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Look What We're Doing to the Internet . . . .

by MeysterR
45 replies
Hi fellow Warriors:

I've noticed a certain unnerving trend that seems to be picking up whenever I'm searching for info on basically *anything* using Google or other search engines.

Last night I was searching for info. on a medical condition. I was confronted with a *whole first page* of Google results which were articles written in broken English, describing generalities about whatever I was searching for.

It's honestly painful to read content written in this manner because you can spot it right away and it's always in this over enunciated, over elaborating style, and citing NOTHING, even for material that's supposed to suffice as quasi-MEDICAL ADVICE! For instance:

". . . and it is for this particular reason that this condition is looked on as dangerous and avoided by many"

I also did a search for articles/reviews of a major motivational figure/speaker whom we're all familiar with, who fairly recently entered the weight loss arena:

". . . .and now he has learned how to lose weight! Don't you want to know what he learned to lose so much weight?"

The word "Review" now may as well be code for "Advertorial" or "Affiliate page discussing the program, advocating it, and recommending that you purchase, without giving any criticisms."

I typed in a query for a review of a certain product, and had to actually click through three pages of Google results before I got to the first actual review that went through the product's performance in detail, and recommended that I save my money.

Guys, is this what PPC revenue and affiliate campaigns have brought us?

Just because so many people are trying to earn a buck (And let's be honest, there're so many sites you find in the results advocating these products, there's no way each one is really earning a ton of money; the pot is spread too thin), we've seen search results, which have historically been relied upon to give us legitimate leads to widely-recognized authority sites and articles on topics, diluted into pages and pages of this salesey crap, with sites populated by $4-$5 articles contracted from India.

Does this irk anyone else?

What do you guys see as the ultimate outcome from this trend?
#affiliate reviews #broken english #internet
  • Profile picture of the author xxxJamesxxx
    Just be grateful you know what's going on. 99% of the population out there haven't got a clue what's going on and believe these "reviews" that are spamming up Google.

    James Scholes
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    • Profile picture of the author WittyT
      Originally Posted by xxxJamesxxx View Post

      Just be grateful you know what's going on. 99% of the population out there haven't got a clue what's going on and believe these "reviews" that are spamming up Google.

      James Scholes
      "You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes." -Morpheus
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    • Profile picture of the author Daret
      Originally Posted by xxxJamesxxx View Post

      Just be grateful you know what's going on. 99% of the population out there haven't got a clue what's going on and believe these "reviews" that are spamming up Google.

      James Scholes
      Yeah, I completely agree with James.

      Maximum people dont even know about it!

      I have myself see my friends clicking on ads thinking that the ad is part of the website.

      Google really needs to pull up its socks, because Internet marketers are fooling it big time!
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  • Profile picture of the author LMC
    mey,

    This is exactly why Google, Internet business law, and Congress is trying to change things to adjust to the results we have learned to manipulate. Once you get inside Internet Marketing you notice it all, and realize, half the **** out there is all marketers stuff.
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  • Profile picture of the author GMD
    Banned
    I'd have to agree with some of what you've written -- though there's not much that can be done about it.

    Originally, the 'net (back in the Wild Wild West Days) was developing into an information tool, then a way to "socialize" or meet new people, and so on. Today, of course, the 'net is one giant swap meet/shopping mall/tag sale/junk yard.

    Even though I make my living from the internet, I'd like to think that most of what I put online is of value to somebody. I try to strike a balance between earning money online and my duty to not pollute the 'net with garbage.

    I honestly groan every time I read about somebody slapping together another "site" in order to serve as a honey pot for their hair-brained-scheme-of-the-week. Over time, the net has become a cesspool of useless garbage and stale honey pots all with the aim of not serving anybody except for the greedy sap behind the HTML code holding his hand out.

    That's not everybody of course. But it's enough people to have made much of the net a dump.

    At the end of the day all one can do is stay in their own lane. Focus on their own activities. Ignore what the other guy is doing and hope that you can bark louder than the next guy in this carnival called IM.
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  • Profile picture of the author jascoken
    Unfortunately, spam, in many varieties is big bucks...

    Link spam from Pharma, credit and gambling companies is massive; churning out links on an industrial scale from rooms full of X-Rumer and others submission servers.

    While these guys make 7-8 figures, they're not going to stop.
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  • Profile picture of the author MarketingChad
    For the people who manipulate the system and create sites of low value, it will catch up to them.

    Unfortunately, I think these "scammy", low-quality sites are what's giving us marketers a bad name. There's no reason you can't create a high-quality, high-value site and make money off of it. In fact if you want a long-term business plan, that's what you should be doing!

    Not all marketers are out there to scam the system, Google will catch them eventually and then they'll just have to scramble to find the next way to exploit the net. It's inevitable. All we can do is try to provide a solid product or service that will help others and make a little healthy product for ourselves.

    Don't get distracted by these things, just make an effort every day to make your business a little better...the right way.
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  • Profile picture of the author RHert
    A lot of the stuff on the net is junk, and IMers aren't the only ones noticing. More and more people are moving past the first two pages to the third or further to find what they're looking for. Eventually things will be changed and those who have good content and are actually helpful will end up being on the first page, at least until the spamers learn to manipulate the system again. It's a constant round and its part of the game. For me I make sure there is always good helpful content on my site and don't worry about page ranking. You'd be amazed how much traffic you can get from friends passing on your site to other friends.
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  • Profile picture of the author tpw
    I think that this reveals more about the "world's best search engine" than it does about the marketers who play the game.

    No wonder Google is losing market share to that other search engine. LOL
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    • Profile picture of the author Salashwal
      Originally Posted by tpw View Post

      I think that this reveals more about the "world's best search engine" than it does about the marketers who play the game.

      No wonder Google is losing market share to that other search engine. LOL
      Not really, in my opinion. I still think Google's ability to sort site's based on relevance is above and beyond Bing's abilities. If you've done any significant amount of link spam then you know that while it takes a bit longer to rank in Bing, it's much easier to game and if you're consistent it's relatively easy to consistently get sites ranked high and for a long time. On the other hand Google is much more unpredictable and especially with the updates this year it's even easier to trip a link spam or anchor text penalty then it's ever been before.

      Now if Bing gains more market share what I think we'll see is more and more marketers switching their focus to gaming Bing, and Bing has no where near the same capacity as Google for detecting link spam so I just don't see how Bing will ever surpass Google unless they seriously improve their link analysis methods.
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  • Profile picture of the author mjd081
    This has been going on since Google has existed, and they continue to improve results. The answer IS NOT more regulation from the government. The internet is the last government-free frontier that we have left. Google will come around with another Panda-Esque update in time and wipe these poor websites out of the results. It's also important to mention that results that you experienced are the exception, not the rule.
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    • Profile picture of the author Salashwal
      Originally Posted by mjd081 View Post

      This has been going on since Google has existed, and they continue to improve results. The answer IS NOT more regulation from the government. The internet is the last government-free frontier that we have left. Google will come around with another Panda-Esque update in time and wipe these poor websites out of the results. It's also important to mention that results that you experienced are the exception, not the rule.
      That's absolutely right.
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  • Profile picture of the author jaiganeshv
    I get really pissed on when i read 400-500 word article content that has nothing but filler content and stop words with adsense blocks.. yes as people in this thread say, once you are into IM you know the ins and outs and start to know the ugly face..

    But i think normal users will not know completely how these sites operate (while i was a normal user i did not know abt the magic affiliate links, reviews etc) all the know is the results are not relevant and Google needs to improve
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  • Profile picture of the author garyv
    I think this is part of the reason why Google got into the social networking niche. I don't think it was necessarily to take traffic away from Facebook, but it was to get more relevant search engine results using things like the +1 button to give users a more personal search result.

    I also think it's part of their reasoning for having everyone consolidate all of their google owned accounts into one account.

    The problem is - spammers are usually much more tech-savy than the regular website builder. So it becomes near impossible to have an automated filter function to weed out the spammers.
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  • Profile picture of the author jivens
    Banned
    Yes it sucks. BUT aren't you glad that you're aware of internet marketing and you can separate the crap from real solid information?
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  • Profile picture of the author MeysterR
    Well, I am glad that I can see the "man behind the curtain" when I'm searching, but it really just hits home when I got on the web as an actual user and see what's come about because so many people bought and are following these $35 eBook's saying, "All you have to do is setup tons of these connector sites to the aff. sales page, outsource your content, and you're good to go for making $10K+ a month!

    Thank God I know the inner-workings of "review sites", otherwise I'd have probably wasted a ton of money by now.
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  • Profile picture of the author Abdullah
    To the OP:

    Yes I can see it too, as internet marketers and people who have studied the field, the tactics and methodologys used and who have knowledge about the said subject: we see what's happening here right before our eyes clear as daylight.

    We can just SEE it, whereas there is a clear percentage of people who can't see it and another percentage of people who can see it but can't understand it.

    The good thing however is: you have discovered a big problem, and as a person who can see: it is clearly profitable to be find, create or be involved in the solution of that problem.

    Kind regards,
    Abdullah
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    • Profile picture of the author talashme
      Originally Posted by Abdullah View Post

      The good thing however is: you have discovered a big problem, and as a person who can see: it is clearly profitable to be find, create or be involved in the solution of that problem.
      This is what Google is thinking too and many other marketers like us. I am sure it will change, and we have to cope for that now. and good to be part of the change
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      • Profile picture of the author Jill Carpenter
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        • Profile picture of the author lukedidit
          I was researching keywords last night and as is always the case a majority of .coms, .nets. .orgs were taken up.

          Looking at each reg it was a shame to see the crap put up on a majority of pages. Most of the time the content was spun badly and quite laughable + really hard to follow.

          Try this one out for size that I picked out of my browser history. Try to see how far you can read without becoming confused:

          Flight Attendant Salary | How To Become A Flight Attendant

          Unfortunately this is all down to 'niche websites' movement - granted some are good, but all to many are just crap flung against the wall in the hope of getting some clicks
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          • Profile picture of the author Centurian
            Originally Posted by lukedidit View Post

            Try to see how far you can read without becoming confused:

            Flight Attendant Salary | How To Become A Flight Attendant

            Unfortunately this is all down to 'niche websites' movement - granted some are good, but all to many are just crap flung against the wall in the hope of getting some clicks
            I always wanted to know how to be a flight attendant. Now I don't know. :rolleyes:
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          • Profile picture of the author John Coutts
            Originally Posted by lukedidit View Post

            Try this one out for size that I picked out of my browser history. Try to see how far you can read without becoming confused:

            Flight Attendant Salary | How To Become A Flight Attendant

            Unfortunately this is all down to 'niche websites' movement - granted some are good, but all to many are just crap flung against the wall in the hope of getting some clicks
            This phrase in that "article" sums it all up rather well: "... the flight attendant salary is quite nice ..."

            Don't you just love things that are "nice"?
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  • Profile picture of the author Lloyd Buchinski
    Someone I have almost a bottomless respect for, mentioned that the internet came around quickly, and things that do that, tend to leave quickly too. I think that is very, very possible.

    About all it would take is for it not to be cool anymore. Combine that with a second influence, like an improvement in hologram technology, and that could easily leave it for the academics or some small groups.

    A group of construction workers I was near at lunch, completely trashed the idea of making money on the net. 'All it is, is make money by selling this program that tells you how to make money.' That sort of talk. Not a single one of them put in a positive word about it.
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    • Profile picture of the author Shoot
      Originally Posted by Lloyd Buchinski View Post


      A group of construction workers I was near at lunch, completely trashed the idea of making money on the net. 'All it is, is make money by selling this program that tells you how to make money.' That sort of talk. Not a single one of them put in a positive word about it.
      Sounds like they hit the nail right on the head to me.
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      • Profile picture of the author LegitIncomes
        Originally Posted by Lloyd Buchinski View Post

        A group of construction workers I was near at lunch, completely trashed the idea of making money on the net. 'All it is, is make money by selling this program that tells you how to make money.' That sort of talk. Not a single one of them put in a positive word about it.

        Originally Posted by Shoot View Post

        Sounds like they hit the nail right on the head to me.

        I had a client email me and thank me for everything....he told me he hit $10,000 this month. Did these construction workers hit the nail on the head with that?

        What they were really talking about are the scams, envelope stuffing, chain letters, etc... those bad reputation products pollute the entire industry and cause people to lump everything together, and write it all off - even when there are MANY good products out there.
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  • Profile picture of the author Mark Andrews
    Banned
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  • Profile picture of the author sentinelsoft
    The reality is that as long as their is money to be made online people will always finds ways of manipulating the system, the solution to this is unpredictable.
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  • Profile picture of the author hotwebwords
    Ugh, I experience this same thing. Invest in quality writers, sheesh. I am so tired of reading crap like that.
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  • Profile picture of the author buckeyes09
    Give it a little time and Google will slap these types of sites. They already have a category for them: Google definitely knows they exist. Unless you're doing this big time, you might as well do it very well with good content and a lot of it, or find different methods of IM as to not get slapped for being a thin affiliate site.
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  • Profile picture of the author CDarklock
    Originally Posted by MeysterR View Post

    Does this irk anyone else?
    Google is all but useless for certain kinds of searches, because there is a teeming army of people trying to subvert Google and turn your search for medical information into a click on their ad banners.

    This is why you search for medical information on WebMD, not Google: WebMD doesn't contain any of this garbage. Branded authority sites with targeted, niche-specific search are the answer to this problem.
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    • Profile picture of the author garyv
      Originally Posted by CDarklock View Post

      Google is all but useless for certain kinds of searches, because there is a teeming army of people trying to subvert Google and turn your search for medical information into a click on their ad banners.

      This is why you search for medical information on WebMD, not Google: WebMD doesn't contain any of this garbage. Branded authority sites with targeted, niche-specific search are the answer to this problem.
      I agree 100% with this. I keep my own searchable database of bookmarked sites that I know have been of good use to me. Before I do a painful google search, I'll search my bookmarks first.

      I don't know if it exists, but someone should build a search engine that has no automated indexing. Make it so every site included is reviewed by a live person and not an algorithm.
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      • Profile picture of the author CDarklock
        Originally Posted by garyv View Post

        someone should build a search engine that has no automated indexing. Make it so every site included is reviewed by a live person and not an algorithm.
        That would be a "directory." Yahoo had one of those. Nobody used it, because the "good" sites never ended up in it.
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        • Profile picture of the author MeysterR
          Originally Posted by CDarklock View Post

          That would be a "directory." Yahoo had one of those. Nobody used it, because the "good" sites never ended up in it.
          I think there was one a while back called "Zeal" or some such; they were a human-moderated submission directory, but the thing is, they were completely hell-bent on keeping sites earning revenue of any kind showing up in their directory.

          Back in the hay-days of Site Built It, we'd share comments on the forum, "A Zeal representative wrote me, 'I researched where your site came from.' "E-Commerce for the rest of us??!" This has no place in our directory. We want sites that provide great content and value only, and aren't out to make a buck."

          So that's the other side of the same coin I guess.

          In order to be in that directory, you had to be basically a huge, authority site, that was totally conceived (and funded for operation) from someone's hobby interests.

          That directory eventually flopped, to my understanding. I can't really speak to Yahoo's directory, and why the good sites didn't seem to be making it in, but I do know that getting into that directory was often pushed as one of the prime objectives any upstart site should be going after, circa 2000.

          Hmmm, starting a completely human-review based directory, reviewed by people knowledgeable about what's been discussed in this thread......Don't be giving me any ideas now, because me and others like me just might end up doing some damage. :-)
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    • Profile picture of the author hotwebwords
      Originally Posted by CDarklock View Post

      Branded authority sites with targeted, niche-specific search are the answer to this problem.
      So, go forth Warriors and build those!
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      • Profile picture of the author fluffythewondercat
        Originally Posted by hotwebwords View Post

        So, go forth Warriors and build those!
        Sure. Except there isn't any easy money in that, just long hard unremitting endless work that may or may not pay off one day.

        Warriors aren't up for that.

        fLufF
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  • Profile picture of the author Russel Mogul
    Those pages are not created for the internet savvy user. You probably do know where to look, if you are adamant on being an info-seeker use medical journals .I'm sure the search engine blekko would best suit your needs,
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  • Profile picture of the author premiumonlinewriting
    I think that this reveals more about the "world's best search engine" than it does about the marketers who play the game.

    No wonder Google is losing market share to that other search engine. LOL
    Exactly what I've been saying for a long time now. Despite all their marketing a blustering about their supposedly space-age ranking algorithm, Google is nowhere near as close to eliminating spam as they like to have everyone believe. Look at Panda. For every two crappy low quality sites it knocked out, it knocked out one good quality site that followed the rules to the letter.

    I'm going to tentatively predict we'll see an open source search engine in the next five years which will give the big boys a few things to think about.
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    • Profile picture of the author Salashwal
      Originally Posted by premiumonlinewriting View Post

      Look at Panda. For every two crappy low quality sites it knocked out, it knocked out one good quality site that followed the rules to the letter.
      Where exactly did you get this data because I HIGHLY doubt it's true. From what I see the majority of the people that are complaining are the one's with crappy sites, and yes that even goes for many of the "white hatters" at Web Master World.

      I'm sure there was some collateral damage, there always is. But from the point of view of a consumer, I think Google's search results look better than they use to look before Panda.
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  • Profile picture of the author MaroshIS
    This problem is mostly related to sites written in english language. When you look at other world languages there are no IM tools like article spinners existing.

    On one hand for non-english IM is good since there's less competition on other hand it's bad because one must create high quality if not unique content and thus more expensive.
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  • Profile picture of the author TopGamer
    yeah google sucks
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  • Profile picture of the author NicheDad
    There are micro niche sites out there that actually provide value.

    That just needed to be said.
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  • Profile picture of the author lacraiger
    maybe google search results just suck
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  • Profile picture of the author stevenfabian
    This is exactly why it's worth to keep it real and add value to the internet. In the long run these scams will disappear as Google and other SEs get smarter and then only good, valuable info will stay. Also, if you create great content you're much more likely to earn a nice income as opposed to spamming.

    The "secret" to online money making is this: Pick a niche you're good at and STICK with it. Build it to be a high quality BUSINESS with integrity and get a bunch of loyal followers or clients.

    I think this more of a "long-term" approach is better than spamming, and it's also more profitable for everyone else, expect for the gurus who sell their secret spamming-machines for hundreds of dollars.

    Just my 2c,
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  • Profile picture of the author HelpingYouBeAnExpert
    Originally Posted by MeysterR View Post

    I also did a search for articles/reviews of a major motivational figure/speaker whom we're all familiar with, who fairly recently entered the weight loss arena:

    ". . . .and now he has learned how to lose weight! Don't you want to know what he learned to lose so much weight?"

    funny, I lost over 80 pounds, maybe I should make an info product out of it


    PS: I lost the weight while traveling overseas without working out and eating more then I use to. Don't worry, I will not make an info product about it, I was just kidding (not the weight loss part, the info product part)
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    • Profile picture of the author wtatlas
      Perhaps the original question should be re-phrased as "Look what sort of internet Google has created".

      If adwords were to disappear overnight, and if there were no adwords there would be no adsense, none of the websites that are causing so much concern would have any reason to exist. They are only there as a result of Google's business model.
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