Re:My Google Traffic Has Fallen to Zero
by Syzygies on Tuesday January 05, 2021 @02:07AM
(#25642952)
Agreed. I used to loathe the experience of trying to Google an Amazon alternative, and the first fifty links would be Amazon affiliates. I'd pay Google a subscription to simply block all affiliate links. I'd call these changes in Google's algorithms progress.
This could be handled locally, like uBlock. I'd like to have such a browser extension to re-filter and re-rank the search results, where I could simply ban/boost a keyword or a topic. The same extension could be applied to FB and Twitter as well - they too generate feeds that could be re-filtered and re-ranked.
Re:My Google Traffic Has Fallen to Zero
by johnwdefeo on Tuesday January 05, 2021 @06:29AM
(#25644425)
Fair points. I don't scrape/spin any content, and I would argue that it's easier to write 500 words than 50, but I can see how my content might run afoul of an automated system. Plenty of the comments on this thread make similar points.
Ironically, I know of a scraper site that mirrors Amazon's bestsellers list, reformatted as blog posts: https://gistgear.com - and it's growing like gangbusters.
> it's growing like gangbusters
For now...
Re:My Google Traffic Has Fallen to Zero
by germanjoey on Tuesday January 05, 2021 @11:03AM
(#25646882)
Is this the reason why top recipe results always contain the poster's entire life story before they ever show a list of ingredients?
That plus you can’t copyright a recipe but can copyright a story. So it thwarts scrapers.
Re:My Google Traffic Has Fallen to Zero
by ihaveajob on Tuesday January 05, 2021 @02:28PM
(#25649835)
This. I keep telling my wife how much I hate recipe websites. There has to be a better way! And yet, you're probably right that this is the reason. It's insane how much they have favored this anti-pattern.
"Pages of product affiliation where the majority of the site is made for affiliation and contains a limited amount of original content or added value for users."
Also, the site may not comply with this policy: https://developers.google.com/search/docs/advanced/guideline...
"Sites that copy content from other sites, modify it slightly (for example, by substituting synonyms or using automated techniques), and republish it"
While I have seen much poorer quality affiliate sites than this ranking in Google, IMO this model is on borrowed time. I think the way to survive in this market is by increasing the value:affiliate ratio, and diversifying income sources, so affiliate revenue isn't the sole focus.