During the blog monetization session over at the currently-running WordCamp 2006, Kevin Burton of TailRank raised (yet again) the issue of Text Link Ads (aff link) being a form of domain spam, a.k.a. black hat SEO.

This issue isn’t new, and seems to repeat itself in yearly cycles, but for those who’re new to it, it is alleged that buying paid links through brokers such as Text Link Ads (TLA) spams search engines, taints search results, and artificially increases the PageRank of the purchaser’s site.

Why Bloggers Shouldn’t Shut Out Text Link Ads

I make money through TLA, so I’m not going to take the moral high ground. The gist of my opinion is as follows. Since TLA is affordable, if you don’t use it, your search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns will lose out against a similarly skilled competitor who does. Since everyone seems to be monetizing using TLA, if you don’t, you’re losing out on a source of income so many others (from the biggest fish to the small guys) are benefiting from. And TLA isn’t new nor unique. Paid links have been around every since inbound links began playing a part in search engine ranking algorithms. Do a search for “text link ads” on Google, and see the variety of brokers that appear just on the front page.

Not everyone is in it for the PageRank (though most are). Text links have high CTRs as well, and they compare very well with conventional ads. Last but not least, search engines use more than just inbound links to rank web pages these days, such as content (e.g. keywords, descriptions) and “environment” (e.g. outbound links). To say paid links completely destroy the system is to generalise without proof.

Conclusion

I’ll be the first to admit that none of the arguments above really answer the questions in the title of this post. The thing is individuals can’t really answer those questions. If anyone is to answer, it’s Google, Yahoo and MSN. If paid links are domain spam or black hat SEO, they’d have banned Text Link Ads. At the very least, we’d have seen some sort of warning - which has yet to be forthcoming. Yes, this is a passive approach to things, but is a proactive one any better?

I have answered, however, whether bloggers should consider using Text Link Ads to monetize their blogs. To me, it’s a yes. More income sources = Good. Revenue diversification = Good+. But I won’t say that the ethics of this doesn’t deserve your consideration, because it does. Instead of passing judgment though, I point you instead to a reasonably objective article at Sitepoint which outlines both the pros and cons of buying paid links to help you make the final decision yourself. I respect Kevin Burton’s opinion and so should you, but at the end of the day, it’s (almost) always your own opinion that rules your actions.

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