Dec 06 2007
Honesty is Not the Best Policy When it Comes to Link Sales
I’m thinking that if I want to treat this whole thing like a business I might need to kick up the professionalism a bit. It’s not really by choice because I don’t like stuffy crap like that, but I’ve just been given a kick in the arse by the people at Moneysupermarket.com that has made me rethink a few things.
I posted a couple days ago about the first link sale on my London site and mentioned the name of the company buying the link. I actually thought twice about posting their name and decided to do it anyways because I really want this blog to be up front and give as much information and help to people as possible. I’m thinking that hasn’t been a smart move.
I got an email yesterday from Moneysupermarket.com guy saying that the deal was off. I emailed back to ask why (it’s annoying I had to ask, especially since they’ve already had a link up for several days without any payment) and he went into a spiel about it not being acceptable that the private details of the deal had been made public… blah blah blah… a professional level of privacy is expected… yadda yadda yadda… trust has been lost… etc etc etc.
I really can’t fault them at all for feeling that way but I don’t think my post was particularly evil, really. I’m guessing that someone read my post and innocently contacted them about selling a link of their own, mentioning my post. I wouldn’t expect someone would have read it and thought to rat me out but if that’s the case then you suck.
This has cost me the deal for the London link, and a couple of other links worth £150 for a total of £250. An expensive lesson, but I’m actually happy to have learned it. Unfortunately for this site it means that I won’t be giving details of the companies I deal with anymore, but I think that actually makes sense. If I keep mentioning who is buying links from me then people with similar sites are likely to try their luck too. Common sense is not one of my strong points so I guess I’ve had to learn it the hard way.
I guess the chatty, casual approach isn’t gonna cut it! Time to treat this thing like the business that it is. This email probably isn’t too professional either but I’ve already been bitchslapped by MoneySupermarket and really have nothing to lose. Plus I think it’s a valuable lesson and I don’t want to see anyone else making the same mistake!
Professionalism starts now. No…….. now. Ok, NOW!
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I've been travelling since January 2008 living off earnings from the web. Follow me as I bum around Asia and beyond, getting up to mischief and working online as I go.
The reason that Moneysupermarket will be bothered is that you have posted proof that they buy links, and they will be buying links for search engine ranking benefit, which is against the terms of service of Google, and they don’t want to be banned or penalised by Google.
Also its not too clever to talk about selling links as Google will slap you out of their index if they catch you, and then your blog won’t be able to pull in as much income as it could otherwise i guess.
Sorry to hear about this issue you had. A great lesson for everybody!
Putin is right. You have now officially given Google the word that moneysupermarket is buying links. And of course that you are selling them. Both are big no no’s for Google and will result in penalties. For moneysupermarket that can mean 10’s of thousands of dollars a month in lost revenue. Not to mention you might be held liable for dobbing them in (although I doubt they’ll do that and draw even more attention to their buying behaviours - which are already wide known anyway mind you
) Normally Google can’t actually verify that a buyer has bought links themselves because it could have been a competitor and they wouldn’t penalize for it. But in your case you gave them the proof they’d need.
Seeing as you make most of your money off of affiliate sales, I’d be VERY careful selling any links at all…. that is, if you want to still rank for the terms you do. It’s most likely already cost you PR as that was the first ‘penalty’ that G has given out for selling links. But there’s strong suspicions ranking drops are next. And of course it’s frightfully obvious that you are selling links on some of your sites….
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news
that’s a real pain kirsty -but i suspect that putin has it spot on. they are concerned with being outed as a buyer of links and therefore have decided to pull the deal as a result.
i love the blog and please don’t change your writing style as a result of this -just maybe change things so that instead of putting the company name you say ‘a very well-known comparison site’ or something like that and you’ll be safe.
with regards to making it obvious on your blog that you sell links -i wouldn’t worry -there’s millions of other sites on t’internet doing the same for mr. google to check out before he gets to yours…
I agree with Paul here. I don’t think you need to change the style of the blog at all, just the details on the companies I suppose! Keep up the good work!
I thought buying links was fine so long as you put a “no follow” tag on it? Otherwise surely everytime anyone advertises anything from commission junction they are breaking the rules? And I am sure G doesn’t want the internet to be an advertising-free zone
A good lesson learnt. At least it makes a good story for your blog!
Perhaps you should talk about selling advertising rather than links, which no-one can penalize you for because all companies do it.
Interesting — a more intelligent action would have been for Moneysupermarket to contact you asking to remove the mention of their name from the original post, but retain the deal.
If they’d done that, there wouldn’t have been a follow-up post naming them oh, what, half a dozen times (including comments), discussing how they’re trying to manipulate the index by buying links.
Was there a privacy clause in the agreement? If not, it’s they who have behaved unprofessionally — not you.
Ugh, that’s such an upset! I would think maybe the guy got upset because others knew how much he paid for the links. Perhaps? Oh, well, you’ll find others, I’m sure
It is unfortunate this happened but thanks for letting us know. The amount of influence that Google has is sort of ridiculous. Your blog is a joy to read so hopefully the style is not affected too much by this.
47
The real reason for why the site in question was not o.k. with you being honest is because it fears the big Google will regard them as being dishonest against them. It seems wrong that business should stand in the way of you expressing yourself as much as you’d like. Any other way of making money online would be just fine with you blogging your hearts content about it. Then again one cant go giving details for google adwords of course so this seems to go with the territory in varying degrees.
As 47 wrote, “Your blog is a joy to read…”, and I completely agree! It’s just unfortunate you had to lose something in the process. May you have a better luck before the year ends…and let me wish you a very Merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year! That’s how we say it in the Philippines…not too concerned about being politically correct since the Holy day of Christ-mass is celebrated more importantly than any other Holiday no matter how Happy we are to have that day off from work.
Wow thanks for all the great compliments! I won’t change anything… just might have to be a bit less obvious about who I’m selling links to, I guess.
You know I hadn’t even thought about the whole Google thing when I wrote this post and even after he sent me the email. I’ve been lucky with Google and so far haven’t been burned so I guess I don’t think about their anti-link sales stance much. Might have to start though.
Stuart I totally agree and as I thought about this more and more I couldn’t understand why he went into lecture mode rather than just explaining where he was coming from. Now, like you’ve said, their name is there for all to see. There was no privacy clause because there was no agreement. Link sales tend to be pretty casual and usually just involve a couple of emails and a Paypal transfer. Plus I wasn’t doing anything wrong really and if they’re afraid of being busted for doing sneaky things then the solution is not to do the sneaky things, not to take it out on my.
Thanks for the Xmas wishes Cecilia, same to you. I appreciate all the votes of confidence everyone!
This might be relevant, what google blogs about link selling:
http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/12/information-about-buying-and-selling.html