8 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}
8 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}

Question for Amazon Affiliates using contextual links

by Danny Woolard
7 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Do you feel that using contextual links to Amazon in your posts (reviews or other type of posts) has possibly hurt your rankings these past 6 months?

All my sites using contextual links died, although sites that only have links in the header or widget area survived quite nicely.
#affiliates #amazon #contextual #links #question
  • Profile picture of the author lotsofsnow
    That is interesting but most likely you did
    other things then just contextual links.
    Signature

    Call Center Fuel - High Volume Data
    Delivering the highest quality leads in virtually all consumer verticals.

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7540333].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author youngsiteowner
    Banned
    I don't believe that it is anything that you did. Many affiliate marketing websites have died in the wake of Google's most recent updates. Based on my website's stats, their updates were on April 20, 2012 and September 29, 2012. It is not good that I can tell when Google's updates were based on my Google Analytics account. Check out the stats here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/40025604/Ana...1230%20(2).pdf

    Please note that these are stats for my first blog and that I didn't post to it much. Now, the only posts still going every week are PLR that I took right from a package.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7540507].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author raffman999
    It might not necessarily be the contextual links; I've not noticed in drop offs in my own sites based on this. Have you considered any other variables?
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7540679].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author cooler1
    Originally Posted by denutza View Post

    Do you feel that using contextual links to Amazon in your posts (reviews or other type of posts) has possibly hurt your rankings these past 6 months?

    All my sites using contextual links died, although sites that only have links in the header or widget area survived quite nicely.
    How many links did you have in total on sites with contextual links? Maybe it has something to do with the total # of links rather than them being contextual links. I don't think Google has a problem with those, header links are probably more likely to affect rankings because they are above the fold.
    Signature

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7541331].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author Danny Woolard
      Originally Posted by cooler1 View Post

      Maybe it has something to do with the total # of links rather than them being contextual links. I don't think Google has a problem with those, header links are probably more likely to affect rankings because they are above the fold.
      Thats a great observation and something i've thought about myself. All my sites had about 4-5 amazon links above the fold in the header on all pages.

      But the ones that survived use adsense as well. In fact I use the horizontal ads that have 4 text links and place them between excerpts on the homepage.

      So as far as # of links, unless google favors its own ads, # of links isn't the issue.

      I thought it couldve been a backlinking strategy, as one site I could have been too aggressive with but another site didn't do any backlinking.

      Now I could sit here and say, well blame backlinking for one sites demise, and low content for another sites demise, etc etc. But this isn't very consistent as some of my sites that have survived since Aug-Sep 2012 have only 2-3 articles, lots of links (4 above the fold and 4 more adsense links), are EMDs, but just dont have outbound contextual links to affiliates.

      Since nobody so far as suspected the same treatment from Google, I will have to reconsider.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7541808].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
        Banned
        Originally Posted by denutza View Post

        I could sit here and say, well blame backlinking for one sites demise, and low content for another sites demise, etc etc.
        I'd probably sit there and say exactly that - because at least we know that those things have recently incurred some pretty major SEO penalties.

        Originally Posted by denutza View Post

        But this isn't very consistent
        Then the observed facts match the theory, too, because sometimes Google isn't, either. But clearly building backlinks on non-relevant sites, at the moment, especially if in large numbers and/or automated, is a very common cause of SEO "accidents".
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[7541873].message }}

Trending Topics