The SE Upshot.

[feedman]

Hi all - first post here and a few questions for the experienced if I may.

In all honesty - do the SEs (G, Y, M) still realistically index and RANK pages created like this by affiliates?

Or - do they just, in their own ways, punish and bury such sites.

With
a) dupe content
b) the fact the sites are jammed full of affiliate links

surely people are seeing their shops punished in the SERPS?

I'm reading around and whilst SEO is being looked at - at the end of the day I personally feel that the engines will not like the shops at all.

Can anyone provide an upshot on how their shops are performing on the engines?

Cheers
Feedman

[Confuscius]

Hi Feedman

Those with 'modded' versions probably fare better than the 95%+ who just load the standard product ;)

My view is that the best bet for a standard install is to start the homepage at a lower level niche and add a few custom menu items - some good examples in the members' sites thread.

To get a complete Shop Window Site indexed would involve the indexing of probably about 100 million pages if you look at all the possible combinations therefore starting at a lower level should mathematically reduce the chances of duplication near the top of a site.

Shop Window sites are like any other website and the challenge to get results is precisely that, a challenge.

My 5 years of earning a living online have taught me one thing - you can ignore 99% of what the Gurus say about Google. You can also get reasonable traffic from other search engines.

The more people that try to 'beat' Google then the happier I am because that is not where my effort goes. ;)

As regards your queries;

"In all honesty - do the SEs (G, Y, M) still realistically index and RANK pages created like this by affiliates?" - YES!

"Or - do they just, in their own ways, punish and bury such sites." - NO

"With
a) dupe content
b) the fact the sites are jammed full of affiliate links

surely people are seeing their shops punished in the SERPS?" - IF YOU CAN DEFINE 'PUNISHED' THEN YOU CAN ADDRESS IT - THE HARSH REALITY IS THAT YOUR GUESS IS AS GOOD AS ANYONE ELSE'S!

I'm reading around and whilst SEO is being looked at - at the end of the day I personally feel that the engines will not like the shops at all. - IT IS NOT A MATTER OF WHETHER THE ENGINES LIKE THE SHOPS, IT IS A MATTER OF WHAT YOU CAN DO WITH YOUR SHOP. THERE ARE MANY OTHER WAYS TO GET VISITORS OTHER THAN THE SEARCH ENGINES.

The truth is, from my perspective, is that if you know how to achieve results in the search engines then you can take those principles and apply them to Shop Window and be equally successfully. If you think that you can just stick up a Shop Window site and retire from it then you will probably retire at an old age. I would love someone to prove me wrong. Shop Window gives you access to a mammoth amount of data to play with and finding an approach to this is what makes it so challenging (and potentially, rewarding).

Paul

[feedman]

Confuscius,

Thanks for your reply - it gives me some hope.

I'm in it for the long term - I mean years - not a quick buck thing so no worries there. About 8 years in sofar - and if I need to get 1000 domains to get 100 million pages indexed - then sobeit. :)

I have been (since the florida update) concentrating more on Y and M myself - and living fine off that traffic - whilst I would like to think I can get some from G, a lot of my latest work has completely disregarded any SEO geared for G, and moreso has been worked with M in mind. So in that respect - I too ignore G and consider anything I get from them as a bonus.

I find it very interesting where you mention that a high percentage of what SE gurus say about G should be ignored. In the context of whats best described as bewilderment, I suppose you are correct, because to be quite frank if it is as complex to rank as they go on about (I read about 4 hours per day) - then yes - ignore it if only for that reason!!

My main issue with G is really the 10,000 human reviewers they are reputed to have - and I get the impression from my reading that a product feed data site offers no value to the surfer and therefore is downgraded in the serps, made supplemental or whatever else they like to do.

It would however be extremely financially rewarding to add G traffic to existing traffic once in a while with a large site. (Again though - I'm concentrating on other SE's for the next two or three years anyway).

Defining and addressing punishment in the Serps, well I would note theories and examples alike - such as the -30, -950 penalties, thin affiliate sites dropping down in rank, incorrect (unnatural) rate of attainment of inbound links, purchased links, incorrect anchor text percentages. The list is quite long. However I find that whilst I know about a "rate of attainment of links" potentially causing problems, I do not know what the correct rate is - I therefore struggle to address it. :confused:

"Shop Window gives you access to a mammoth amount of data to play with"

This is without doubt an extremely accurate statement. :D

I do believe that I have stumbled across something here that is a first in terms of volume of data (for uk affiliates) - in addition to the volume, the search and comparison facilities appear to present opportunities for creating sites as powerful as just about any comparison site you may see advertising on TV.

Hmmmm - I can see some serious programming heading my way........

Cheers
Feedman