12 replies to this topic

[tommr]

Recently, I received an email from a site owner looking for a link from a blog post in one of my sites.
He submitted an article that contains a link. The article, while grammatically correct is worthless filler.
His site does not offer much, no ads, nothing for sale, just some information on artificial flowers.

The only outgoing link on his site is in the wp footer and it is to a word press travel theme much the same as any "powered by" links.

He offered me $150.00 to post the article in my blog and asked for my paypal address.

I could use $150.00 but at what cost?

I tried to check the site and from what I can figure it is not blacklisted or listed as a spam site.

Has anyone heard of a similar situation and what might the dangers be.

Thanks

[Dr.Marie]

My rule of thumb is to only add an outgoing link to a site if it is going to benefit my readers. Period.

When people contact me about advertising I tell them that I do accept advertising on my site but that all links from ads are nofollowed.

I know $150 sounds great for adding a link, but if it was me, I'd run fast.

[A.N.Onym]

A few points:
- if the article is worthless, it's not worth publishing, period, regardless of the money involved
- I wouldn't link to a useless website for any amount of money, either, unless it's counted in millions, so I can semi-safely retire the website (again, unless it's my main addiction vocation project)
- the amount of money paid for the link is probably enough for a not very popular blog or a very narrow niche. But, given the above, I wouldn't touch it.

In short, like Dr.Marie said, I'd ask for $10mil for posting the article. Either way, you win

[EGOL]

I would simply block the person's email address from my inbox.

[DonnaFontenot]

At what cost?

1. The possibility of being penalized by Google for selling links. (Unless you nofollow it)
2. The possibility of harming your reputation with your users, if the article is bad and/or the site linked to is bad.

If you're desperate for the money (and I know there've been times in my life when that was so), then it might be worth it. But you have to understand the risks involved, and not cry or moan later if the cost overtakes the benefit.

Risk vs. reward

[jonbey]

Why not offer to publish the article and the link for a 1 year period and state that the page will have to abide by Google guidelines and will also state that it is a sponsored article / advertorial? Then you can add nofollow if they agree and if you feel uneasy about it at least you can remove it after a year?

Article marketing / advertorials have always been big business in the old media world. My main concern will be what they plan to do with the site. Maybe they are link building for an innocent looking site, knowing that they would struggle to get links once the "real" site is live. But you could work that into the contract, i.e. only link to the site so long as it remains a site about artificial flower, or at least does not start promoting various more dubious topics.

[AbleReach]

If the article and the link were good enough to feel proud to offer them *and* I felt I could trust the article to be unique, I'd not hesitate to publish it. If any of those things are not scrupulously true I would not touch it with a ten foot pole.

As far as the issue of paid links, if everything else was in line, I'd probably offer a paid ad on the same page and then treat the article like a guest post.

[EGOL]

If the article and the link were good enough to feel proud to offer them *and* I felt I could trust the article to be unique, I'd not hesitate to publish it. If any of those things are not scrupulously true I would not touch it with a ten foot pole.

As far as the issue of paid links, if everything else was in line, I'd probably offer a paid ad on the same page and then treat the article like a guest post.

I agree with this.... if the article was great and unique (and would not be duplicated elsewhere) I would publish it for free. If they had great information that my visitors would be interested in on their website I would give them a two sentence blog post and link without any payment. But whenever they want to buy a link or an ad I would tell them it would be nofollow.

I get offers for paid links and paid articles a few times per month. If you write back and tell them that the links will be nofollow. They never write to you again. It is probably better than a spam filter.

[jonbey]

If you write back and tell them that the links will be nofollow. They never write to you again. It is probably better than a spam filter.

This is not a set rule. I have published articles with nofollow. There really are still some companies, albeit very few, who want the article / readers of your site, not the SEO link. Generally I find that PR companies are like this. If the request comes from a company that is very much a visible, public relations and marketing firm, then they are usually happy to pay to publish articles with nofollow in them. Generally (at least for me) the SEO article buyers are the ones using a webmail address and are very cagey from the outset who they are placing an article for.

[EGOL]

You are right, jonbey..... people who want to get the word out about something simply want the exposure.

[Dr.Marie]

My experience has been the same as EGOL's. Any time I have had someone ask me if they could put an article on my site (either paid or not), I respond saying that I would definitely consider publishing their article, but just so they know, all links would be nofollowed. No one has ever responded.

[A.N.Onym]

Yup.

They write that they seek publicity and want to place a paid advertisement in a form of text with a link included, to which I respond, "Sure, since it's advertisement I'll just nofollow the link." or "Alright, it'll cost $100k/yr.", to which they never respond

Edited by A.N.Onym, 29 November 2011 - 07:01 AM.

[DonnaFontenot]

Just to show the other side of the coin...

A few months ago, I got a similar email. I replied with "I don't sell text links unless they are nofollowed". I fully expected to never hear back, like always. However, he emailed back and then asked about an image ad, to which I replied, "Sure, that will be $1500 and it will also be nofollowed." Later that day, I was $1500 richer and the man was happy with his nofollowed image ad.

So...sometimes things work out, even when you've expected nothing.