Trouble for Affiliate Marketers: Google is Attacking

This is How Google Weeds The Garden

The Internet has been referred to as "The Wild Wild West" for years now. Well that is slowly starting to change on many levels. There is one level that you should be aware of if you market on the Internet as an affiliate.

Many people who are marketing on the Internet are marketing what is know as affiliate products. Basically what that means is that they are marketing some other person's product.

One very cleaver way to market these types of products are with what is called review sites. They write a review of the product with the intent to make sales of that product.

Google has made no bones about not liking affiliate sites and shows their displeasure by offering little or no page rank to those sites. With out page rank, you can not get to the top of the search results unless you are paying to be there (PPC) and even that can be a challenge.

Up until now review sites were not considered the same as an affiliate site itself, but rather a source of information. Now, that has all changed. Google is on a mission.

I just found out that several review sites, just now, overnight, went from a 10 page rank to a 1. These were not flimsy sites. These were sites that were well build, constantly being updated, xml site maps, relevant keyword mapping, long average time on page... All those things that Google usually loves.

Google is clearly on the war path with affiliate marketing, and a different business model should be considered if you are one or are thinking of becoming one.

It is fair to say that relationship building and e-commerce Internet business models are where it is at with regards to what Google wants to see in Internet marketing. At the very least it should be clear not to place any affiliate links on a landing page.

I believe that all of this is a good thing, even though affiliate marketing is lucrative for so many people. Google is weeding the garden.

I would like to conclude this post with a quote from Perry Marshall:

"The Internet used to be some fringe phenomenon where only geeks, social rejects and vagabonds hung out.

That was, maybe, 10 years ago. (Which is probably why I liked it so much.)

Now it's center stage of the world.

Which means the Internet is no longer an easy place for digital vermin to make a quick buck. Online you need to demonstrate substance. This is what Google now expects of you."





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