Does Google punish affiliate links?

11 years ago

Originally Posted by goldbiz

Hey Warriors!

I have a site that presents cpa offers to visitors. In reading Warrior Forum, I have noticed people mentioning something about affiliate links and Google not liking them. I haven't seen it explained well, though, and am just wondering if that is the case. If so, how to fix it?

I already have privacy policy, disclaimer, terms of use and contact pages in case that helps.

Thanks.

Nope - just a myth. You can even do affiliate links in AdWords and Google themselves runs an affiliate network.

I've seen some anecdotal posts about buying expired domains and adding in affiliate links right away leading to them being deindexed and from sites that just run hundreds of affiliate reviews (and no other content) getting de-indexed.

I suspect that anyone who did an affiliate link and got dinged by Google probably has other site quality issues related issues to it.

Thanks
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online only

11 years ago

Originally Posted by Vikram73

Nope - just a myth. You can even do affiliate links in AdWords and Google themselves runs an affiliate network.

I've seen some anecdotal posts about buying expired domains and adding in affiliate links right away leading to them being deindexed and from sites that just run hundreds of affiliate reviews (and no other content) getting de-indexed.

I suspect that anyone who did an affiliate link and got dinged by Google probably has other site quality issues related issues to it.

No offence, but saying that you can use affiliate links in Google Adwords is wrong. In most cases (99%) it will lead to an instant ban without a chance to recover. Of course, if you use cloakers and other blackhat stuff then np.

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nightrider85

11 years ago

Originally Posted by goldbiz

Hey Warriors!

I have a site that presents cpa offers to visitors. In reading Warrior Forum, I have noticed people mentioning something about affiliate links and Google not liking them. I haven't seen it explained well, though, and am just wondering if that is the case. If so, how to fix it?

I already have privacy policy, disclaimer, terms of use and contact pages in case that helps.

Thanks.

If you're afraid..just use plugin like Thirsty Affiliate to cloak your affiliate link and the best part...make your life easier to manage your affiliate links..

Thanks
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goldbiz

11 years ago

Thanks guys. I wasn't afraid, just wanted to make sure I wasn't shooting myself in the foot. I wouldn't see a good reason for punishing affiliate links, though G is not always logical.

I'll look at the thirsty affiliate plugin to see if it's something I need or not.

Thanks
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paulgl

11 years ago

Their are affiliate links and then there are affiliate links.

Everybody should know the difference. And yes, one
of those google despises the crap out of.

The reason? Because google would rather send someone
to the main site, rather than via an affiliate site. Cut
out the middle man. They want to provide their searchers
with a destination that will take them to exactly where
they should end up.

I'm not sure why more people are not reading everything google
publishes. I feed on it daily. They don't make this stuff a secret.

Amazon is a tad different. They are not really "affiliate links" in
the true sense of the word, and certainly not ones that
google gives much of a rip about.

Cloaking, nofollow, and other such crap does not work.

As far as adwords, well, people are PAYING GOOGLE for that privilege...
I believe the topic is on ranking, not PPC. Most "real" affiliates
would not allow you to use adwords using an affiliate link or
a page with the affiliate link as the main landing page link.

Paul

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goldbiz

11 years ago

Originally Posted by paulgl

Cloaking, nofollow, and other such crap does not work.

Thanks for the response.
So are you saying it does affect ranking? And also that there's no way around it--at least by cloaking?

And then, what's the point of cloaking?

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nik0

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by goldbiz

Thanks for the response.
So are you saying it does affect ranking? And also that there's no way around it--at least by cloaking?

And then, what's the point of cloaking?

There is no point of cloaking.

Well there is on way of legit cloaking for tracking purposes but you can't really name that cloaking.

Cloaking with the intention to hide your affiliate links is the biggest bullshit I ever heard. Google is following the link right? Not so hard to find out then.

No wonder most people fail with IM

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paulgl

11 years ago

See, each day is a new day, Nik0. I don't know or care
what happened yesterday.

Google does not despise affiliate links. But let's face it,
most affiliate stuff is garbage. I can't name a single item
I would ever buy from CB or any other IM crapola.

And all that stuff still has a name brand main site that all
affiliates are pointing to. So, why would google show your
site, with that affiliate link on it, if someone could just
go to the main domain.com and friggin buy it?

That's the problem for pages that are landing pages for
CB or other affiliate garbage. Why bother showing these in
serps? Yes, I know they slip through.

The other problem is when you have a zillion links to some
affiliate crap on the same page. It's a garbage page.

IMHO, if you gotta do affiliates, then do main content articles,
linking to your landing page. I might even make these landing
pages invisible to google, although there is no guarantee they
won't index them.

I hate to admit to the almighty google here, but if they get
even the slightest whiff that you are just a site created for
affiliates, then why bother showing it? That automated bot
from google can be a killer.

Me? I just can't see doing affiliate stuff. I don't hate people
that sell CB stuff either. Anyone that has the patience and
skill to sell that stuff, well, my hat's off to ya.

Paul

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goldbiz 11 years ago

Yeah I didnt see how the cloaking thing would work either. I saw a lot of people talking about it, though, and just wanted to be sure I wasnt misunderstanding something.

As for CPA and seo, there seem to be plenty of high-ranking sites similar to my own. So I dont see serps being impossible for my site. In fact I assume it will work fine, especially since I use a few more tools now and the keywords are less competitive than my other site, which I've had on Google #3 when I pay attention to it.

Without getting too specific about my site, it isnt a bunch of garbage links. It just offers free stuff to visitors who are looking for free stuff. If loads of people come there, then Google will see it worthwhile too.

Step 1: Get loads of people to come there!
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nik0

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by paulgl

See, each day is a new day, Nik0. I don't know or care
what happened yesterday.

Google does not despise affiliate links. But let's face it,
most affiliate stuff is garbage. I can't name a single item
I would ever buy from CB or any other IM crapola.

And all that stuff still has a name brand main site that all
affiliates are pointing to. So, why would google show your
site, with that affiliate link on it, if someone could just
go to the main domain.com and friggin buy it?

I once promoted some clickbank products, admittedly it took me quite a while to find a product that seemed legit. Later on it turned out to be a rip off of a free software :S It's that 3d animation software btw.

The odd thing was that I just blatantly copied the sales page from the clickbank vendors website and it was the best ranking page on my site.

Anyway, review sites can provide additional value of course, if the reviews are legit. But hard to find an honest review lol.

The worse sites are the ones that link to a CPA offer / survey btw. I had to rank 3 of such websites for someone and 2 of them tanked and one of them is dancing so insane heavily that it's just not normal. Google just must be able to automatically detect this stuff. Cloaked or non cloaked.

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cpa-money

11 years ago

just dont put 10 affiliate links on a page.... keep it for just a few and you are ok

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himanuzo

11 years ago

Google doesn't fight against any affiliate links, make sure to provide original, unique and high quality content to your site. And add nofollow to the affiliate links.

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nik0

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by himanuzo

Google doesn't fight against any affiliate links, make sure to provide original, unique and high quality content to your site. And add nofollow to the affiliate links.

I disagree but whatever.

Why you nofollow your affiliate links? It's not like you lose any juice cause of it. Are you afraid that Google will treat it as Paid links?

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RedchilliMedia

11 years ago

Google automatically remove there ads/page, if it is more than 3...People are using infolinks that places more 8-10 links/post so my answer is "NO"

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goldbiz

11 years ago

@himanuzo
Good point. A week ago, after I had been posting on this new site for about a week, I remembered that I better make the links nofollow. So I went back and edited them all.

@nik0
First, there's no point in leaving them dofollow.
Second, and more importantly, you don't know how google treats that landing page. If they see an lp as a scammy kind, and you hook to it with a follow, that's not good for you. Or when the link eventually goes bad, you will have a bunch of broken dofollow links. Or maybe the lp becomes an lp for something else, and google dings you for something related to that. Too many risks.

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nik0

Banned 11 years ago

Originally Posted by goldbiz

@nik0
First, there's no point in leaving them dofollow.
Second, and more importantly, you don't know how google treats that landing page. If they see an lp as a scammy kind, and you hook to it with a follow, that's not good for you. Or when the link eventually goes bad, you will have a bunch of broken dofollow links. Or maybe the lp becomes an lp for something else, and google dings you for something related to that. Too many risks.

You haven't convinced me.

Linking out to a bad site is never good, whether the links are no- or dofollow doesn't make a single difference. Same for broken links, a link is broken or it is not.

No idea where you pick this kind of stuff up.

The only reason why large platforms make their links nofollow is to prevent spammers from abusing the system. Nofollow doesn't pass any juice but it still eats up the juice same like any other OBL on your page.

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Hansons

11 years ago

If you are putting too many affiliate links then you may be penalized, your affiliate link should be relevant, and use one or two per page.

Thanks

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Does Google punish affiliate links?

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