As you know, Google doesn’t like people selling links on their websites. So, here is a dilemma I recently ran into. I have a high PR website where one advertiser is ready to pay $100.00 (through LinkWorth which takes only 30% commission compared to text-link-ads.com’s 50%). Here is what I did. I took the link text the advertiser wants to place on my website and searched on Google. Guess what? The first result happened to be the advertiser’s webpage. So, if Google already concluded that for that specific phrase the advertiser’s webpage is the most appropriate, what’s the big deal in me accepting $70.00 a month to endorse it further?
But the dilemma doesn’t stop there!
Above the search results, Google had 3 paid advertisings. The 3rd one happened to be my advertiser to the same webpage. So, if Google accepts a specific URL to be advertised against a specific phrase and make money, why should I not do the same? Well, some of you might think, it doesn’t make sense to sell apples in a store meant to sell oranges.
However, I think there are two types of advertisers buying links. Those who want to reach to the top page of the search engine not because of the true merit but by manipulating their search. Then, there are those who reached to the top through their own merit (my advertiser has been in the business since 1999!) but want to reinforce their position.
So, the question really is, why not sell those links of the advertisers who are clearly the market leaders for the phrases they are trying to search engine optimize further? I mean, my advertiser is not trying to make his oranges selling page to show up when searched for apples or anything!
