Pulling together the Google penalty threads
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Let’s tie the various posts I’ve written over the past few months together into some coherent form, shall we?
In October, I pointed out that using human reviewers to penalize websites for selling links was unfair, given that this is a highly subjective process that can’t possibly address all, or even a majority of link-sellers. One especially egregious loophole certain A-list bloggers were attempting to slide though were the monthly “Thank you” posts, complete with DoFollow links. This has recently been addressed by several of these A-listers in an attempt to come into compliance before losing their livelihoods, although the market has now been deprived of competition for advertising dollars.
This last point is critical to understanding Google’s motivation and the insidious nature of the company’s monopolistic business practice. Because Google sells the top search results in key searches, websites that sell links that allow other websites to rank for those key searches are deemed a competitive threat. When link-ad sales were done directly between the advertiser and publisher, the threat was not seen as significant; as soon as the market began to organize into marketplaces like PayPerPost, Google could see the potential for siphoning significant advertising dollars from Adwords.
Google’s argument is that search results must be kept relevant for searchers. But a company can pay for one of the top 3 spots in key searches on Google, thus skirting the “inbound-links-as-a-measure-of-relevancy” requirement (Seriously, Ditech and Lending Tree are more relevant than Bank of America? Who knew?). In so doing, Google destroys its own argument. It also speaks volumes about Google’s true motivations when it is revealed that Google did not get its own house in order with regard to paid links, before penalizing their competitors.
In the past month, whispers have grown louder about the supposedly penalized sites continuing to pass PageRank, causing me to wonder if advertisers are receiving great deals from publishers that have reduced their prices in the belief that a lower toolbar PageRank passes less link juice. Later in the month, Andy Beard accused Google of manipulating public and advertiser opinion by showing that the Google Directory displays what appears to be the internal PageRank, which is different from Toolbar PageRank, and I demonstrated that search engine traffic on my websites has grown despite a significant penalty.
In summarizing these various posts, I hope I succeed in painting a picture of a company that does not “walk the walk” with regard to their “Do No Evil”. Top search engine results are available to the highest bidder, and anyone with the chutzpa to compete with Google must be stifled.
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