Internet Babel

Hey everyone – just a quick wrap up about a couple of things making me grumpy today:

Google PR:
After Nicks previous Google bitch slap incident, I had vague hopes that Internet Babel may start getting some of its PR back this time around. No such luck, and even Jim at The Net Fool confirmed my lowly ranking ;-(  It doesn’t really matter of course, PR ain’t that big a deal and I’ve just got to carry on with building the quality content and link building/SEO stuff.

Link-Lies/Link-Fraud:
The term ‘linkbait’ can cover a number of practices – WikiPedia breaks linkbait down into a number of distinct types, but something that really bugs me is the trend towards totally manufactured stories.

Of course, this kind of rubbish has been going on in the mainstream media for a while, and I guess there’s no real reason to assume it wouldn’t take off on the Web as well, but it annoys me when you see some of the people doing this stuff actually being proud of the crap they put out and getting some level of ‘respect’ from other people for it. It’s not as if fabricating a ‘sexy’ story and touting it to a gullible press is so difficult, it’s just that not all of us want to stoop that low.

More to the point is that the big G will start to look at ways of punishing fraudulent link-bait and people using legitimate teasers/bait/promotion methods may get caught up in the crossfire and get dragged down as well. There’s nothing wrong with building and promoting traffic and links but doing it with stuff that has absolutely no basis in truth (while trying to pass itself off as a legitimate ‘news’ piece on a respected site) is just plain wrong. A great short term result for the guy who placed it, probably not so good in the long run for everyone else.

Adsense:
This last few days, Adsense (on my other sites) has been performing  like an arthritic, three-legged nag. Very sad.

Waiting for people:
I put a bid in for some sweet domain names a few days back and the clown isn’t responding. It is annoying.

On the brighter side, I’ve got some nice ideas for upcoming posts about SEO, WP, domain speculation and parking etc – plus I have some Domain name giveaways coming up soon AND a neat little SEO project that I hope to start and that I will update about on this Blog.

On the even brighter side, I’m about to go and sink a few well-earned beers

All will be well soon and I hope your day is going better than mine.

Google trend figures show that the term ‘SEO’ is now becoming consistently more popular than ‘PPC’ in the major Western, English-speaking markets such as the United States, United Kingdom and Australia.

For the last few years of the ‘boom’ economy, ‘PPC’ has generally had the upper-hand over ‘SEO’ as a search term, but the last few month’s figures show a steady reversal in fortunes, with ‘SEO’ gaining ground, overtaking and recently building a lead over ‘PPC’. The actual proportions vary from market to market but the pattern seems to be there.

This could be a reflection of the tougher economic times in the ‘Western’ markets, and an associated tightening of wallets. ‘PPC’ is going to be the first to feel the pinch because it’s more of a luxury item than bread-and-butter SEO. Consequently, more businesses are having to adjust to the reality that the slow-burn and long-tail business of GOOD SEO is always going to be reap dividends in the long term, even if you don’t get the ‘bang’ of a PPC campaign.

PPC is a ‘target’ traffic booster that is good for individual campaigns but of course it’s effect is generally short-lived and in the current financial circumstances PPC can be the first thing to be put on the back burner.

I had a quick look around at different regions and the same trends didn’t seem to be reflected in markets such as China and India, which seems to confirm the ‘recession/cutback’ idea – but there is every chance that China in particular will follow suit if their economy starts to overheat.

Just another reminder (if one was needed) that PPC and campaigns have their value in the right time and place, but content and quality SEO still rules the roost.

Comments welcome.

Hi Everyone – I hoped to get this one out a few days ago but the site move has all been a bit ‘hectic’

Following on from its purchase of Doubleclick, Google has re-badged the Performics Affiliate product as the Google Affiliate Network (1st July).

The Affiliate program will operate as a separate ‘entity’ to Adsense, and Publishers will need to apply to join the program even if they are curently Adsense publishers. Once accepted, Publishers will be able to apply to various advertisers and select creative for use on their sites.

Payments will of course be made on a ‘per sale’ basis rather than being based on impressions/clicks and may be flat-fee or commission-based, depending on the individual advertiser. Google says that payments will be made twice per month, although these will be subject to a minimum amount of $50USD per advertiser (it seems that payments due will not be aggregated for the purposes of Publisher payment). I’m assuming that the same payment methods as used for Adsense will be available. They also say that they’ll be offering a VIP/rewards type program to high-performing publishers.

The network’s page currently shows a small but impressive Advertiser list, and my understanding is that the program is still restricted to US advertisers/traffic only (according to a note on this page).

So, it’s a cautious, ‘toe in the water’ type approach but something that will have to be taken seriously, both by site owners who’ll be hoping to get some future leverage from Google’s muscle, and from existing players in the Affiliate marketplace, who may just be getting a bit worried about the effect Google could have on their current cosy arrangements.

I’ve been busy lately with the transfer of Internet Babel but I certainly intend to take a closer look at the program.

I’d really like to hear other people’s thoughts though, both in terms of any first-hand experience and also what you think this is going to do to the Affiliate arena if and when Google really jumps into this in a big way. How will players like CJ, Tradedoubler, Buy.at etc react? Will we see a shake up of the Affiliate marketplace or will things continue pretty much as before with Google just being another of many options?

With Google also dropping its referral program (in August) will we see a gradual integration between the Affiliate Network and Adsense, not just in terms of integrating your Publisher account, but maybe the creation of some kind of Affiliate CPA/Contextual hybrid – where you can choose your Advertiser base but still see a range of contextual ads from those Adverisers on your site?

Might be interesting times ahead – I don’t think the big boys will be too worried yet, but would love to hear your opinions on how this will all play out.

Dave