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Stop talking about "Quality"....

by GeorgR.
20 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Everytime we have an algo change and sites getting slapped, you can hear a) Google talking about Quality sites b) webmasters talking about quality sites

Here is the problem: You do not know what Google deems a "quality" site nowadays.

Chances are you can have a clickbank/aff-link on your site and Google MIGHT slap your site simply because you dare to sell something as an affiliate. We had this happen in the past where Google literally terminated the majority of PPC ads and advertisers, simply because they were affiliates.

So..what is a "Quality Site"? You do not need to tell me or any other halfway smart webmaster that a quality site means good, helpful, unique etc. content, good navigation etc.. BECAUSE WE ALL KNOW THIS.

But i think there is more to it. I personally have/had one site which was at TOP Google position for almost 5 years in a row now, with unique, helpful content etc..this site is now literally gone from #1, #2 on Google...vanished. The only reason i can think of is the fact that Google knows it's a site where i link out to clickbank. And i *suspect* (i do not know, i suspect!) that this is one thing they are doing, in the same way they canned all PPC advertisers promoting something from clickbank.

Short: As soon as you *dare* to sell something on your site and make your site with (God beware!) the intention to also make money with it..you have to be careful. Just my $0.02
#quality #stop #talking
  • Profile picture of the author Ashera
    I don't think we can pinpoint it to this. Tons of my sites link out to my Amazon referral link multiple times on the homepage and they weren't effected negatively at all. I said this somewhere else - but out of 40 sites, the only sites that had more than a 5 position drop were 5 that were AdSense sites.
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  • Profile picture of the author GeorgR.
    Interesting, because in the past i read horror stories by people who had amazon sites.
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    • Profile picture of the author Ashera
      Originally Posted by GeorgR. View Post

      Interesting, because in the past i read horror stories by people who had amazon sites.
      Me too - I've seen so many WSO's and other plugins that somehow hide your affiliate links from Google, but mine are right there, plain as day and I've never noticed an issue. But the question I always ask myself when building a site- can I take an honest 3rd party perspective and look at my site and say that it's informational value takes priority over its commercial intent. If this is the case then I am comfortable with it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Dayes
    In the eyes of Google, a quality site is one that provides (for free) exactly what the user has searched for.

    The majority of affiliate sites do not meet this requirement.
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    • Profile picture of the author mrultra
      Banned
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      • Profile picture of the author retsek
        Originally Posted by mrultra View Post

        How many free things does Amazon give away?
        They got free shipping
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        • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
          Please. I dare anyone here to beat these GA stats for their site before they talk about 'quality'. Just an FYI, in Google 'infinite' wisdom, this site does not rank #1 for any of the terms.




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          • Profile picture of the author retsek
            Originally Posted by aygabtu View Post

            Please. I dare anyone here to beat these GA stats for their site before they talk about 'quality'. Just an FYI, in Google 'infinite' wisdom, this site does not rank #1 for any of the terms.




            That really means very little. I have info sites with 20,000+ uniques per day, bounce rates as high 80%, tos around 1 minute. Visitors find exactly what they are looking for and they leave. If all the updates over the last few years are an indicator, then Google is perfectly fine with that too.
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            • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
              Originally Posted by retsek View Post

              That really means very little. I have info sites with 20,000+ uniques per day, bounce rates as high 80%, tos around 1 minute. Visitors find exactly what they are looking for and they leave. If all the updates over the last few years are an indicator, then Google is perfectly fine with that too.
              It is debatable whether a high bounce rate for a particular site is a good or bad indicator. Like you said, if they find what they are looking for, then that makes your stats looks bad, even if it is a good site.

              But when you have a site with 40 minute average time on site per visitor PER DAY, with pageviews average around 20. Well there is no question that that is a site people like. Those numbers rival sites like Facebook.

              My point is, I am sure statistically my site beats out all the competitors, has good on-page seo, yet google doesn't rank it #1 for its keywords.

              My other point is to the people that try to assume that my sites are crap because I complain about google's latest algorithm updates.
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              • Profile picture of the author Ashera
                Originally Posted by aygabtu View Post

                It is debatable whether a high bounce rate for a particular site is a good or bad indicator. Like you said, if they find what they are looking for, then that makes your stats looks bad, even if it is a good site.

                But when you have a site with 40 minute average time on site per visitor PER DAY, with pageviews average around 20. Well there is no question that that is a site people like. Those numbers rival sites like Facebook.

                My point is, I am sure statistically my site beats out all the competitors, has good on-page seo, yet google doesn't rank it #1 for its keywords.

                My other point is to the people that try to assume that my sites are crap because I complain about google's latest algorithm updates.
                Doesn't matter how quality your content is when you yourself said you've bought Fiverr gigs for the site.
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                • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
                  Originally Posted by Ashera View Post

                  Doesn't matter how quality your content is when you yourself said you've bought Fiverr gigs for the site.
                  And promoting my site means it is crap? Wow, last I checked promoting your brand was a good thing. Last I checked, the purpose of google algo changes was to get rid of the CRAP SITES. How is it, with all those brilliant engineers that they equate promoting your site through buying gigs on fiverr as having a crappy site?

                  It doesn't, but they seem to think so. That is the problem.

                  Do you think when google first started they weren't back linking the hell out of it everywhere they could? Really?
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                  • Profile picture of the author retsek
                    Originally Posted by aygabtu View Post

                    And promoting my site means it is crap? Wow, last I checked promoting your brand was a good thing. Last I checked, the purpose of google algo changes was to get rid of the CRAP SITES. How is it, with all those brilliant engineers that they equate promoting your site through buying gigs on fiverr as having a crappy site?

                    It doesn't, but they seem to think so. That is the problem.

                    Do you think when google first started they weren't back linking the hell out of it everywhere they could? Really?
                    Buying gigs on Fiverr is not how your promote your brand. By doing that you associated your site with crap sites.
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                    • Profile picture of the author aygabtu
                      Originally Posted by retsek View Post

                      Buying gigs on Fiverr is not how your promote your brand. By doing that you associated your site with crap sites.

                      And just how do you promote your brand? Oh wait, according to google you can't even post your links manually out there. WTF? Does that mean google in its infancy played by the same rules to overtake yahoo, msn, etc?

                      I don't think so!
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      • Profile picture of the author SuppaDave21
        Originally Posted by mrultra View Post

        How many free things does Amazon give away?
        Excellent point there, and once I began to think about it I realized that sites such as Amazon does give information that the searcher's want...

        They give them the option to purchase the products that they just typed into the search bar. How often do you see an Amazon page ranking for a phrase like "how to water your garden faster"??

        Probably never....

        But you will see Amazon page ranking for a term like "Gilmour Weeper/Soaker Hose 50-Foot 27050G". See what I mean? They searched for a product and google gave them results on where to find the product.

        You making a site about "how to stop snoring" and not giving actual facts about how to stop, you can bet that a medical site explaining with facts will rank higher than your site selling a scam snoring remedy.

        So it does make since for google to push sites down in ranking that focuses on selling an item rather than giving the searcher an answer for the question...

        The key is to provide a good answer the the searchers request without making them purchase something to get it....I.E "Quality Content".

        Just my thoughts
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  • Profile picture of the author retsek
    Sure we know what Google calls quality. Just look at the serps and you'll see that brands dominate. It doesn't matter if they have a page full of content or just a empty page.

    Content really doesn't matter, but it helps. And it's in your interest to have the best quality since the odds are stacked against you.

    If you're gonna depend on Google traffic, you need to become a brand yourself. And you have an advantage, the big companies don't. The fact that you're small means that while you don't have their budget, you're still more agile, more able to jump on new trends and what not.
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  • Profile picture of the author stayfocusedonthis
    I think original is quality.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    If your dependant on Google to hold your hand & show you what quality content is, your traffic will be over on your competitions site, not your site.

    Forget what you think Google quality is, know what is your traffic looking for, that's all that matters about quality content.
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    • Profile picture of the author inter123
      Google does not mind commerce as long as you are big like Amazon and co.
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  • Profile picture of the author cashtree
    GeorgR. thank you for making this thread, i felt like I was the only one getting tired of Google and marketer's alike spamming the "quality" word.
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  • Profile picture of the author iobeek
    retsek : Exactly. There are sites made for browsing around(fun) and then there are sites (pages) with high % bounce rate that might be just what people were looking for. If that page is linked as a reference from actual people ( school, scientific papers ), linked from high school and college professors personal pages as recommended reading, linked from behind the scene blackboard university software that G can see from analytics, url mentioned in various pdfs, etc., etc., etc.
    You wouldn't believe how many times some of the high bounce rate pages get printed
    Once a site gets a couple of references from above mentioned sources and you have G analytics installed...well figure this out for yourself ..... you don't see those links but G sees where referrals are coming from....from some physics professors lectures....
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  • Profile picture of the author ComoSEO
    I think if we focus on quality in the eyes of the searcher then we'll be good in the long run especially with this "over optimization" alg. We can still do on-page seo but tone it down a bit maybe.
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