Is PayPerPost Losing Its Way The Truth About Real Rank
Posted in Search Marketing by jspirko on November 29th, 2007 
Since PayPerPost started I have been a huge fan. They have up until now done everything right. They kept everything above board with the Disclosure Policy Requirement. They provided great control for advertisers (I have used them to advertise massively) where you could filter by geographic region, alexa traffic, google PR and many other criteria. Now I always knew this was too good to last, I knew that the Link Fascists over all Google would ruin it. My hope was PPP would plan ahead and be ready. Well just days after Google Screwed over countless single moms who were making a bit of money, PPP announced that they were going to release a product called "Real Rank", I was cheering it on waiting for a great solution and finaly what everyone really wants a true alternative to Google's Total Bullshit PR numbers.
What PayPerPost has come forward with in my opinion is a joke and probably nothing but yet another way for Google and their team of Link Nazis to target, punish and slander participants in PayPerPost and others that dare to sell links on their websites.
Now before I go further I want to state that I may sound harsh about PayPerPost and their new product "Real Rank". To be clear I am still a big fan of PPP and I want to see them continue to grow and provide both bloggers and advertisers with awesome service. My intention here is only to be very clear about what sucks about "Real Rank", how to fix it and how obvious the solution really is.
In short I am about to give PayPerPost about 5,000 dollars in free consulting, let's see if anyone listens.
So let's start out with the obvious problems of the new "Real Rank" that PayPerPost is rolling out.
Where do I begin? First the system according to PayPerPost is pretty easy to "game". The formula for Real Rank is as follows,
70% weighted towards visitors per day
20% weighted towards amount of ACTIVE inbound links per day
10% weighted towards pageviews per day
Anyone with a modicum of the dark side in them can see very easily how to game this. Try this, take a few high traffic websites that are on various crap that have nothing to do with your blog. Create a 1 pixel by 1 pixel iframe and frame in your blog. Presto an great deal of traffic from tons of varying IPs ever day. Now hop your butt over to Findology, 7Search and other various cheap second tier search engines and blow say 2 bucks a day on random traffic at 2 cents a click that adds another 100 visits a day for 60 bucks a month.
Then pop some links on your other sites click them every day form a little group of fellow posties and everyone take a few minutes a day to visit a "ring" and do some clicking. Want to really up things? Page views are the last factor. So use wordpress and put in the Random Post plug in. With this you put your blog domain this way, domain.com/?random and it redirects to a random page. Push 20% of your traffic to your random url and it all balances nicely.
Now most of the blogs are PPP are small time as this Real Rank is based on your percentage of value compared to all other PPP blogs this formula could push you to the top 20% easily. All this for a 100 bucks a month or less to qualify for the best opportunities? Look I did not even mention other cheap sources of traffic or even things like Google PPC including their content network for visitors you can actually win as subscribers. Nor the effects of just a few well SEO'd posts for a bit more organic traffic.
And what do you get as an advertiser for all of this? The big screw! PPP is successful because of LINK BUILDING anyone that thinks other wise is kidding themselves, this is the only reason the Google PR slap mattered in the first place and it is also the only reason they did it.
It gets worse though. If you log into PPP you might see your RealRank as a blogger is 613. What does that mean? It doesn't mean anything to you because you don't know if you are 613 of 617 (bottom 1%) or 613 of 100,000 (top 1%). Advertisers log in and they select your Real Rank as 1-9. The two sides do not even pretend to match. Hell even though this thing is a lead balloon at least tell the blogger where he or she is at. Show the blogger a 4 or a 6 or a 3 not a pointless number.
So thus far I have shown
1. Real Rank is easy to game and will not serve the advertiser
2. Real Rank is only relative to other blogs in the system this means the actual value of a 4 vs 8 may be of very little difference
3. Real Rank is a meaningless number because no one knows who is number 1 and who is zero and the blogger and the advertiser see different figures.
4. Real Rank requires code to be on your blog that only a Blogger doing PayPerPost would use and therefore risks further punishment of PPP blogers by Google, who has already shown they are willing to do it.
Think I am done? Hell no, I just got started.
Next let's ask a very simple question. "Does anyone want Real Rank as it is being proposed by PayPerPost today?" First I again want to say I spend a lot of money for clients with PayPerPost and as an advertiser I don't want it. It doesn't give me anything of value. It tells me basically that a blog has decent traffic compared to the other blogs in the system. This is not much more useful then Alexa which sucks anyway.
So what do I get as a advertiser with Real Rank. Well perhaps screwed by bloggers who follow my system of gaming it above but not much more. Look I like the "bursty" traffic from a PPP campaign it lasts a few days maybe but that is it. I am buying LINKS though as so are any other smart advertisers. For links I care more about the links to the blog posting about me then any other factor. If I can choose a post on a blog with 1000 visits a day with 20 incoming links or one with 20 visits a day and 1000 good inbound links guess which one I will choose? The one with the 1000 other pages linking to it, why, it better serves my purpose in ranking my own site that's why.
Next let's turn to the bloggers and ask if they want "Real Rank". I can tell you based on the comments on the PayPerPost blog the answer is no. Now some posties may be savy enough to game Real Rank but most are just everyday people. Housewives, Single Moms, College Students etc that found PPP as a nice way to make a few hundred to a few thousand dollars a month. These are the people Google screwed to protect their own bottom line. Now it seems PayPerPost is screwing them further, though I don't think PayPerPost intends to, I think they are doing their best, just really missing the boat.
I think I understand this better as unlike most people I both blog for and buy from PayPerPost. So follow this, now there is a woman in Detroit who has a blog about Managing Money. She used to have a PR of a 5 from Google and I was willing to pay big time for a certain clients links on her blog. Google did not care that she was saving for her daughter's college fund with the money from PayPerPost and they now say she is a PR0, which is a LIE. Her blog still passes plenty of ranking value with a link, Google just ruined her ability to sell it.
Now here comes PayPerPost with real rank. This lady only has a few regular readers and her "real rank" ends up being a 4 on my end. I have no way now to reach this lady (if I believe "Real Rank") and buy her links unless I happen to know her first hand. Now my only choice may be to circumvent PayPerPost and buy directly from her or simply not spend my money with her any longer. I mean I don't want to allow bloggers with low real rank that I don't know to take my opportunities and I don't trust Google PR so what other choice do I have.
Now perhaps while her blog had low readership she wrote a great post when ever she blogged for me or my clients. So perhaps I was actually PUSHING TRAFFIC and links to her blog. To demonstrait what another site said about mine or build link power to the site that already linked to me.
You see how this works, before Google screwed the single mom in Detroit everyone was doing good. I got good posts and links, the blogger got paid fairly and PayPerPost connected us and got a fair fee for helping both of us.
So again how does Real Rank help this situation? It does nothing for me, it does nothing for the Blogger in Detroit and it makes all of us unhappy with PayPerPost.
So I guess the next thing to ask since I am so good at putting this thing down is if I have a solution? Indeed I do!
The Solution
This is actually so simple as to be laughable. I happened to figure it out after reading another post from the IZEA blog today about this turd they call Real Rank. It took me no longer then the time to finish my Starbucks Vente Capuchino to come up with a much better form of "Real Rank". Here is a solution I think everyone actually spending or making money in this mess would love not to mention thousands of others who would love a real alternative to Google's PR which no longer is valid so far as the published values go.
The first step is to understand what PayPerPost has done thus far is 100% reactive. They have a problem and they are trying to make a solution to that problem from a "fish bowl mentality". In other words they are only looking at "their individual problem" rather then the problem for the entire market.
You see Google's published PR number has been an unreliable method of link value setting for several years. All sites are not treated equally under Google's system. Some are hand adjusted and many times the current displayed PR is over 6 months or more old. Additionally Google has said on many occasions that there is a page value that really drives their rankings that is never publicly displayed and it may or may not be relative to any one sites published PR.
So let's define the problem for EVERYONE not just PayPerPost, do that and a solution should tumble out like free can of coke from a faulty vending machine, that makes it a GIFT!
The problem for everyone is simple. Links drive ranking and a site with a lot of links to it has more value to then with a few, additionally the quality of the sites linking to it and to them increases or decreases the value based on that same said quality. Hence there is a value to buying links and up until very recently Google PR was a pretty decent way to determine that value and has become the industry standard for link value.
Now Google created this mess! No one asked for PR but they put it out, they are the big dog so it got accepted. Of course Google hates it when you sell a link on your site and don't apply the "nofollow" attribute on it. Now no one wants a link that way because it doesn't serve the purpose of helping your site rank better. So since people won't use nofollow just because Google commands it they punish site owners but making a FALSE PUBLIC STATEMENT about their site, that statement is the flawed and fictitious system of today's Google Page Rank.
This is what PayPerPost missed because they were only the LATEST VICTIM of this Google Nazi attack. This is not a PayPerPost problem, this is a industry wide problem that effects every site owner that wants to do better in the search engines, know the link value of any site or wishes to sell advertising and links on their site. The problem is there is no accurate measure of the relative link value on any given site or page any longer available to the public.
To fix this you solve that problem for everyone, you don't try to drive a round peg into the square hole that is the PayPerPost fish bowl.
The solution when you see it that way is remarkably simple. You get a few programmers in one room for few weeks who are decent with SOAP APIs and you data mine the one solid and honest source of back links available to the public. That would be Yahoo Site Explorer. Many such back link tools already exist they are not hard to build. You mine perhaps 3-4 levels deep into back links, you check for reciprocal links and devalue them because we know Google does.
You hand down power from pages to sub pages on any given site. You value links from sites with known "Rank Value" higher then unknowns. Now you don't need huge resources for this like Google does because one problem that PayPerPost has can become a solution. You absolutely do require any site that wants "Real Rank" displayed to have some type of tracking code on it.
Well now I can hear you yelling at me, Jack you blew it won't that make Google able to track who is doing PayPerPost? Now now you are not listening remember this is a solution for all not just for PPPs bloggers. You make this "service" available for free to any and all. Each person has an account just like Crazy Egg, Technorati, Google Analytics, MyBlogLog or any service that provides data to users about their sites.
You make it a solution for everyone so that hundreds of thousands of people use it on sites about any and everything. You make it rock solid and useful so that anyone paying attention to their site wants it. Google can't penalize all these sites and who cares if they do it replaces PR anyway. It becomes reliable, very up to date and useful right away and fixes the problem. Not to mention that PayPerPost/Izea would become privy to some of the most valuable demographic and trend data on the planet.
Yahoo could an should have done a PR type product long ago but they have list a mile long of thing they should have and never have done and that is why Google has kicked them down to being about as used as Live.com is today. Izea has the advantage of having the resources to develop this, the creditability of being a "third party" and a good base to use to tell everyone about it. The value of data in such a system would soon be worth more then the rest of IZEA itself if it were well adopted and there has never been a better time then now to release such a product.
So there you go long but hell I wanted to get this out. If you like my idea why not tell Izea about it? Cruise over to their contact page or visit their blog and let them know. Send them a link to this post and say you like the idea and it is worth looking at. I am sure my plan needs some work but it is a hell of a lot better then what they are doing now.
This is an opportunity I do hope the folks at PayPerPost/Izea grasp that and make the most of it.
Popularity: 12% [?]
Ted Murphy said,
November 29, 2007 @ 9:43 pm
Jack,
First let me thank you for this in depth post. I am indeed listening and found value here. I would like to address the issues that you raise:
1. Gaming RealRank
I am not going to claim that someone can’t find a way around RealRank. There is not a system out there that is 100% foolproof. When you place value on any system people will work to influence that system in some way. RealRank does have some gaming detection and we will continue to work on ways to eliminate those trying to take advantage of the system.
You mention some unethical ways of building a perception of traffic along with some methods of building actual traffic. I encourage bloggers to build actual traffic, spend money on legitimately marketing their blog and create well SEO’d posts. Those are all good things in my opinion.
2. Link Building
I read your post on our blog and responded to your comments there as well. From that post: While there are some benefits to using PPP for SEO that is not our core value proposition. We would be foolish to create a business based solely on someone else’s algorithm that we can neither control nor decipher.
3. Real Ranking Numbers
You are right, the difference in the way things are presented for bloggers vs advertisers doesn’t make sense. We are already working to update this on the blogger side. There will also be much more visibility when we release the public site which is coming soon.
4. It’s Your Choice
“First I again want to say I spend a lot of money for clients with PayPerPost and as an advertiser I don’t want it.” Thank you. We appreciate your business. That is fine if you don’t want to use RR, you don’t have to use it. You can still use PR if you want to. But we have over 12,000 advertisers and they all have different needs and desires.
You stated that you still want to advertise on PR0 blogs because they still provide the link value you desire. If that is the case I see no harm in trying to provide you with the highest traffic blogs with RealRank because you have taken PR out of the equation. Whichever you choose we provide you with options as an advertiser to target as you see fit.
5. RealRank is Not Reactive
RealRank was under development for many months before any of this Google fiasco. RealRank is not a reaction to any of this, rather it was designed to solve a problem. The problem is that PR and Alexa are unreliable as you have pointed out and aren’t based on real site data. The answer is a system based on real site data with full transparency.
6. A Link Based System is Not The Answer
If there is one thing that Google has taught us is that simple links are not the answer. Whether it comes from Yahoo, Google or any other spider links just don’t mean what they used to, especially dead links. From a recent blog post about RealRank: We assign link scores based on ACTIVE links. We define an active link as a link that has been clicked that day. Google (as far as anyone knows) treats all links as active, regardless of whether they have been clicked or not. I call these dead links.
Why don’t we count dead links? We all know that link building is a common practice in the blogoshpere and the web in general. Bloggers and companies alike can build up links over time, regardless of whether or not they have quality content and an actual reader base. You can wind up with hundreds or thousands of links to a site buried in directories, infinitely long blog rolls, comment streams and so on. The bottom line is links without clicks don’t really mean much - “dead to me”.
We are in the unique position of being able to track active links because we can track actual traffic on the blog level.
7. Making RealRank Public
I couldn’t agree more. We ARE making this public and plan on spending a good amount of money getting adoption outside of the PPP network. I hope you will join us, we need smart people like you to help make RealRank all that it can be and spread the word.
jspirko said,
November 29, 2007 @ 10:54 pm
Ted,
Thank you for your comments, here is are my responses.
1. Gaming real rank - Ted of course those methods are unethical but they are also really easy to do and will be very difficult for you to prevent. Can you game Google PR too? Sure but only by getting links which is much more difficult then pushing around traffic. The reality is the methods I mentioned only scratch the surface, I could game real rank much harder. Don’t worry I won’t but this system is so easy to manipulate as you have designed it as to be laughable. I am sorry that is just the way it is and I don’t waste time saying things that aren’t true.
2. Link Building - You say this is not your core value proposition. Really? Let me ask you this after doing a lot of posts in the past and after buying a lot for ourselves and others I can see how people are using the system. So have you asked your customers why they buy? I have never been surveyed. I can tell you this is why I buy your links and I think while PayPerPost aspires to more and does deliver on some levels that is what most of your business is all about. If not no one would have cared about PR. If you really want the truth just do a quick survey of your paying customers, ask the question. Time has taught us that companies better know why their customers buy. So ask, you need the answer anyway and it would be real easy to do.
3. Real Ranking Numbers - You say you are working to correct the Blogger side. Great to hear. It is a start.
4. Its my choice - no not really! I now have no choice, I buy for two reasons the buzz and the links. The links are more important and PayPerPost knows this! That is WHY YOU LET ME CONTROL IT AND VARY THE ANCHORS IN A SINGLE OPPORTUNITY in the first place. With Google hosing over bloggers PR to be malicious and PPP not providing me with a way to gauge link value I HAVE NO CHOICE to reach the blogger I really want to reach now.
5. Real Rank Is Not Reactive - Of course it is, it is not fully reactive to the Google PR move but it is reactive from the stand of providing a way for PPP to place a value on a blog outside of the control of Google, Alexa, etc.
6. A Link Based System Is Not The Answer - Pardon me but as your PAYING CUSTOMER let me say you are wrong. Right now whether you or I like it or not links drive SEO rankings and that is the most valuable aspect of the average blog in your system. Ted the bloggers that make up the main PPP population are never going to be heavy hitter bloggers. I am sorry I but I have paid for many of these posts, and I then read every one that I buy for myself or a client and I know most are little guys with very small amounts of traffic. You have done a great service to these people and a great service to advertisers at the same time. Sure you have some big players but your platform is built on the backs of the internet’s middle class. The biggest value these blogs have is link value and so long as links drive SEO this is what your customers want.
If you doubt that I challenge you, poll your customers, ask them why they buy then come back and tell me if 70% or more don’t say the prime motivation was link building. If you get any result lower then that I will eat “blog crow” for you right here. I am glad you plan to make this public and used beyond your bloggers but trust me, ask your customers I can already tell you I know what your results will be.
Take my comment about 1978 IBM executives with some real seriousness. Trust me you do not tell your market what your core value prop is, they tell you and not listening can be very bad for business.
You say you need smart people like me to help, call me anytime I can tell you that I have only scratched the surface here on many of these issues.
Jack Spirko
Opal Tribble said,
November 30, 2007 @ 8:18 am
I saw your comment on PPP and decided to come over here and see what your website was about. I had the same reaction when I saw how Real Rank was based sure it’s unethical to game just like it’s unethical to game Google you will have people that will still do this for those of us who play by the rules it’s simply not fair. There are so many ways you can artificially boost your traffic. I was surprised when I saw their model.
It’s always good practice to follow up with your customers I do that with my real business, and I do that with my personal websites. I ask my readers opinions before I make major changes. I honestly listen to what they have to say. In doing so I help my business and my personal websites become better. I don’t know whether PPP does this actively because I’m not an advertiser with them.
Eventually I’ll be advertising for my regular business however I’ll contact the blogger directly simply because I want them to have all the money. I’ve received a few review that way along with the advertiser who is on my website.
Currently I take a few opportunities on Vegan Momma; however, I mainly use Sponsored Reviews the pay is a lot higher.
Eventually I’ll write a post about Real Rank on my main website. I’ll be sure to link back to this article.
A great article I shall Stumble and Digg it.
jspirko said,
November 30, 2007 @ 10:29 am
Opal,
Thanks man you or someone did indeed Stumble it and thanks for that. I have not found it in Digg yet. I would love to get this dugg but don’t want to do it myself as that is frowned upon by the Diggers.
Let me say that I personally don’t find it unethical to Game Google PR. Why? The only way to do it is with links. Now links are what the net is all about, any site owner should be after links. With SEO you try harder and think more about the strategic value of links, that is smart business not bad ethics.
I can tell you because I do advertise on PPP they have never once asked the general population of buyers why we buy. Such is the hight of corporate arrogance. It is never intentional it is generally thinking you know but again I remind you of the once mighty IBM in 78 or say the power of Ford, GM and Crysler just a decade ago.
The problems with real rank are many but they boil down to two at the surface.
1. Easy and I mean easy to game! You think what I laid out her is “unethical” I will tell you that is a joke. I could set up an automated Real Rank booster! Pay me say 20 dollars a month to have your blog in the Q and I guarantee you a 50% improvement in 30 days or less. Again Ted should not worry about me doing it, just about HOW EASY IT IS TO DO.
2. It doesn’t give me what I want and I imagine I am the majority of advertisers. This is about links, it has always been about links, links fuel the fire, so let it be written so let it be done. A simple survey would give an answer again I encourage PPP to do one.
Opal Tribble said,
November 30, 2007 @ 12:41 pm
Yes I Stumbled your article. I try to actively stumble articles that I know people will like. Sometimes it’s my friends who have written a great article but often it’s a new person.
I’ll also bring attention to them on my website so yes I’ll be linking to this article. I just got back from the gym so I’ll Digg your article also. I just need to remember my password I couldn’t remember it earlier this monring, lol.
Good point about the companies. They were powerful at one time and then they did take a huge tumble.
Excellent point about the links also. I actively link to bloggers and companies that I like without me doing that how in the world would people find the sites I recommend?
I do like what PPP does for the blogger not sure what’s its like as an advertiser simply because I haven’t gone that way. I think it would be nice to see a section that talks about Real Rank on the front page. I’ve been searching on the internet for info and there are a lot of confused bloggers out there not everyone stops by the PPP forum or reads their blog. I rarely read it but I have been stopping by more simply because I wanted to find out what Real Rank is about.
Hopefully, PPP will take note of what you and others have been saying about Real Rank. I’ve read bloggers views on Real Rank but yours has been the most thorough that I’ve seen so I had to comment and Stumble (and yes I’ll be Digging it also) :-)
Adam said,
November 30, 2007 @ 4:36 pm
I also am a fan of PPP. One way they could stop bloggers from gaming the traffic stats would be to factor in a quality metric. For example, they could look at bounce rates and page views per visitor. This could be easily accomplished with a Javascript tracking script.
Are Izea “Allies” doing more harm than good? » the Spun Puppy said,
November 30, 2007 @ 8:18 pm
[…] count for something. Unfortunately, Jack also posted his ideas in a recent post on his blog titled Is PayPerPost Loosing Its Way The Truth About Real Rank. I have not replied to him directly, simply because I believe that it would be pointless for me to […]
Lisa said,
December 1, 2007 @ 10:49 am
Adam, I think that’s what the plan eventually is. I was at PostieCon and Social Spark will show you bounce rates and such. At least that’s what they showed us.
PayPerPost Real Rank | Startup Addict Musings said,
December 2, 2007 @ 3:00 pm
[…] bloggers the opportunity. WebDosh is a fan of the Real Rank and can get more info there. ComtechNews on the other hand feels Payperpost has taken a hasty turn with the new Real Rank, (at least in […]
In response to Mr. Spirko » the Spun Puppy said,
December 3, 2007 @ 10:57 am
[…] O.K. I gave my opinion on the topic of Izea and Google. In doing so I leveled some criticism at Jack Spirko of Comtechnews regarding this post. […]
A Peculiar Blog » Blog Archive » Did -a- -e- -ost Explode? said,
December 3, 2007 @ 8:10 pm
[…] to Google’s nuking people’s page rank, I think that he would do well to read “Is -a- -e- -ost Losing Its Way The Truth About Real Rank” over on ComTech News. I think that Jack Spirko gives a very good look at Real Rank and whats […]
Richard said,
December 4, 2007 @ 12:29 pm
The problem with pay per post is that Google does not like link juice been bought and sold. The fact that they have hugh banners saying I sell links is just dumb, thats why Google came in and gave everyone a hugh PR reduction.