Ray.  What you said confirms what I speculated - too good to be true.  And not entirely above-board, either.

[randfish]

Totally agree with Ray that this isn't a legitimate tactic, nor would I expect it to work. Google's got a lot of defenses and checks to prevent manipulation of this kind, so while it could have an impact briefly and in some SERPs, I'd expect it to be mostly a waste of time and money.

The only part I'll disagree with is Google's disclosure that they do (or rather "might") use pogo-sticking. I believe this was mentioned at a conference last year or in 2013, though I can't find the reference now. There's also lots of test evidence, including the experiment I ran live at Mozcon, this one from my blog: http://moz.com/rand/queries-clicks-influence-googles-results/ (which I did repeat with success), and some mixed results from Darren Shaw here: http://www.slideshare.net/darrenshaw1/darren-shaw-user-behavior-and-local-search-dallas-state-of-search-2014.

Queries and clicks are most certainly impacting rankings, though how directly and with what caveats/other influences we don't yet know (and may never).

[Ray-pp]

Is this a legit approach?

No, not really. Google has never confirmed the use of CTR as a ranking signal for their search rankings. And, services such as these point to the fact that if Google did use CTR as a heavy ranking signal, it could easily be manipulated. That's what this service is proposing they are doing, manipulating the search results.

Now, does CTR actually impact search rankings? It's only speculation at this time and does seem like a logical factor to influence ranking. Google wants to show the most relevant results to the user; the results that answer the users search query the quickest and most complete. However, I don't think it could ever be a heavy impact ranking factor because it can be so easily manipulated.