Does clickbank have a negative effect on SEO

[ThomasTe]

Hi,

I believe I heard something recently that having affiliate links (such as clickbank) on your sites can effect how google looks at your site (SEO wise).
Have you experienced anything like this?

I have some sites with adsense on them and am thinking about adding links to for example clickbank products.

Any inputs or experience?

Thanks.

Best regards,
Thomas

[Dexter007]

I have tried working on SEO for affiliate products but they seemed to fail. I dont know but my sixth sense always tells me that Big G does not love affiliate sites. On a lighter side, Google perhaps does not like others earning more from affiliates than adsense.

[VaultBoss]

Thomas...

Here's a tip for you.

Optimize your pages for organic traffic separately and for paid traffic separately again (different KW strategies and KW sets, etc..)

Then, point your multiple pages to an inner moneymaking page (this one doesn't need to be optimized for traffic and SE's but for conversions.

This way you will achieve multiple goals: no need to worry about Google liking you or not and you multiply your conversions and hence earnings tremendously.

Hope it helps...

Oh, and YES, Big G doesn't like aff links too much, so try to use those only on that sales page not on the landing pages.

Other options may be to use something like PrettyLink plugin for WP if you run your websites on WP or any other similar script, or even build your own redirect pages on your own domain if you want, to make the links look like pointing to your own domain rather than outside...they will also look very clean and will hide your aff details (which is very important espacially with CB and PDC and other websites that use similar 'hoplinks')

Steve Lorenzo SEOVirtuoso

[ThomasTe]

So I could simply make a page, domain.com/redirect.asp, which then redirects to the affiliate link?
Won't google be able to detect that?

Otherwise, your idea about making a seperate site, and link to that, and then let that have the affiliate links, also sound like a great idea.

Thanks.

Best regards,
Thomas

[Marakatapolis]

Originally Posted by ThomasTe

So I could simply make a page, domain.com/redirect.asp, which then redirects to the affiliate link?
Won't google be able to detect that?

Otherwise, your idea about making a seperate site, and link to that, and then let that have the affiliate links, also sound like a great idea.

Thanks.

Best regards,
Thomas

He didn't say make another site, he said "money making page", so just design a page on your site to be a conversion/sales page and then link to it from your other pages on your site. Also, split up those other pages on your site with different keyword strategies, this way you don't have all your eggs in one basket (big G!).

[ThomasTe]

Allright, thanks for clarifying.

Regards,
Thomas

[VaultBoss]

Yes, indeed, I said 'money making page' but it would be no problem if for instance, you build a blog (optimize for SEO) and a few well designed landing pages for Adwords traffic (or similar PPC) optimized for great Quality Scores with the AdNetworks...
and finally say you have your own product that you wanna sell (that could stand alone on another website)

however, as your question referred 'affiliate sales' rather than your own product, it would be difficult to build a separate website when in fact you wanna drive traffic to an aff offer.

Nevertheless, it is always a good strategy to squeeze in between your traffic getting page and the final landing page (money making page) especially when on another websites, an intermediate page where you could offer an incentive for an extra step (like a subscription) in order to build a list, to follow up with the prospects for a later sale, etc..

So, if you have the will, the means and the knowledge plus the time or money to outsource, an extended blueprint would indeed have a separate website or at least a supplemental page, while the 'on a budget' option might be just a separate inner page on your site as suggested before.

Steve Lorenzo SEOVirtuoso

[vikramd]

Originally Posted by ThomasTe

Hi,
I have some sites with adsense on them and am thinking about adding links to for example clickbank products.
Any inputs or experience?
Thanks.
Best regards,
Thomas

Yeah - that's definitely something Google will look at in analyzing your site & I know more than one person who has been sandboxed because all they had were outbound affiliate links & a fairly dormant website.

Google is pretty clear about what they want:

- content that is updated
- terms of services
- contact information

On top of that:

List of the Google Webmaster Guidelines

I think a lot of people get sandboxed and they think it's because of some link building strategy they were using. In fact it was that their link building strategy was good but their on site SEO was off and thus they got sand boxed.

Google also has specific requirements if you are using a website for PPC - you can look that up in the adwords section.

I follow all these guidelines (even though I am annoyed by them) - it helps you get ranked.

[paulgl]

The site you quote above is not from google.

You don't want to be a linkfarm, but outbound links have
little to no effect on your PR or SERP.

Do you ever notice how big sites sell ads to anything and everything?

How about warriors? How many outbound links are on the page you
are reading ? Are they related? Hmmmm. And yet, just do a search
for internet marketing forum. Warrior is either #1 or #2. So, why are
you worried about outbound links affecting your ranking? And all these sig
links are without the "nofollow" tag.

Putting a referral link on your page does not affect anything.
Unless it's for something illegal or otherwise "bad." Clickbank
products are a non-issue.

Paul

[ThomasTe]

Seems like there are some very different opinions about this topic.

Thanks for all your input.

Best regards,
Thomas