Matt Cutts on Advertorials on May 29th

[cbielich]

Just saw this video in which Matt Cutts talks about "Advertorials" on the net as apposed to "Editorials" (Content where one is paid, the other is not)

Thought there was some interesting points in the video, but as obvious as it gets Google is cracking down on this HARD! You can see it and smell it Google News joined the bandwagon as well

Matt Says @ 45 Seconds

"but it basically means that someone gave you some money rather than you writing about this actually because you thought it was interesting or because you wanted to"

I pay writers to write for me, do they like what they are writing about? No. They do it because I pay them, but they write very well and provide great content that gets shared naturally and socially (soturally - I just made up a new word :)).

Anyways yes I may place links in those articles that point to other sites, but nothing in the aspect of paid advertising. Just that it relates to the content.

I'm just curious how far the rabbit hole goes on this one...

[Chris.Menke]

This shows why social engagement signals are playing/will play a larger part in organic visibility.  It's less about the content per se (or who writes it) and more about the social actions that take place around the content.  Producing great content is nice, but if no one reads it or cares about it, should it help your authority or rankings?  And about links on content that no one engages with--should they count as much as links on content that earns a lot of engagement?

As "big data" is becoming more and more manageable and the social actions of individual user profiles can be evaluated based, in turn, on their interactions with other profiles and content, how those profiles interact with your content can provide signals as to the content's value.  Start thinking about engagement and the rabbit hole does't seem so deep.

[cbielich]

Yeah I hear ya, I have to be honest here that my weakness in SEO is engaging users. And by weakness I mean it's my hardest struggle, of everything

I have a tools based website that I rack my brain everyday trying to figure out how I could engage my users more, when they just want my tools. They engage by using my tools, but they are in and out. Luckily they repeatedly come back and use them over and over (59% return rate)

My competition in this niche out ranks me in keywords, yet their tools are no were near mine.

But because users click on him first. He gets shared first.

LOL I was even thinking of incorporating "cat memes" into my results just because it seems like everyone loves cats and people might share the images.

[josh-riley]

I think engagement is harder for many than they always admit. I'm in an old school manufacturing field where there's a lot of assumptions on our user's online behavior. Even with the growth of sharing tools and whatnot, the 90/9/1 rule still seems to hold true.

[cbielich]

I believe it does hold true in many areas, except now we have the "Viral" factor which blows that theory out of the water.

[Chris.Menke]

You don't think viral can't be clearly identified, isolated, and measured as in independent incident, and authority applied as such?  Check this out...

http://m.c.lnkd.licdn.com/mpr/mpr/shrink_200_200/p/1/000/0e5/3dd/0598183.jpg

[cbielich]

Nice Picture

[Johnny4B]

Crazy stuff .... there is no way that Google can absolutely legislate that an "editorial / advertorial" is paid for or not if you are smart ... Unless its blatantly obvious (site A sells backlinks)

Then again, they have never ever needed to legislate on anything before.

For example, we approached a large wedding paraphernalia blog a couple of weeks ago to cover a new website, the client was happy to "exchange goods in return for the client to "evaluate" the good pre the editorial ..

We received a nice review but more importantly a link back to the website form a website with a high DA.

Now, how does Google qualify that as paid service for a link ... the content was relevant, it was actually about wedding jewellery, the clients website is a wedding jewellery store, the content was relevant and appropriate, of contextual and useful information to their readers ...

[cbielich]

I suspect that Google poses as users trying to see if companies/websites will sell them links. Its the Google version of Chris Hanson "To Catch A Black Hatter"

[Johnny4B]

You mean Google have jobs going, if you cant beat them, join them !!!