In the last 24 hours MediaWhiz (disclosure - they are sponsors of this site) have released a new advertising product for those interested in selling text links on their blogs) called InLinks.
InLinks is an ad network that allows advertisers to buy text links within the content of your posts. The links pass on Google Juice (ie they don’t have nofollow tags), they are approved by publishers before going live and they don’t have any kind of indication that they are ads on them (no popups like Kontera ads for example).
Lets be clear - these ads are against Google’s quality guidelines and if you’re caught selling them your blog is likely to be penalized. Also - not disclosing ads as ads is seen by many as unethical (and in some parts of the world is outside of the guidelines of bodies like the FTC - there is risk involved here.
Having said that - InLinks is banking on their ads being difficult for anyone to see as ads (including Google). I’m yet to see them in the wild but would bet that they are intended not to have a footprint that Google can see.
I personally would advise to proceed with caution. If you want to rank high in Google then this is probably not for you. If you don’t care whether your blog is in their index or not then it could be something to investigate.
If you want to be up front with your readers about what links in your content are paid ads and which are genuine and useful links - then this isn’t for you. If you’re not worried about disclosure and transparency with readers - you might consider this.
Our latest Poll here at ProBlogger indicates that 31% of readers of this blog currently sell text links - so I’m pretty sure that there is a market for InLinks - but I’m sure there’s going to be lots of debate on this on in coming months.
My personal stance is that I don’t sell text ads.
Further Reading on the InLinks story:
- At TechCrunch - Insidious New Seo Ad Product Will be Hard for Google To Detect (includes a reaction from Google’s Matt Cutts).
- At Shoemoney - Does Google Really Want to go Down this FTC Route?
- At Deep Jive Interest - Text Link Ads Debuts InLinks
- At Digital Inspiration - InLinks - These Text Link Ads May be Tough to Detect
- SEOmoz - Normally, It’s a Good thing to get Featured on TechCrunch
Tags: Advertising, Search Engine Optimization
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