The Divide Between Search Engines And Seo's - "no Follow" Fiasco Options

[cre8pc]

I think Dan is onto something, with his intriguing I, For One, Welcome Our New SEO Overlords

He talks about Google's possible concern over paid links and a desire to slap "nofollow" on them because they fall under what the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) - (yes, USA only), says is "advertising". Therefore, there should be some sort of regulation over purchased links.

I had a few things to say, including

Let Google "nofollow" their own paid sponsored links and see how many advertisers they get.

The comments are worth going through. Everyone has good points and concerns.

Are people getting paranoid or becoming "helicopter SEO's?" (Hovering around too closely.) Why? Is there a blanket fear that a non followed link equates to an entire site not being crawled?

Here at the forums, outbound links are scrambled to protect us and keep the forums in good standing with search engines. This doesn't mean the forums are not crawled. It means links inside posts are not followed. There's a difference.

There are reasons to not want engines to follow outbound links. Search engines created this fiasco when they came up with links as votes. To help remedy this mess, they came up with various ways to stop bots from following certain links. It's a bandaid for a bigger problem.

Dan asks, "Will Google believe me"? in one example. Many SEO's don't sleep because of this fear of freaking out Google. Why have the SEO/SEM industry given search engines this much power and when are they going to say "enough"!

If you offer a paid links model, you offer a paid links model. If it feeds a child or pays for someone's health insurance, just do it and who in the hell should be worried about the Google Gods?

I like Google and love Matt Cutts, but the divide between marketers and sacred search engine ground is widening. Both need each other and Google acting deranged isn't helping matters.

Do you think paid links should be regulated by trade laws and how in the heck is it enforced? The FTC governs the USA. By shooing away income opportunities, site owners will simply go outside the USA.

[rynert]

If you offer a paid links model, you offer a paid links model. If it feeds a child or pays for someone's health insurance, just do it and who in the hell should be worried about the Google Gods?

I had/have this dilemma - we link out lots to sites that we feel are useful to our visitors. Occassionaly a company comes along and offers to pay to, in effect, replace the existing link with one to thier own site.

As long as I am happy with the quality I gladly accept the money.

Do I identify as a paid link? Heck no, why should I? Websites and paid adverts links were around long before google.

If that gets me in trouble with google, and my sites drop from the SERPs, I will be dusting of my CV (resume)

[cre8pc]

This isn't going away.

A blog directory is under fire for its JavaScript URLs given to blogs that submitted to it and alleged "nofollow" on RSS feeds.

BlogCatalog - Blog Catalog Doesn't Pass Pagerank

What trips my trigger is that some SEO's are becoming so desperate for page rank that it over rules business practice logic.

Marketing has never begun and ended at the search engine door.

[bwelford]

It makes me wonder whether Google has removed those 'Do No Evil' signs it used to be so proud of.

[iamlost]

Some clarification of the two nofollows::
1. The HTML meta element name 'robots' with the value 'nofollow' explicitly tells conforming bots to ignore and not to follow links on that page.

<META NAME="ROBOTS" CONTENT="NOFOLLOW">

the links in that document will not be parsed by the robot.

2. The Google (and other conforming SEs) proprietary HTML anchor attribute 'rel=nofollow' has no standard value. It's value is whatever a particular parser/filter/algorithm determines at a particular point in time.

The critical difference (other than variable value) is that a 'rel=nofollow'ed link actually is and always has been followed. It should have been named something like 'nojuice' or 'norep' as it was originally used to help SEs identify potentially untrustworthy or spam dropped URLs, discounting their ranking value. It was an admission that they had an internally unsolvable problem. Note that Google service partners appear to have a marvelous 'rel=nofollow' immunity.

Then it was promoted for internal PageRank flow adjustments.
Or help Google identify SEOed sites.

Now it is being touted as labelling for advertising.
Or help Google identify competing advertisers.

Matt Cutts, aka GWI (Google Webmaster Interface), is once again simply shovelling FUD - the FCC is a regulatory red herring. Those lemmings who blindly include 'rel=nofollow' deserve their SERP cliff-drop or extinction.

Whenever Mr. Cutts, informally, or Google, formally, suggest, request, or require a change (especially one they are not themselves implimenting) it is best to determine why. Note that it is rarely the reason stated. Start from the point of what it will do for them. Finish at the point of what value to you in acquiescing.

Repeat after me:
Google is an ad server that markets its products via a search engine.
All together now:
Google is an ad server that markets its products via a search engine.
Again...

[JohnMu]

It makes me wonder whether Google has removed those 'Do No Evil' signs it used to be so proud of.

Why do you say that?

(as to the rest I'll just shut up for a while )

John

This post has been edited by JohnMu: Sep 12 2007, 01:33 PM

[eKstreme]

It makes me wonder whether Google has removed those 'Do No Evil' signs it used to be so proud of.

They used them ages ago to power up a new datacenter. When they ran out of signs, they put up solar panels.

[bwelford]

Re your question, John, I had always assumed that proudly declaring that all should 'Do No Evil' was not just a minimum expectation. I perhaps naively read into that an encouragement to 'Do Good'.

In a society if members are trying to 'Do Good', that presumably is for the equal enrichment of all other members of that society. If everyone has good intentions, then presumably all are better off. If on the other hand, some while appearing to be operating with good intentions have hidden agendas to better their own situation then inequities will develop.

I know that view is not at all in sync with what is normally regarded as typical business ethics. The average company will be assumed to try to tilt the table in its favour. Google with its 'Do No Evil' seemed to want to be better than that average company. The current Google machinations on paid links and 'nofollow' show it's just like your average company. That may well be good in business terms but it isn't what they implied they would be doing.

[cre8pc]

Is page rank value the only reason site owners submit to directories, recip link or pay for links these days?

In the second link I point to, the blog directory is debated because of the JavaScript in the URL. I've never worried about PR value not being passed due to JavaScript because SE's don't execute scripts. I didn't realize people agonized over this until now.

I think there's a reason for "no follow" on RSS feeds but can't recall what it is. It's fine to follow the link but feeds weren't ever assigned PR, correct?

If true, then being angry for that action by the blog directory isn't logical either.

iamlost, excellent input.

What I am missing in my hopes to understand what's upsetting people?

[iamlost]

Is page rank value the only reason site owners submit to directories, recip link or pay for links these days?
...
What I am missing in my hopes to understand what's upsetting people?

1. Google has historically made a big deal about PageRank.
2. By imbuing PageRank with a value Google made it a commidity and created a market.
3. By prohibiting its sale Google boosted its value and ensured the market.
4. By retaining PageRank on its toolbar Google encourages its use.

So we have Google actively marketing PageRank and an entire industry built on its supply: it is actually a wonder that any of us link for any other reason.

The silly addicts are upset because an expected supplier actually wasn't. Addiction can alter the perception of reality creating pink elephants, Dali-scapes, or delusional expectations.

I wish more of my niche competitors were silly addicts.

[cre8pc]

Fascinating! The pot brews even hotter.

Andy Beard writes a response to the woman who complained about a blog directory not passing PR juice, in response to the link I posted earlier in this thread.

The discussion blew up and Danny Sullivan has now weighed in on whether or not JavaScript "onclick" code in a URL passes PR or not.

Blogcatalog - Does Onclick Pass PageRank?

[Ruud]

Frankly I'm amazed at the arrogance of saddling web site owners with a problem Google created, and compounded, itself.

How come more than a year after Big Daddy we're still talking about a manual solution while Matt said in March 2006 "As these indexing changes have rolled out, we’ve improving how we handle reciprocal link exchanges and link buying/selling" ?

Of course, in the end it is us site owners deciding, not Google:

What would the impact be of a No-Google attribute day? A 24 hour period during which sites en masse reject traffic which has Google as a referrer? What would happen with a search engine which can provide search results, but the results themselves lead nowhere?

It is said that another search engine is only a click away: if needed we can provide that click.

[bwelford]

You describe the situation very well, Ruud. Unfortunately corporate ethics does not seem to be considered when it comes to marketing situations where mega-bucks are involved.

[SEOigloo]

If it feeds a child or pays for someone's health insurance, just do it and who in the hell should be worried about the Google Gods?

For the record, I'm completely uninformed about all of this, because I have absolutely 0 experience buying links for my small business clients. We'd like to have the budget to have this headache

However, Kim, isn't the big fear here that Google will destroy your business model and cause you to be unable to feed your child or pay your health insurance? I thought that's what the fear was.

Am I wrong?

Miriam

[cre8pc]

However, Kim, isn't the big fear here that Google will destroy your business model and cause you to be unable to feed your child or pay your health insurance? I thought that's what the fear was.

If this is the fear, things are worse than I thought.

Too many businesses rely on Google for their success and when Google pulls the rug out from under them, they're screaming foul.

My feeling is that people have choices and if they want to gamble with paid links, it's their choice. I think some of the total crap sites we see, esp. splogs, are from people desperate to make a buck and think spam, stealing content, adsense, paid links, etc. are the fast track.

I think search engines are not Gods and have no right to decide if those links should be regulated by trade laws or earn any lessor value because there's a monetary value attached. I don't devalue paid spots on SERPs. It's a search engines choice to sell the space, display and do as they wish.

They can't do it and tell all other site owners they can not.

I remember YEARS back when link popularity was the new algorithm. Ammon and I fought a hell of a battle in forums in those days, trying to educate people on how a link vote is not an honest, fair vote or accurate measure of value.

We lost that fight, as you can plainly see