Raise your Google PR, add 'nofollow' to affiliate links 2 comments Added on 11/21/07 by
Kris
For the last six weeks I have paid the price for forgetting to upload updated scripts that had the "nofollow" attribute added to text links. By not getting this done when I wanted I suffered the wrath of Google's PR (page rank) drops for those with "paid" text links.
Though, mine weren't paid, they are a home grown system that I wrote for the eBay affiliate program. Turns out the Google algorithm never asked if I was being paid for those links. Stupid robots.
The impact has been that our Google search referrals went down by over half!
This cut my average monthly take from Adsense and the eBay affiliate program to less than $200 combined. Barely enough to cover my server and not enough from Adsense to even get a payout last month. Bluh.
Since Monday I have been watching search referrals steadily climb and our Adsense and eBay money generation increase accordingly.
My recommendation to anyone that currently relies on search traffic to make some loot add rel="nofollow" to all of your text links that might be interpreted as paid.
And if you are using a text link ad company, ask them if they are using it. If not, make your own affiliate links and blaze a DIY trail that Google won't punish you for.
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