Google Slap Heard ‘Round The World

November 21st, 2007 - - Filled in: Blogging

The Google Bitch Slap lives! Last week while thumbing through Text-Link-Ads, I discovered that my “link popularity” (i.e. Google PageRank) had gone down from 5 to 3. I decided to check this against my SmartPageRank meter at the bottom of my page. Much to my chagrin, it read “2″. Hopped over to PayPerPost. Zero…which is where I currently sit.

Completely unaware of what was happening, I emailed Google to get to the bottom of this. That was a few days ago, and I haven’t received a response yet. But after digging around, I discovered that I’m not the only one.

My good friend, Michael Kwan, was recently bitch slapped by Google as well. Like Michael, I wonder why some of us were singled out, and others have retained their coveted PR.

It appears that Google has targeted blogs with paid links and sponsored posts. While Michael doesn’t fit this profile, most of the others effected do. Yaro Starak over at the Entrepreneur’s Journey was penlized by Google. And Yaro does sell text links on his PR6 blog. Because advertisers refer to PR to gauge pricing, this creates problems. Luckily (and so far I can only speak for myself), the PR of Derrich.com has been reinstated to a 5 on those services I do use until this is resolved.

Robert Clough at the Search Engine Guide decided it would be best to surrender to Google. A little hasty in my opinion. But probably the smart thing to do. This move by Google will definitely effect the smaller bloggers before it effects those with greater traffic (versus higher PR).

John Chow has quite the track record with Google…having been bullied before. While the bitch slap might effect Derrich.com, it probably won’t effect JohnChow.com. John has done an excellent job of monetizing his blog through readership and by selling his own sponsorships and advertising. John talks about this very topic and how some bloggers mentioned here surrender to Google. Since this isn’t his first rodeo so to speak, he has a more confident stance on this whole issue.

For me, surrendering to Google would cost way too much money. Sure, it will be nice to be ranked properly in their index but the traffic they would send wouldnâ€™t come close to making up for the money lost. This is a business decision that each site will have to make on their own.

He’s right. Each blog will react differently after considering a number of variables. I’ll just sit back, and wait to hear from Google. Surely there’s a way for us bloggers to continue to monetize our blogs without being penalized by Google. I value the traffic I get from Google, but I don’t believe they are right to chastise me and the others. Derrich.com offers value to readers, and advertisements and paid reviews are pertinent to the rest of my content and to my blog’s purpose. C’mon, Google. Stop slapping me.

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7 comments »

Comment by Jez

November 21st, 2007 at 3:06 pm

Can you negotiate with Google in that way??

Looking at it from another point of view, if Google don’t stop people passing PR for money, then the internet falls into the hands of an ever shrinking number of people with big bucks to bulk buy links… and Google searches become less relevant… that is not good for Google… and it is not good for small players like ourselves.

Jez

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Comment by Mig

November 21st, 2007 at 3:09 pm

Actually many bloggers are already surrendering - and that’s somehow sad. But I do think we shouldn’t over-obsess over PR. In the end our purpose is to create passionate users and to sell our products and ideas. And there is no way Google can stop us from doing that. There are more other sources of traffic available online.

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Comment by ms danielle

November 21st, 2007 at 4:29 pm

“I emailed Google to get to the bottom of this.”
freakin awesome

i’ve never published any paid posts or text-link-ads and i was not dinged. that’s not to say i haven’t sold links the world (i.e. google) will never know…

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Comment by Derek

November 22nd, 2007 at 12:03 am

I’ve had one site drop while the others have thus far not been impacted.

The approach that I am taking right now is to do my best to roll with the punches and continue doing what I want to do. Maybe that means that I am truly blogging just for fun or I continue to build on previous progress, time will tell.

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Comment by derrich

November 23rd, 2007 at 10:10 am

@ Jez: I have no clue. I suppose I’ll find out soon enough.

@ Mig: I somewhat agree with you. For a blogger like me, I reply heavily on Google traffic. So, having my articles rank high on the results totem pole is important.

@ Danielle: I did it for you. Seriously, though…you are a sneaky SOB!