Would This Help Avoid the Google Slap?

[sree94]

Recently, a VERY profitable site of mine got slapped Now, I am trying to think of ways to avoid having it happen again

Here's my idea: put up a site with NO affiliate links. Just a straight review site. But, the site has an opt-in, and when the user does opt-in, I will send them the link that way

Would this avoid the dreaded Slap?

[Brad Gosse]

Many other factors like how you get traffic come into play here.

[dburk]

Hi sree94,

As long as there is no affiliate links (even masked links) on the landing page you should be okay for this latest slap.

[Jason Dolman]

Originally Posted by dburk

Hi sree94,

As long as there is no affiliate links (even masked links) on the landing page you should be okay for this latest slap.

Don,

From which sources are you finding even masked links are the problem?

Are you finding masked links are a problem even with non-thin affiliate sites too?



Jason

[dburk]

Hi Jason,

I have clients that escaped the first wave of slaps due to masked links I believe, but two weeks later their review sites with masked links were slapped. I don't know if was because they are what you call a thin affiliate site, there were other pages including articles, or they detected the affiliate links even though they were masked.

[cashcow]

You could also try promoting merchants that provide you with a website. Put the site up on a domain and then link your review site to the domain. Markethealth is one place that provides these not sure who else does - probably not a lot of the merchants on clickbank do.

[Jason Dolman]

Originally Posted by cashcow

You could also try promoting merchants that provide you with a website. Put the site up on a domain and then link your review site to the domain. Markethealth is one place that provides these not sure who else does - probably not a lot of the merchants on clickbank do.

If you read this and thought about doing as suggested... please don't.

All due respect to you cashcow, but that's a horrible idea.

More likely than not, the OP's review site has been slapped because Google ranks it low on the "added value" scale - 'thin' affiliate site as I mentioned earlier.

Trying to solve that problem by taking a template website provided to him by the merchant is just going to make things worse.

In fact... I wouldn't suggest any advice other than adding more unique content, keeping the site update to date with fresh content, linking to other valuable resources related to the market/offer, and working to get inbound, deep links to the site.


Jason

[cashcow]

Actually Jason, I agree with you. But I think maybe I didn't make myself clear.

What I mean is to put the template site on a domain that you don't care about. You're not trying to get it ranked or using PPC to it.

It's simply there so that you won't have affiliate link (masked or other wise) in the domain that you want to get ranked or use PPC for.

So your review site (or whatever it is) points to another website - it does not use an affiliate link. But the conversion rate is just as good as what you would send an affiliate link to because it is actually the same site.

Would Google still think of the links as affiliate links if you did that?

[Jason Dolman]

Originally Posted by cashcow

Actually Jason, I agree with you. But I think maybe I didn't make myself clear.
...

Would Google still think of the links as affiliate links if you did that?

Thanks for clearing that up...

I don't imagine Google would think of the links as affiliate links because they wouldn't care to look into the fact that both domains are yours.

That's not to say they couldn't figure it out... or that there aren't ways to get around the issue if they do - using multiple servers, etc.

My concern with this approach is that it will greatly reduce conversions and eyeballs on the offer, as well as fail to solve the real problem behind the OP's concerns.

Although I'm not 100% convinced at this point, a move to remove all Adwords advertisers promoting offers as affiliates (either naked or cloaked links) really flies in the face of all previous Google slaps.

A common thread among prior Google slaps was Google's intent to weed out thin affiliates who add little to no value.

Why would they suddenly change to targeting all affiliates?

There must be some common thread among those "fat" sites who were slapped... and if I had my guess, it would be the FTC.

The FTC recently cracked down on all the Google Kit offers and is updating their guidelines on the use of endorsements and testimonials in advertising as well (weight loss, anti-aging, etc).

Think of it as a two-fold slap..

#1 - The regular 'thin' affiliate slap, especially to those using naked affiliate links
#2 - The market-specific affiliates who are using flogs and fake news sites to pitch offers without revealing the gains they could receive as a result of their endorsement

I can't really say which of the two the OP falls under, especially without seeing the site... but I would hazard to bet it's one of the two reasons.



Jason