Luigi the Blacksmith
I’m reminded of a joke that talks about a blacksmith named Luigi who lived in the Welsh Valleys. Luigi was complaing about a nickname he had acquired and how his reputation had been damaged. All his long life he had worked hard as a blacksmith, fitting new shoes, looking after the horses of the farmers and the gentry, he really thought it unfair that he should be labelled in the way that he had. “20 years a blacksmith, I’m Luigi the Blacksmith, 2 minutes with a sheep and I’m Luigi the sheep shagger”
Reputation hits hurt
The serious point is that for whatever reason, this blog like many others appears to have taken a visible greenbar hit. The greenbar representation does not equate to this blogs link profile.
My little Luigi joke is related to the fact that I have actually made in the 10 months I’ve been blogging here just one sponsored review (which was clearly labelled as such) does this make me some kind of link selling evil seo bastard? Of course not, it’s ridiculous to assert such a thing, yet why else? Why else has this blog seen such a marked drop in its green toolbar PR?
I really wasn’t going to say anymore on this PR thing(plenty has been said already) but I was kinda narked so decided that I just had to pass comment - get it off my chest and be done with it.
I don’t really care that my visible PR has been penalised, but I do care about the reasons behind it, I think it’s an infantile and ridiculous thing to do, the sortof thing some blind cyclops might engage in some cave somewhere.
Last week this blog had a toolbar PR of 4, yesterday it was 3 today it is 2 tommorrow I might be 1.
I don’t sell text links
First off, for the record. I do not sell text links on this website. I’ve discussed things like reviewme and payperpost and TLA and sponsoredreviews because they happened to pertain to what some of what this blog discusses, which so happens to be the monetisation of written content.
Lets take TLA for example, I like many others have a link through to their stuff via some affid banner or text, mine happen to be nofollowed. I nofollowedthese because I’m not a total idiot, I have no desire to stick two fingers up to a company that happens to deliver paying customers every once in a while, that would be silly, that said I still have the right to monetise what I do in any way that I choose to, it’s for me to weigh up the pros and cons of course. Which is why I took the decision to nofollow my PPP and TLA links from the outset.Ithought thatthiswas what people like Mr C had requested. I didn’t like it, but took a broad based decision deciding it was one of those fights for another day.
The reasons were 2 fold.
Reason 1 as I’ve said already I didn’t want to antogonise the 800lb gorilla and reason 2, I didn’t want to leak any juice to stuff that basically already had my tacit support by virtue of me placing their code on my real estate. That action alone was enough, they didn’t merit site wide dofollows too, that would have been like me paying them twice.
No Nofollow blog?
Perhaps they don’t like the fact that by and large this happens to be a dofollow blog. I allow followed links for those who take the time to comment here. Those who are denied are usually done so on the back of a choice taken by me that feels that they are either spamming me or just generally have one of those aint worth sixpence type websites.
Suffice to say that there is not one thing I’ve done on this blog that is outside of any search engine guideline.
Don’t poke the big fat ape
Ive critiscised them a little sure, who hasn’t and why wouldn’t I even. Christ I blog about seo and search engines, lots of others do too. I ask my readers questions I am genuinely interested in what others think, it’s one of the reasons why I post little polls and ask sensitive questions. If that’s a reason (which I doubt) then that’s just a little pathetic. Google have to recognise that criticism comes with the terrority. The feudal lord has raised his tax take,people will complain and criticise, it’s part of the human condition, always has been always will.
Begging forgiveness
Would I consider a reinclusion request and admit to ‘wrong doing’ or ‘badness’ or being evil? Heck no. Their egos are theirs and theirs alone to live with, why the fuck should I go cap in hand confessing like some remorseful sinner for something that is so asinine it’s barely worth geting flummoxed about!
As Andy said in a previous post when he was first slapped. To those who don’t know and view the Pagerank green bar thing as a signal of quality, then it looks like I have a low grade shitty blog. Google is saying this blog is crap and not to be trusted. That really isn’t on.
Whoa whoa calm down…?
Of course…all of this could but be a step back to the days of old where PR updates were a part of the regular landscape.In the absence of any official statement from the Google FUD machine it’s all people can do but speculate.
Lots of people today are reporting fluctuations, some blogs that had seen a toolbar drop the other day have seen a return to form, others (like mine) have seen a worsening.
Andy put together a little list
| Domain | Starting PR | 1st PR Update | 2nd PR Update | Today’s PR |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| www.autoblog.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| www.engadget.com | 7 | 7 | 5 | 5 or 7 |
| www.problogger.net | 6 | 6 | 4 | 6 |
| www.copyblogger.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 6 or 7 |
| www.joystiq.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| www.tuaw.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| www.searchengineguide.com | 7 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 5 |
| www.searchenginejournal.com | 7 | 7 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| www.johnchow.com | 6 | 5 | 4 | 4 or 5 |
| www.quickonlinetips.com | 6 | 6 | 3 | 3 or 5 |
| www.seroundtable.com | 7 | 7 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| weblogtoolscollection.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| andybeard.eu | 5 | 4 | 3 | 3 4 or 5 |
| www.blogherald.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 4 or 6 |
| www.Forbes.com | 7 | 7 | 5 | 4 5 or 6 |
| www.sfgate.com | 7 | 7 | 5 | 5 or 7 |
| www.washingtonpost.com | 7 | 7 | 5 | 5 or 7 |
| www.technosailor.com | 6 | 6 | 3 | 3 or 5 |
| www.9rules.com | 8 | 8 | 5 | 4 5 or 6 |
| blog.nafurai.com | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 or 2 |
| courtneytuttle.com | 3 | 2 | 1 | 1 2 3 or 4 |
| www.SunTimes.com | 7 | 7 | 5 | 5 or 7 |
| TheGadgetBlog.com | 5 | 5 | 3 | 3 or 5 |
| Space.com/ | 7 | 7 | 5 | 5 7 or 8 |
| OneMansBlog.com | 6 | 6 | 4 | 5 4 or 6 |
| entrepreneurs-journey.com | 6 | 5 | 3 | 3 or 5 |
| The following are site updates which were not hit by a penalty previously for comparison purposes | ||||
| www.hobo-web.co.uk | 7 | 7 | 7 | 5 |
| www.doshdosh.com | 4 | 4 | 4 | 6 |
| www.searchengineland.com | 7 | 7 | 7 | 7 |
| www.seomoz.org/blog | 5 | 5 | 5 | 6 |
| www.connectedinternet.co.uk | 6 | 6 | 6 | 3 or 5 |
| More news and updates available from source Andy Beard - Niche Marketing | ||||
I don’t get why Google are getting so hatey with the people who collectively, helped them become as strong and as wealthy as they have. Its like we all created a Frankensteins monster that is just out of control having swigged a bottle of A grade Vodka smashing up the laboratory, trying to get to Dr Frankenstein and wring his neck!
It’s bad bad karma, its arrogant, it’s lots of depressing little things, that for now I’ve already spent far too much of this precious thing called life on.
Have a great day!
If you really really liked this post you might even want to buy me a Stella Artois :D
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O - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 1st, 2007 at 1:04 amI think if at any point a company becomes status quo to the effect that it actually influences individual’s blogging strategy or habits, it’s time for a little self reflection. It’s enough for getting penalized for duplicate content. It should focus more on being audience friendly than making it’s audience bend to it’s standards. I frown upon people being put in a position to actually have to consider bending over backwards for approval from a search engine. In such a situation, I’d suggest anyone look for a new strategy to bring visitors to their site.. like maybe some targeted direct marketing in their niche.
robwatts - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 1st, 2007 at 8:11 amHi O,
Bang on target - I think they are caught up in some kind of bunker mentality. It’s pretty sad really, I happen to have a degree of sympathy with why a group of people could end up in that mindset, but as you point out, they also need to realise that in many cases they end up throwing out babies with bath water and alienating people into the bargain. They need to find a way around that.
O - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 9th, 2007 at 9:01 amI couldn’t agree more with the “baby with the bath water” statement. I ended up ranting about Google on my blog. Fact is, I like Google services. I just don’t like most of Google’s standards. My blog isn’t private but I also restrain from promoting it. I’m hoping when I set up this other blog I’m doing, (which will be more public) that I can challenge some of the misconceptions out there when it comes to popularity.
robwatts - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 9th, 2007 at 8:26 pmHi O
Sounds good, please let me know when its up and running, I love a challenge to a misconception or 3
Tinu - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 11th, 2007 at 8:46 pmTry as I have to ignore page rank, and as much as it’s my policy to tell others to do so, it’s a long term message. Because when you look at that indicator and think yours has dropped… ow. I’m still at the same spot on the visible toolbar, but I’m one of the few that hasn’t done any sponsored reviews in my main site.
Which led me to believe that Google was putting a hit out on Pay Per Post or other sponsored review sites, which is part of why I wrote that article asking whether Andy Beard got a raw deal. You’ve already written about why other factors should determine popularity… I’m just empathising, really…
robwatts - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 12th, 2007 at 7:26 pmHiya Tinu - I think everybody got a raw deal. Yet, from the Goog perspective they obviously felt something needed to be done and for them that happened to be these various visible pens. Its certainly stimulated debate and maybe made a blogger or 2 reconsider their positions, but long term I can’t help but feel that this will be a big loser for them.Who knows maybe it’ll be known as the only we are allowed to make money penalty.
Jan - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 15th, 2007 at 3:13 pmI personally don’t care abour PR. It doesn’t reflect the quality at all.
Your traffic can be measured in thousands a day and you can still have PR3. And when I am posting this comment, I don’t care about this page’s PR completely. It’s a good post which is worth leaving a few lines
.
robwatts - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 15th, 2007 at 5:50 pmHi Jan
Thanks for that, comments from people like yourself are always welcome
So confused.. - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 18th, 2007 at 7:20 am“First off, for the record. I do not sell text links on this website.”
I’m really confused now. At http://www.yackyack.co.uk/blogging/bidvertiser-review-sponsored/
the first sentence you wrote was “This is a sponsored review of the bidvertiser @advertising program@” and “advertising program” is a direct link. The link is text, and earlier in the sentence you said the post was sponsored. I guess I don’t understand.
robwatts - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 18th, 2007 at 9:52 amHello So Confused
I’m not surpised you are, lots of people are.
There is a distinction between the selling of text links and a sponsored review.
I don’t view that review as the selling of text links. I wrote that review based on my honest assessment of their program. How I linked to them had nothing to do with anything, it was in my gift, they didn’t specify that I had to, they didn’t ask. It simply maded sense to link to them in context as I would do when writing about anyone else.
The funny thing is that before that review was written, I’d already discussed them elsewhere about a week or so prior, albeit not as in depth or as critically here
http://www.yackyack.co.uk/bidvertiser/bidvertiser-monetizing-a-blog/
To clarify, had you approached me and said, “rob, I’d like to buy a text link with the keywords blah blah blha” then the likelihood is that I’d decline your request.
Had you approached me and said “Rob I have this product that I’d like you to have a look at and give me your opinion on and I’ll pay you for your time” then I’d probably have a look at it and make a decision.
1000’s of websites review products and goods out there on the Internet. Many are paid too, be it via commissions or whatever other form of compensation they happen to recieve.
Google have paid links all over their website, as do Yahoo, Business.com , Live.com, Ask.com. Google even have a premium spnsor type page whereby people have paid them money and are then flagged up as a good reason to use adsense or adwords, case studies even.
Read this story here
http://www.blogherald.com/2007/11/17/google-selling-links-for-1995/
Then visit this page here
http://www.google.com/enterprise/mini/success_stories.html
Techcrunch use thankyou pages to thank their advertisers
http://www.techcrunch.com/2006/06/02/techcrunch-sponsors-thank-you/ for their patronage, again using plain text or anchor text links. Can you see any reduction pagerank for them?
The bottom line is that Google have gone OTT on this one.
Lies, damn lies and PageRank statistics • Tim Nash UK SEO Blog - SEO blogger to SEO evil link selling bad ass spammer bastard
November 19th, 2007 at 8:42 am[…] hit with penalties and more people talking and linking to these sites then hot dinners, people like Rob Watts, Andy Beard indeed Andy is keeping a list which appears to be growing. These sites provide quality […]