Comments on: Do Authority Sites Really Need Your Help?

By: Richard

Richard — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 10:11:08 +0000

Yeah Josh,

I see that you are focussing on the most important issue here. That is traffic, traffic and more traffic. It is easy telling people to make money with blogs, websites and affiliate programs. Its getting customers and traffic to them which is terribly difficult if you are a newbie.

Traffic generating systems that really work are few and far between.

Rich

By: Josh Spaulding

Josh Spaulding — Mon, 21 Jan 2008 13:58:57 +0000

Andy Beard recently wrote a little about “dangling pages.” It’s something I know very little about, but apparently it’s no good to link to them and some of the biggest culperates are authority sites like Amazon.

By: robojiannis

robojiannis — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 11:07:55 +0000

re="nofollow" is the solution. Or you just don't link to these authority sites at all. If a reader wants to look up a term you've written, he/she knows where to do that. Pointing to google or wikipedia, is...well...pointless, i think. When pointing to books, I really hate linking to amazon. It's a hub and it sells books. I prefer The libraryThing

By: Josh Spaulding

Josh Spaulding — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 16:34:45 +0000

Thanks Steve, great to hear others that agree. I don’t have a problem with authority sites, but why not help the little guy instead of the big guy.

By: Steve Mills

Steve Mills — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 23:41:51 +0000

I can see your point Josh, and if credible sources for information that are separate from the information monopoly that is wikipedia and google are found they should be encouraged.

By: Josh Spaulding

Josh Spaulding — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 21:15:09 +0000

We won’t always find good info on the topic we’re covering, but my point is that we should look. I always take the time to look for other blogs/sites that could use my link juice rather than linking to Google, Wikipedia etc.

Controlling your own authority is extremely important, although many don’t care about it. I’ll let those who don’t think about go though If they want to throw away what their sites/blogs have obtained and deserved then so be it. I’ll control mine, which will benefit both myself and those who I decide to link out to (which will rarely be Google, Wiki etc.) Why should I (the little guy) help fill the pockets of Larry Page etc. when I can help another little guy.

By: Chuck Brown

Chuck Brown — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 20:37:02 +0000

I think your point is a reasonable one…however, the issue here is that, for the most part, we don’t SEE these other helpful blogs/sites in the first place. I usually end up at Wikipedia or some other authority site first, because that’s what comes up at the top of the search engines.

Especially since “link juice” has pretty much zero value to me personally, I link rather freely to resources that I find helpful. And I would hope that most of us do this naturally. If not, maybe folks need to find a way to become a little less stingy about “PR leakage”.

But…if I understand you correctly…what you’re really suggesting is that we spend extra time looking for other authority options and link to them instead? I don’t think that’s likely to happen for most of us. I’m certainly not going to spend extra time trying to find someone to promote when I’m on an info hunt. If I run across them, and a solution is worth sharing, I will certainly do that.

I do think your point about “no-following” Google and Wikipedia and IMDB and other authority titans is a solid one, though.