Link Bait Con
After searching online for the free vegetarian food truck in London apparently called Hare Krishna Food for All. I found that a suspicious looking link from an innocent looking blog redirected from it’s URL to a untrusted SSL certificate at an unrelated scam site.
Apart from the very real probability that blogs are systematically hacked and links altered to direct to scam sites I began to wonder how much money someone could make from writing a basic blog and directing links to carefully considered scams.
Link bait could be a lucrative market for digital workers if those sites featured high enough on search engine listings. The blog in question had approximately 70 entries all documenting things to do and see around London.
A high enough proportion of links leading to unoriginal ideas like visiting the London Dungeon could be an easy way to write lucrative link bait. For transparency I should say I know someone that created some of the models at London Dungeon and his talents are highly original.
It seems like a lot of effort to go to just hide a few suspicious links so this kind of link baiting must be quite lucrative.
Clients of mine have raised concerns about their page views and often enquired about search engine optimisation and the services offered by companies offering to boost page views.
What does this really mean? Modern day search engines require a hierarchy of links denoting popularity of a website and it’s authority.
The only real way to do this is to write popular articles with links to other pages requiring attention. The dilemma is that if you are paying for people to write about your website you are promoting biased and misleading advertising.
You also run the risk of being associated with these sorts of scams. Your incoming links might be fine for a while until the blog owner decides to resell links to online scams.
When you pay for publicity at least know what you are paying for and learn to commission writers at websites you respect and trust.
I suspect most SEO is clouded in mystery simply because it’s more palatable to pay for some sort IT black magic that you don’t understand than to pay for pump pieces in popular blogs.
Gaming the search engine can be done quite simply by connecting with your peers and exchanging recommendations comments and advice.
I won’t link to those sites here but I believe I have found the real food for life web site and have emailed them to inform them about the problem. Hopefully I will actually be able to get a meal on Monday and Tuesday before my next pay cheque comes in. In the mean time I’m finding food where I can and have a few leads for restaurants that will donate their excess at the end of the day.
For those interested this seems to be the real food for life I will probably be forced to check it out on Monday and Tuesday before my next pay check comes in on Wednesday in the mean time if you want to leave any tips for free food in London please do so I would really appreciate it.