I feel almost bad for reporters in the mainstream media who attempt to cover the search marketing field. It's a tough gig to wrap your head around the concepts of what makes the industry tick, made doubly so by shady tactics and those who practice them. When these combine to slip past Google's spam filter and slide onto the desk of a hapless journalist, it's time for Rand to put on his sleuthing hat and become... drumroll... Debunker-Man! Defender of SERPs, righter of SEO wrongs and foe to those who would point at their crappy link farms and call themselves
wizards who possess a sophisticated understanding of the complicated mathematical algorithms used by engines such as Google
Yeah. That's a direct quote from the piece. On to the debunking.
Business reporter Chris Sorenson wrote about the "Robin Hood of Online Marketing," which, by any standards, is a great title for a piece. Heck, I was excited to read it and I'll bet a lot of my Canadian cohorts were too, eh, gang? In the piece, Chris follows the success of local directory portal, FabulousSavings.com:
At present, FabulousSavings has about 1,100 clients, about 240 of which are small businesses located mostly in the Toronto area. Each of the small businesses pays about $180 a month to participate in the program.
Here's how it works. Yack's firm, first launched in 1999, signs up small businesses in several pre-identified categories – painters, car rentals, furniture stores are examples – and then uses pre-existing templates to build custom Web pages to be posted at www.fabulousavings.com. Search engines notice the pages in part because they include key words and attributes that are popular among online surfers looking for particular services, Yack says.
Yack deliberately limits the number of clients he will do business with to two per business category. He says that's because searching on Google, for example, for "Faux finishing and Toronto" won't bring up more than two painting businesses connected to FabulousSavings.com.
The key ingredient is that all FabulousSavings clients offer online coupons for discounts or free services, which are designed to convince surfers to engage the website by leaving a name or phone number that can be followed up. It sounds simple, but Yack says the technique has proven to be a real competitive advantage.
I have to say that the concept behind the company - connecting those interested in small businesses online with incentives to really use small business websites - isn't a bad one. In fact, if FabulousSavings.com were on the up and up SEO-wise, I'd be praising him. But, that's really not the case. Here's how the article pitches the rankings they've achieved:
Yack is less forthcoming when it comes to explaining the finer points of his firm's "search engine optimization" services, saying only that he employs several "wizards" who possess a sophisticated understanding of the complicated mathematical algorithms used by engines such as Google.
"A lot of it has to do with their algorithm and what it's looking for," he says cryptically. When asked to explain further, he stresses that his firm has never "broken any laws or done anything unethical."
One shadowy technique is known as "link bombing," where a Web page is filled with hundreds of hidden hyperlinks. The idea is to fool Google's algorithms, which rank the importance of a Web page by looking at how many other pages are linked to it. Google, however, has said it's wise to such tricks and changes its algorithms regularly to prevent abuse.
Yack, however, says his firm's techniques are above board and focus more on providing the type of content search engines look for, which can be as simple as ensuring that key search terms are included on a Web page.
As well, he says FabulousSavings benefits from being in the business for eight years because search engines tend to favour websites that have a history of providing relevant information.
Are you getting that creepy, something-doesn't-feel-right vibe? If so, you're on the right path. Let's go investigate how and why Yack's portal is pulling in traffic from the engines.
The best tool we can use for this is Yahoo!'s Site Explorer. In fact, if it wasn't for Yahoo!, I don't know how the search industry would police itself. Diving into the results, I see them reporting ~100,000 total links to the site - not great, but not bad, either. It's once you start looking into those links that things appear fishy...
As you surf through the first few dozen links, you can see a lot of lists of pages on the site being linked to with appropriate anchor text. There's nothing particularly wrong, but it's clearly manipulative and "un-natural." Still, not particularly heinous. It simply looks like they've asked all the companies they work with to link back to them on their websites. However, when you start seeing interconnected linking like this:
from parcsafari.qc.ca
...on the bottom of lots and lots of pages, it's an eyebrow-raiser. This is the same "link-farming" style tactics that got countless webmasters into trouble way back in the Florida days at Google. Here's a few more gems:
from cppterminsurance.com
from hiven.qc.ca
from cityknowitall.com
Of course, once you notice a pattern to many of these link farms, you can pick up on them and expose an entire network - like this - Google search for fabuloussavings+"this webpage is available for a business offering" - 700+ results. And that's just one of the apparent schemes, all of which center around building sites for "clients," interlinking the domains (or sometimes just building junky, worthless sites for more interlinking) and reaping the rewards. I wish the reporter had pressed a little harder about those "wizards" who follow the algorithms.
Once you see something like this, is it any wonder that folks are attempting to cloak their links? If I were in FabulousSavings' position, I wouldn't want anyone knowing where my links were coming from, either. I guess link farming and high volume interlinking is back. At least, in Canada...
p.s. The Toronto Star was kind enough to embed a link to what they thought was the correct site in the piece, but sadly, a typo by the reporter (one "s" instead of two) means that some domain squatter is making a killing right now, and a lot of frustrated newspaper readers are probably scratching their heads. Is that karma, or just poor proofing?
p.p.s. Rand - why are you outing spam? Because I hate to see the mainstream media take the bait and give the industry and profession a bad name by association. It's not that I want to see FabulousSavings fail, I just want the wider world to be aware of how misinformation combined with a difficult-to-investigate field can combine to make SEO out to be something it's not.
UPDATE- Spent some time on the phone this morning (the 19th) with Mr. Yack. While he didn't attempt to defend the link tactics, he certainly is very passionate about helping small businesses succeed and has a great number of satisfied clients and consumers. I did my best to make it clear to him that I was not, by any means, attacking him personally or his business model, but rather, the interlinking domain tactics.
There are alot of similar companies in toronto that call themselves "search optimization companies" yet produce some real shady tactics.
Check out techwyse.com and check it's backlinks. Those are basically the list of all their clients. It looks like they make their clients put in a techwyse link at the bottom to power up his main site....
But, take a closer look at the back links of techwyse's clients and you'll see it's some sort of link farm / co-operative linking system. Usually you'll find them at the very bottom of the homepage. Probably using link-vault or digital-points co-opt link system..
I wouldn't want to fathom a guess on how much they charge there clients, but either way it's very hard for the clients to know what's right for them. Especially in canada where business are not as saavy as their american counter parts in online search.
There is nothing wrong i guess in seo companies getting backlinks from clients websites.but again yes its wrong when seo companies adding link backs to their clients in link farms.
The dp forums co-op is a very bad service which can get your websites banned from the se's like google and i have had a very bad experiance when i used it.
I wish there were ways to give your comment multiple thumbs up. Lets just say "you don't know the half of it"
Thanks for making that post and shedding some light on that particular company
I can't stand those types of sites. They're always ranking with useless content and it's usually tough to get on top of them in Canada. I think Google in Canada is a little screwed up.
And yes. The link farming does seem to work up here. It's very frustrating for those of us trying to build quality sites.
As a fellow SEO company in Toronto, thank you all. The article and comments illustrate some of the issues we face here. The worst part is that many prospects won't even tell you which other firms they are looking at, so it becomes even more challenging to discuss and educate these issues with them.The Canadian search market place is no doubt less competitive in some industries. This provides a nice advantage to those “earlier adopters” to obtain more clients at a low cost, however this does make it easier for those more basic optimization tactics to work and unethical practices to flourish. For those not so savvy, on the surface fs.com’s solution works and is cheap compared to a better and longer term SEO alterative. Let's just hope our good Canadian neighbours [Canadian sp. for neighbors ;) ] do their research.
*Playing Devils Advocate* – It won’t take much for the clients to get their money’s worth if all they are paying is $180 per month. Furthermore, if no link love is being passed, then the client sites shouldn’t suffer any consequences from spammy inlinks, when and if the link farm gets devalued. This is a lot less bad than charging thousands for keyword stuffing and long tail keywords.
No doubt Spammeisters like this reflect badly on the industry, but there aren’t all that many positions for #1 White hat SEO firms out there. Everyone just wants a little piece of the pie.
You may commence with the down thumbing.
DrDave,
"Devils advocate" is sometimes also called perspective, depends
upon whether or not you like what is said.
CollieMan,
Exactly. I personally believe in high quality long term investments. But, I can understand why others want / need to go for the quick buck. The bad guys are the ones who don't care who they hurt in the process.
I am only seeing about 2,947 Inlinks from Site Explorer. Is anyone else seeing this data?
Great Article! Rand, you know one thing I notice is that a lot of companies are doing this reciprocal linking krap, and other things to that nature, which I mean theres nothing wrong with reciprocal links in my opinion, which I wouldn't convery it to any of my clients, or any one I talk to.
The point is I'm tryin gto get to is that it might be okay for a few recips, but some of these people just get carried away linking to one and another, and the thing is that a lot of these people are just out to make there buck, and really don't even think about the search engine abuse, or they might not even realize what there doing is bad, they might think its ethical because its helping them out, but in googles eyes is this ethical?
Nope :)
"saying only that he employs several "wizards" who possess a sophisticated understanding of the complicated mathematical algorithms used by engines such as Google"
First paragraph is where it went fishy. Didn't Google tell us not to trust an seo who spewed out such rubbish ie were secretive?
"possess a sophisticated understanding of the complicated mathematical algorithms"
Yeah...like they would be working for him if they did.
You don't need an expert understanding of the search engines to create a link farm. Isn't this where everybody starts? :)
It's just a good online / bricks and mortar con but certainly not a sophisticated one if your analysis is correct.
how about some more info on Debunker-Man? does he have a costume? is there Debunker-Man merchandise that die hard Debunker-Man fans can buy?
long live Debunker-Man.
Dear Rand, I am not in the habit of being a Web vigilante and trying to expose ever Tom, Dick, and Harry for every little wrong doing that they do on the Internet.
But there are people who a wrongfully and greedily trying to gain from the Internet from the hard work that the developers and Webmasters do.
These hard core Internet abusers deserve to be exposed. If one is so evil as to step on everybody’s backs to profit their own greedy empire they deserve no mercy.
So let’s not persecute the Webmaster for some small infringements of Google Webmaster Guidelines but go after the really nasty search engine Spammers.
Software Projects released a Beginner's Guide to SEO Link Building today that we are going to share with clients.
After reading your blog entry, I re-read our guide to try and pick out if there's anything there that would be considered search engine spam like this guy Yack.
We do mention launching a few social networking profiles, filling them with basic content and linking back to the main site, as well as using forum signatures and publishing articles.
Then again, as long as the content is real. Stuff users can use. Unique and not basic keyword spamming, I think it's all above the board.
Please correct me if I'm wrong.
Rand, based on your detective work I have added FabulousSavings dot com to PHSDL Spam domains list.
They will feel right at home!
https://www.travelinasia.net/forum/project_honeypot.php
Igor - I'm usually not one to expose people's ranking manipulations for no reason, but when they get coverage in the mainstream press it really irks me. I'm not even sure I'd blame FS, so much as the Toronto Star and their reporter for the very shallow investigation.
Rand:
I can't believe you outted this site. One of your previous posts was saluting some black-hats, now you are playing SEO-Cop with a site that's just using some questionable linking tactics.
I hope this is the last post from Debunker-Man. I hold you in higher regard than that.
Response to comments:
Why do people always quote google guidelines like they are LAW? Stop whining about sites like this outranking yours. If you can't outrank a site like this with some legitimate SEO tatics, you need to consider a change of profession... SEO is not for you.
on Michael Martinez:
Sometimes I feel most of his comments are posted just for aurguments sake... but at least there is a counterpoint. The blog comments are turning into a bunch of "way to go" and "yes sir" replies. That's not good for the learning process.
Kurt - I think it would be tough to defend FabulousSavings.com given that Michael Yack clearly knows what he's doing and yet still agreed to share with the TorontoStar. If I was uncovering someone who didn't go bragging to the world about his "SEO wizards" I'd certainly be more sympathetic.
As for Martinez - I agree that the blog certainly needs more discussion and debate. I don't want anyone to feel that I'm trying to limit that. As I've told Michael frequently, I'm often a fan of his underlying content, but have never really been a fan of his presentation style.
Kurt,
You need to keep it in perspective. I remember many of Rand's posts on Digital Point, SEOChat, etc way before SEOmoz existed (and John Stewart was his avatar). If there has been one consistency that Rand has kept over the years, it's been to properly educate those outside of this industry as to what SEO really entails. We are still a widely misunderstood "cottage" industry. A lot of mainstream media considers SEOs to be the equivilent of used-car salespersons in the online marketing mix. Rand has focused his energies on properly representing SEOs time and time again. SEOmoz itself is a result of this agenda.
So it is no surprise to see the above example. I'm sure there are millions of other examples Rand could pull out of the air if the true goal was to oust spammers. But this particular example was already made public by a widely-circulated publication and heavily misrepresented our industry. All Rand did was extend the existing discussion and counter the points made by the misinformed reporter.
Is FS.com going to become a causulty of this debate? Possibly. But I guarantee their going to see a very large short-term gain from the exposure they recieved in the Toronto Sun. In addition to that, the majority of their clients probably won't even notice if FS.com becomes penalized in the process, mostly because they haven't been properly educated as to what they are actually purchasing.
re: Michael Martinez:
You are correct. Yeah, it feels that the only time Michael speaks up is when he disagrees. But damn at least he speaks when he sees a differing point. Even if he's just throwing out fodder for the sake of arguing, it never hurts to stir the pot a little. Xena would be proud.
To Rand and the rest of SEOmoz:
See my post above. I love seeing examples of our industry mentioned in the mainstream press, both good and bad. Keep the radar up! There will be plenty of opportunity for more discussions like this as search marketing continues to become more and more mainstream.
Rand, you are my man!!!
Power to the people!
Ran maybe you can do forensics on passionasia dot com
12flights dot com 12flight dot com go to the buttom of the page and look at the hotel domain links
All these domains have content that is being used by passionasia dot com
So duplicate domains, link farms, domain spawners, duplicate content!!!
And this company is owned by a multi billion dollat telecome company in Thailand...
Here is a forensics I did on them
https://www.travelinasia.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3418
disclaimer: The reason I know about this, because this company was a CMS ASP provider to our company, and about a year ago, they just said we are closing the service and you have to leave.
They hurt many small stravel agencies in Thailand by making them build a Website using their CMS on their host and then they threw them out and stole their customers.
If you want more info on Passionasia and its CEO let me know.
Rand, it is so funny, I just checked, it has been a month since I wrote the origional post and posted a thread to the post on Matt C. blog.
They have done a 301 redirect from 12flights dot com to 12flight dot com
They also got rid of the hotel domain links from the buttom of 12flight dot com Web page!!!
Rand, they also closed all the duplicate hotel domains.
They say they are under construction.....
Wow our work is great....If a single man can cause a mutli billion dollar public company to listen....this is the real power...
Rand keep doing your detective work and fighting SERP's Spam
We got the power!!!!
Thank you,
Igor
I have worked with a few clients who utilize FabulousSavings.com and some have had success while others haven't. One point made above speaks to the "value" the client is getting from a small monthly investment. While that may be true, I have been on sales calls trying to pitch SEO/PPC services to clients who won't budge from FabulousSavings.com because they are generating business from it. I fear what will happen to these small business' when the FabulousSavings.com sites begin to disappear from the first page. Any value they received from FS.com will quickly disappear and they will be left scrambling for some internet marketing presence.
Any clients I have worked with who utilize FS.com and SEO/PPC services quickly see the better ROI from SEO/PPC and have subsequently dropped FS.com.
Lastly, in many cases, the per month fee is much higher than $180 and is more often a flat 6 month or 1 year fee that ranges into $2000 mark.
If the listed clients are happy with the service offered then they would not care to worry about 2k$ paid.
The clients I have worked with didn't work out the ROI calculations. When the analysis is presented to them, they understood the better value and better business decision was not to engage with FS.com. Thats the point I was trying to make.
Hi Rand,
When i run site explorer for the whole site, not just the index page
i see over 100k links.Am i missing something here?
I reckon they take nearly $2.4m per annum on membership
for this site which is very impressive by any standards.
Also i dont see any link love being passed to their clients.
So where do you go from here?
If we take it for granted Mr Cutts will be interested, what comes next:-
1. De Bunker man sounds a great idea, but does he only put his cape on if it is a "public" issue like being in the press.
2. or does he root out evil where ever it is?
3. or maybe you might create a rogues gallery of black hat examples which effectively becomes a learning resource so that
we can see what is bad , learn to recognise it and avoid it.
I think the last point would be great, but with this much money
being at stake there will be some very upset people!
Good luck and many thanks
Colin
https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search?p=http%3A%2F%2Ffabuloussavings.com&bwm=i&bwmf=s&bwmo=&fr2=seo-rd-se
yes its 101k but thats a clever idea of taking backlinks from all the clients network and not passing anything back. :(
They've never "broken any laws or done anything unethical"???
If they haven't spotted their flaws from Google's Webmaster Central... oh wait, my bad, that's like the Pirate Code - not rules as such, more like 'guidelines'...
Perhaps they could find some enlightenment from Aaron's article - The Authoritative Guide to Unethical SEO Business Practices
Nice catch. Maybe keep an eye on their Alexa rank after Matt reads this post.........
Its better to stay silent on this topic instead of creating a buzz for fabuloussavings.com and help them in getting more traffic :D and better alexa.
I completely agree Amit.
There are other companies out there that have a very similar model.
All you can do, is keep doing things the right way and focus on the long term.
I make all my clients understand how I work, and what I will and will not do.
Google is not "broken" in Canada, but rather there is less competition here than south of the border. This was one of the main topics of discussion at this year's SES conference in Toronto.
My personal opinion is many of Canada's best "online brains" were sucked down south during the '99 .com boom, thereby leaving the online marketing community a few years behind the US, thereby allowing "shady" online marketing practices like the one discussed in the Star article to be succesful.
Certainly there has been a 'brain drain' of techies from Canada to the US over the years, but I think search marketing is one part of the technology industry where the effect has been relatively limited.
I personally don't know of a lot of ex-Canuck search folks that are now in the US. On the other hand, I do know lots of very smart and successful Canadian SEOs/SEMs (and affiliate marketers) that are happy living here. A lot of times their marketing focus happens to be towards the US market, though... One of the nice things about the Internet-related work is that in many cases your physical location doesn't matter. (Getting income in USD while living in Canada is a bonus. ;) )
Anyway, I do agree that there is less competition when marketing to Canadians. But I think it's more because of the market conditions that it is the case, rather than the people that are involved in the work.
Visit our sister site Fabu.com < this one seems to be working on the same idea as the main website.
Also dont you think the backlinks are very less compared to the network they are linked with which is around 240 small business in their network and still they have just 3k backlinks.
Also its nice that the reporter missed a 'S' :p
Amit - yeah, good call. There appears to be a whole diverse network of sites that are part of the company and all link out to each other and (in some cases) the client sites.
I remember when a large company out of Nevada was doing this in 2003. They did huge business selling "targeted landing pages" and for a while, unfortunately, it worked. It is unfortunate that spam tactics like this succeed because it brings a false sense of security. Once the Matt Cutts of the Maple Leaf (Canadian Eh?) secures google.ca these techniques will cease to function.
Man am I glad to hear you say that. This is a great post and I really hope to see more examples of this in the future. And don't forget good examples either, mainstream media can get it right sometimes (if the reporter contacts the "right" people).
Now all that is left is a costume!
It seems like they have a pretty good business plan and way to generate quality links from clients & partners. Plus, the coupons & discounts could really help shoppers.
It's too bad they created "fake" sites for better SERP ranking. Thumbs down for them.