Web Marketing Strategy Update

Just a quickie…

Minutes ago I came across Linktator2, which is a low-cost backlink service, and as part of my new, “just post what you’re doing” initiative brought about by my long hiatus, I thought I’d briefly tell you about it.

I’m not sure if you know or not, but there are quite a few backlink networks about now. These services provide one-way links to members, by ensuring websites in the network never display links to the sites that link to them. Sites are categorized so that the backlinks can be somewhat targeted, and of course they use the target site’s preferred keywords in the anchor text.

Generally speaking these systems work very well. Google doesn’t discover the networks (of course there’s always the possibility that may change in the future. Anything is possible) and the sites climb in the rankings.

They are all costly though. Ranging in price from expensive, all the way up to more than your mortgage. Except this one that is — and thus the post. It’s cheap. By far the cheapest I’ve seen for this kind of service.

Google makes money by selling targeted advertising space. That’s its core business. Providing search results is simply the vehicle for doing so. Search doesn’t generate revenue in itself.

Has it ever occurred to you how contradictory the goals of these two activities are?

One being to provide perfectly targeted search results, the other to sell as much advertising as possible?

What would happen if every time someone performed a search, they found EXACTLY what they were looking for in the first few results?

This is what would happen: people would hardly ever click on the Adsense ads displayed on the results pages.

Why do people click on ANY link?

Because they think that it will take them to a page about whatever it is they are looking for.

Why do people click on the Adsense ads around the search results?

Because they think the ad is more likely to take them to a page about whatever it is they are looking for than the other links they see on the page.

Key Point: