Network Solutions Logo
(Photo Credit: Network Solutions)

TechCrunch reported NetSol was "hijacking" unassigned subdomains and slapping spammy paid links on them. The proprietor of GotGame.com was surprised to learn that app.gotgame.com (no longer in service since news broke) had links to online poker sites, courtesy of NetSol. It was later reported that GoDaddy has a similar unused subdomain practice.

Commentators at the TechCrunch thread sang a rousing march of class action lawsuit potentiality. NetSol appeared to be riding the cash cow under webmaster radar. Hang on a second and I’ll find another metaphor to end this paragraph with: Over 300,000 known subdomains were revealed to have more spam than a grocery store shelf.

I guess, technically, that’s not a metaphor.

ArsTechnica, though, took the time to dig into NetSol’s 59,000-word Service Agreement (yick) and shovel out a load of legalese that says NetSol customers may have indeed given permission to have any inactive webpage on their site used as a spam shelf.

Having the language buried in a EULA agreement doesn’t necessarily let NetSol off the hook for shady behavior, though. Back when Eliot Spitzer was still on top of the world, he didn’t have any qualms about suing and fining companies for being sneaky like that. The Electronic Frontier Foundation hasn’t been too friendly toward unfair EULAs, either.

At least NetSol allows customers to opt out of the program in their account settings. Opt-out policies themselves are controversial—just ask Google and Facebook.

What’s not clear yet, though, is whether the links placed on the websites pass PageRank, thus creating a Google penalty bull’s eye, amid a number of other SEO concerns. Network Solutions did not get back with me yet about whether the links are no follow or whether there was any way the link pages could affect a website’s search ranking.
 

Google Scrubs SubDomains

A couple of weeks ago, Google made a change in their algorithm. Prior to the change, a subdomain was considered more or less like a separate URL. Matt explained the reason that presented a problem was due to the fact that multiple subdomains and main domains had a tendency to dominate search listings for some queries – specifically, for example, elaborate long tail query strings.

"We did hear complaints that for some types of searches (e.g. esoteric or long-tail searches), Google could return a search page with lots of results all from one domain. In the last few weeks we changed our algorithms to make that less likely to happen." – Matt Cutts

Matt described the changes as not something anyone should get too worked up over. Google will still return multiple results from a single domain where appropriate. However, you should no longer find whole pages of results totally dominated by one site and 5 or 6 of its subdomains.

We asked Matt if there was a preference or order of importance ascribed to domains vs. subdomains – in other words would Google tend to return one over the other in the results. He told us plainly that there is no algorithmic preference to subdomains vs. domains, so they are treated as equally relevant. Matt’s personal preference in this regard would be subdirectories over subdomains because he finds them more "convenient". Subdomains however, are useful he admits for separating dramatically different sections of a site — for example, mail.google.com or videos.webpronews.com.

At the end of the day, based on our conversation with Matt at Pubcon and from the comments he has made on his blog, this doesn’t sound like it’s going to have any huge impact on very many sites. If you had high results for a query on your subdomains, from what I gather, you can probably expect to retain those. If you had 8 out of the top 10 listings, you can probably look for some of those to drop out – though not necessarily lose your high positions for the ones that remain.

When Matt brought this up at the Pubcon in Las Vegas last week there was a significant amount of murmuring and buzz. That’s pretty much to be expected when you have Matt Cutts talking about an algorithmic change to Google at a conference full of webmasters.

In this case though, it doesn’t appear to be anything most of us need to be fretting over. After all, as Matt said on his blog, the change was actually implemented a couple of weeks ago and there haven’t been any frantic comments on his blog and I haven’t heard a peep about it in WebProWorld – or anywhere else for that matter. So, yes, there was an algo tweak concerning subdomains, but no, there probably isn’t any cause for panic.

Matt Cutts informed us that Google will very soon begin treating subdomains and subdirectories the same in this fashion: there will be only 2 total urls from a domain in any set of search results, so no more getting 3, 4 or however many spots via subdomains.

Cutts posted on his blog this morning though, that that was only partially true. Google had received complaints about rarer, long-tail searches returning several results from one domain. So Google changed its algorithms to make that less likely.

Matt writes, "This change doesn’t apply across the board; if a particular domain is really relevant, we may still return several results from that domain. For example, with a search query like [ibm] the user probably likes/wants to see several results from ibm.com. Note that this is a pretty subtle change, and it doesn’t affect a majority of our queries. In fact, this change has been live for a couple weeks or so now and no one noticed."

As eBay and others have aggressively used subdomains to dominate branded AND unbranded search results, and Google has improved their sitelinks technology, any relevancy gain by treating subdomains as a separate site has gone away. Google is going to start treating subdomains like subfolders, and limit the number of results from any site to two.

There is still an upside to using subdomains because they allow you to feature standout content, but that upside relates to how marketable the content on that subdomain is, whereas in the past using lots of subdomains allowed eBay to get 20 of the top 30 listings for some queries, even if the subdomain was recycled garbage.

This move adds value to regionalizing sites and creating niche brands (like MobileCrunch), since currently I believe ebay.ca and ebay.com will be seen as two separate sites. If sites are too aggressive with regionalization or creating niche brands and start double dipping that way then Google might eventually look to devalue that move as well, although that will be more of a challenge because it would create a lot of collateral damage.

Official announcement by Matt Cutts at Pubcon, reported first by Barry.

Comments

"Matt Cutts informed us that Google will very soon begin treating subdomains and subdirectories the same in this fashion: there will be only 2 total urls from a domain in any set of search results, so no more getting 3, 4 or however many spots via subdomains. We didn’t get any more information than just that basic heads-up."

The change could be beneficial to some and costly to others as some lose dominance in the search results and others gain exposure by moving up.

"The implications can be huge for companies," writes Barry Schwartz at SearchEngineLand. "Besides for the traffic implications, companies need to also worry about reputation management issues."

• filter link juice to your mother brand site, which is especially useful for temporal news or in categories where link building is tough
• create additional ad inventory that sells at the premium CPM rate of your core brand (see also: Extending the Reach / Circulation of a Web Based Content Site & Ad Network)
• extend to new markets without requiring you to risk tarnishing your main brand

There are many ways to extend, including

• subdomains (eBay is the master of subdomains)
• related brand sites (US News & World Report launched RankingsAndReviews.com, which touches virtually every high paying category)
• editorial channels tracking the marketplace of your main brand (Yahoo! Buzz published a blog post titled "About That Ringtone")
• sites owned by fake affiliates that you claim no ownership of (use affiliate software to track your sister sites and remove blame from your company)

What tips to do you have for extending your reach while protecting your brand?

Comments

About.com has been selling custom branded sponsored content for about a year. This WSJ page hawking Accenture is a PageRank 4, and this BizJournals lead generation page is also an indication of where sponsored content hosting is heading. How long will it be before you can log on to the WSJ ad platform and just buy a topic and upload a page?

A few months back Threadwatch had a post about Yahoo selling subdomains. Yesterday I stumbled across an AdSense ad for a company selling subdomains that they forward to other sites. I don’t believe it is smart to build a big site on someone else’s domain, but if you wanted to fling up a bunch of spam or create a single targeted ad page that goes after a competitive phrase why not leech of their authority and let them assume the risks?

There are no search engine guidelines on hosting advertisements for third parties because it is not an idea Google wants people thinking about or talking publicly about, and they can’t edit out WSJ.com if they will want the WSJ to spread their public relations messages and business interests.

Comments

Since Google has been over-representing site authority in their relevancy algorithms many sites like eBay have begun abusing the hole with the use of infinite subdomains. These techniques not only effect branded search results, but also carry over to many other competitive keywords. 

Creating Shadow Brands & Buying Top Ranked Competing Sites

While small businesses are worried about the risks of buying or renting a few links, some large corporations are launching shadow brands or buying out competing domains en mass. There are thousands or millions of other examples, so it is unfair for me to point any out, but here are a few for the sake of argument.

• Monster.com has a near unlimited number of education related domains, with a near identical user experience at almost all of them.
• Bankrate has a double listing at #2 and #3 for mortgage calculator. They also bought the #1 ranked site.
• How many different verticals does Yahoo! cover the Nintendo Wii in? Off the top of my head, at least 9: their brand universe, yahoo tech, yahoo shopping, yahoo news, yahoo directory, ask yahoo, yahoo answers, videogames.yahoo, games.yahoo, etc. (and that doesn’t even count geolocal subdomains for answers, shopping, etc.)

What happened to result diversity? When and why did Google stop caring about that?

Is Buying Links Ethical?

Some people may report paid links, but the fact that there is a mechanism to do so shows how effective link buying is.

Why is buying links bad, when using infinite domains or buying a bunch of sites are both legitimate? Why is it ok for the WSJ to publish this type of content, but wrong for me to do whatever necessary to compete in a marketplace cluttered with that information pollution?

The point here is not to say that big businesses are bad or doing anything wrong, but to show the stupidity Google is relying on when they scaremonger newer and smaller webmasters about the risks of buying a link here or there. The big businesses do all of the above, gain more organic links by being well known, and still buy links because the techniques works. Whatever Google ranks is what people will create more of, so long as it is profitable to do so.

If you create a real brand you can buy more links and be far spammier with your optimization with a lower risk profile, because Google has to rank your site or they lose marketshare. Create something that is best of breed and then market the hell out of it. If marketing requires buying a few links then open up the wallet and get ready to rank.

Comments

Tag:

While Google owns a huge number of domain names, these are only the ones that are active, with pages, data or live redirects. The list is long and interesting, and if you take your time, you’ll probably find some stuff you’ve never heard of before in there.

Some good ones:

http://3dchallenge.sketchup.com/
http://services.google.com/
http://wml.froogle.com/
http://www.google.com/librariancenter/
http://www.google.com/macwidgets/
http://www.google.com/permissions
http://www.google.com/plex
http://www.google.com/wireless
http://www.google.com/transit
http://googlebloglist.blogspot.com/
http://google-code-featured.blogspot.com/

Tag:

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Yahoo! My Web | Furl

Bookmark WebProNews:

Nathan Weinberg writes the popular InsideGoogle blog, offering the latest news and insights about Google and search engines.

Visit the InsideGoogle blog.

When Google unveiled a smattering of new products this past Spring, there also came with the unveiling a promise that this would be a big release year for the company. The Googleplex is well-known for the side-project assembly line inside, as Google-drones devote 20 percent of their time to what Marissa Mayer admits are expected to die on the launch pad.

Ruscoe treats us to a tale of intrigue and secrecy as some interesting names appear and his Google detective comrades come out of the woodwork. This could be something. It could be nothing. Reexamining the subdomain he located last year, sandbox.google.com, Ruscoe noted a group of other subdomains he assumes are used for development and testing of new or experimental services.

Among the names on the list, some are quite familiar: Google Writely, Local, Mobile, Talk, and WiFi. But newer names won the attention. Here they are so you can join the speculation:

Google Events: Commentators doubt this is a twin to Calendar. But the peanut gallery is still uncertain as to what exactly it could entail.

Google Guess: Your guess is as good as anyone else’s. Google already has a Suggest function to guide searchers more quickly on their way. A Magic 8-Ball service? A lottery ticket number generator? A probability game? A page devoted to tall blonde jeans models?

Google Online Assessment: Ruscoe concedes this could be an internal platform for Google employees. He also speculates it could be used for qualifying sales leads. Maybe an offshoot of Analytics? An automated Web-doctor? An online branding investigator?

Google Real Estate Search: This one is very interesting. Is it possible Google is experimenting with a vertical search engine to create a directory of the real estate market. I know a few reps that will jump at it.

Google Mobile Marketplace: Ruscoe writes, “Maybe number 13 in John Battelle’s Predictions 2006 post will come true. Maybe Google will finally plug mobile ‘into the web in a way that makes sense for the average user’ and maybe they’ll also be the ones to create “a major mobile innovation – the kind that makes us all say – Jeez that was obvious.”

Whatever Google’s doing with these double secret subdomains, the mystery adds to the fascination that Googlites have with the company and keeps people buzzing. It can be said about the company’s famous secrecy: it generates buzz, conspiracy theory, disappointment, and awe all at the same time, with just 20 percent of the effort.

Discuss this article with your fellow WebPros at WebProWorld.
—
Tag:

Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Yahoo! My Web | Furl

Bookmark WebProNews: