I wanted to look into some of these link selling/link buying sites for a better idea on the whole gist. We know that Google has been playing hardball with link sellers lately, so I thought it would be cool to check some of the services out (admittedly, I’ve never taken part in these services, so you’re getting the thoughts of a virgin).
We’ve all seen the bigger names in the business, so I picked some fresh meat in the game. TNX. Aggressively pushing their free text link ads and an affiliate program, they first seem to be the same as the others.
Initial Thoughts Right off the bat I noticed the cumbersome nature of the site. The TNX site could really use a usability expert to get in there an clean house. It’s difficult to navigate, even once logged in. Reading through the on-site documentation has me a bit happy. Responding to a FAQ “will this help my PR,” the site reads:
“We just offer a convenient tool that is used for mass non-reciprocal link placement on websites. Service is not intended to be used for PR growth, but to get more targeted traffic from websites and search engines.” This is exactly why I would want to purchase links anyway. I use a plethora of other methods for rankings, so qualified traffic is a point of interest for me.
I also noticed that dealings within the system hardly mention money, but
talk in the form of points. This is really difficult to get a grasp on at first, but basically everything is dealt in points for the convenience of using them to purchase links yourself seamlessly, or cash them out for legal tender.
A Little Deeper The list of sites taking part in the program is kept private. This means that nobody at Google can create a quick account and scroll through a list
of potential future penalty victims.The selection of link buying process is a little bit better than some others, in that you set the criteria, then select the amount of links you want to purchase from a list of results that match that criteria. This seemed great at first, but testing it out proved to be a little different.
I purchased links for a site I cared little for, and was put off by the selection of sites that picked up my links. I selected a very specific target niche, and what I got in return was a number of links on made-for-AdSense sites. One was listed in a bullet list directly under a scrollable head reading “Advertisements,” and another “Sponsored Listings.” We know this to be a good signal for Google.
PR aside, if you wanted to purchase a link for traffic reasons, these would also be poor sites. There is no substance to them at all, and likely have a very large bounce rate with use of the browser’s “back”
button. On the same note, the user menu says that TNX has not checked these links yet, so I’m hoping they will look at the sites, and remove my links without charging my account. I’m not going to notify them to see if the system takes care of it without needing my attention. Which is why this is part 1.
Part 2 This is my initial response to TNX so far. I was just going to poke around in the TNX network and give my thoughts, but I would like to become more familiar with the system before I pass too much judgement. The site looks and feels horrible, but V8 tastes disgusting, and we know it’s good for
you…right? So, I’m going to play with it with a few more sites across some other niches, and see what a month produces. Stay tuned.
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