As you can imagine, this can become quite lucrative over time.

In many respects though, Google frowns upon this practice and penalizes sites it sees as unnaturally manipulating search results. What they do (as well as Bing) is use link-based analysis to determine the quality of a site and its relevance to the keyword in question. Google believes buying and selling links circumvents this process and makes results less relevant and helpful to its searchers.

However, if you read Google’s Webmaster Guidelines, you will find that not all paid links violate their rules. In fact, if links are bought/sold for advertising purposes and not to pass on PageRank and manipulate search results, then it’s totally okay.

If you’re getting inquiries about advertising links, there are 8 ways you can safely sell links on your site without being penalized Google.

1. Add a rel=”nofollow” attribute to the link

Adding this code into the link adds the link to your site but prevents your site from passing any “link juice” to the other site – basically it ensures the other site only receives traffic from the link and not a PageRank boost. This suggestion comes directly from Google so you can be 100% sure that it’s okay.

2. Only link to intermediate pages that include a robots.txt file

Robots.txt blocks search engine spiders from crawling a page. Most websites want their pages to be crawled. Therefore, you can redirect links to an intermediate page that includes this characteristic. Using an intermediate page strips the link of any PageRank benefits and ensures the link is for traffic only…this is another one of Google’s recommendations.

3. Avoid “link farm” schemes

Link farms are websites whose only purpose is to pass PageRank and link to other sites. While you probably would not use one, you need to be careful that your site doesn’t appear as one. Understandably, Google does not like link farm sites at all. In order to avoid looking like you’re a link farm site, embed links within relevant content and avoid having them all in one place.

4. Negotiate link sales for the long term

Consistent rotation of links is another red flag for the search engines as they make your site look like a link farm. Therefore, to fly under the radar, you should select paid links carefully and keep them consistent for as long as possible.

5. Don’t advertise that you’re selling links

This is advice that usually isn’t heeded online. If you advertise you’re selling links, you will get a lot of requests from spammers and banned sites. While the money may be tempting, be patient and wait for quality advertisers to come to you. This will give you better link partners and reduce your frustration.

6. Use HTML links only

Some link buyers may be using JavaScript or some other code in order to update or change the text and URL of the link at a future time. Avoid this by sticking with HTML based links.

7. Only link to relevant sites with quality content

Relevancy between links and keywords is the first thing search engines look for. Therefore, you should be sure that links you’re using point to quality content. Doing so helps search engines achieve their #1 goal, which is delivering the most relevant content to their users. In turn, they’ll reward you for it.

8. Be selective on who you partner with for links

Carefully evaluate sites before linking to them and ask yourself if you want your visitors going there. Do a site:yoursite.com search in Google on the company and see if they’ve had any penalties in the past that may hurt you if you partner with them.

One good rule of thumb when dealing with paid links – only deal with sites you would link to without payment. Doing so ensures you only sell links that are of use to your visitors. Selling links shouldn’t be your main source of income but they can provide a nice bonus.

Remember, Google frowns on selling links for PageRank and other purposes. However, you can do it safely by following the 8 steps mentioned above.

That’s why so many people like PPC and online advertising – there’s usually a pretty easy way to see how many clicks you’re getting, which generally start occurring right after you get everything setup. Some even go as far to phase out all other forms of advertising, thinking PPC has got to be the best and easiest way to market a business.

So why is it not a good idea to rely solely on pay-per-click advertising to bring traffic?

First a little history – the subject of SEO vs. PPC has been a debate in the online marketing community for years.

Certainly PPC deserves its place in the marketing mix…according to data from a SES Conference, PPC traffic converts 2.03% of visitors versus 1.26% for organic results. PPC visitors spend about 10% more on sites than organic visitors. And they usually stay on a site approximately 29% longer than organic visitors.

But speaking long-term, there are several reasons why PPC shouldn’t be your primary choice.

First of all, when you use PPC or any other form of “advertising,” the money you spend doesn’t typically increase the value of your online assets. You’re basically paying for every visitor to your site. If you want more, you’ve got to pay more $$$.

SEO on the other hand helps build traffic sources naturally. Money and time you spend goes to improving your website by adding content, making the site’s structure is easy for the search engines to crawl and growing inbound links by letting other people know about your site. Not only will organic listings end up driving a much bigger segment of visitors, your site will have more credibility since most people know anyone can pay for PPC advertising.

And of course this discussion wouldn’t be complete without mentioning the ever-evolving social media landscape online. Building a social community around your brand is another way you can grow traffic…and it increases brand equity as well.

Social media and SEO works to create an asset you own with the traffic coming without a cost per click.

But even still, many companies spend more money on PPC than SEO and social media. Perhaps it’s because PPC is just so easy. Of course, that’s to Google’s credit for making a product that’s user-friendly and gets results.

However, over the long-term, SEO and social media can help you build assets that will bring in site visitors and conversions at a much lower cost. Check back again soon to see how you can migrate from PPC to SEO without losing your traffic.

Are you “addicted” to PPC? Do you carry all of your marketing eggs in that one basket?

Does someone do a search on Google using keyword phrases to search for the products and/or services you offer online?

Or, are they referred to your site from an online directory like YellowPages or Google Maps? Or, do they see your PPC or social network ad?

Data recently compiled at HubSpot definitively proves that organic search is the primary driver of traffic to websites – which underscores the importance of them being search engine friendly. From the survey of 2,100 of its customers, the company shows that site traffic coming from online searches is 67.2% greater than from referral sites and 156% greater than PPC.

They further break the data down by industry – traffic from search engines is much higher in manufacturing, medicine/health services and retail. Referrals play a more important role in other industries like technology, software and online marketing but still does not exceed online search as a primary source of traffic.

So from this data, it really depends on your industry in determining what you allocate to each of these online marketing areas.

In terms of organic search and SEO, Google is by far the most popular search engine still, handling 71% of online searches this past November according to Hitwise. The two closest were Yahoo! at 15% and Bing at 9%.

It’s clear though – having a website optimized for the search engines is key to driving traffic.

Scheduled for Wednesday, October 14, 2009, from 1:00 PM to 2:00 PM EDT, the webinar will feature how to boost product sales through enriched product data feeds and other retailer-tested tips, as well as several new innovations merchants can draw on. Guest speakers from Google, Inc. will join CI to present upcoming Google enhancements that retailers can leverage for the 2009 holiday season.

Google offers merchants many tools to help drive shoppers to online and local stores, including a few new enhancements about to be introduced just in time for the holiday shopping season. Guest speakers Vivek Tata, Associate Product Marketing Manager, and Sarah Beritzhoff, Strategic Partner Manager, of Google, Inc., will join CI’s Larry Weeks, Senior Manager of Strategic Marketing Consulting, and Rob Streeter, Sr. Manager Partner Development, to discuss ways merchants can better leverage Google for a more profitable 2009 holiday shopping season.

CI will share tips with merchants on ways to maximize product performance and increase sales from various Google properties, as well as share success stories from current retailer customers.

A foundational element often overlooked when advertising on Google is the provision of content rich, high-quality data feeds, since Google’s powerful database leverages data feeds to render the merchants’ products to the right consumer at the right time. Attendees can expect to learn more about this essential element and its role in successful campaigns, as well as a host of other ways to improve sales performance.

Attendees can register here

Not much for SEO and SEM professionals to worry about right now – the deal still needs to be approved by federal regulators. In short though, this new partnership:

1. Microsoft acquires an exclusive 10-year license to Yahoo!’s core search technologies and the ability to integrate it into existing web search platforms
2. Each company will keep its own separate display advertising business and sales staff
3. Microsoft will compensate Yahoo! for traffic generated on Yahoo!’s network through a revenue sharing agreement
4. The agreement is for 10 years

Yahoo!’s appearance will not change but will include a disclaimer at the bottom of each page saying “Powered by Bing.” Nothing will change until regulators approve the deal, expected no earlier than the first of next year.

Integration in the United States will begin with search and then with search ads, which will now be powered by Microsoft’s adCenter. Integration will then expand to other countries.

No need to get excited right now – it’s going to take some time for these changes to happen. And according to Rusty Brick at Search Engine Roundtable, Yahoo! has made many changes in the past so even though their agreement with Microsoft is for 10 years, don’t be surprised if something drastic changes in 5.

Learn more at this Search Engine Land article and see what search engine optimization professionals have to say about this merger at DigitalPoint and WebMasterWorld forums.

Especially in a down economy, marketing managers and online search professionals have to find ways to get the most for their online marketing dollar.

There has been much abuzz around AdSense and WebMasterWorld forums lately from publishers saying their revenues are way down. 56% of those surveyed by Rusty Brick say their revenues are down while another 20% say they’re stagnant.

While not everyone is singing the AdSense blues, I think it does exemplify the downfalls of PPC, especially in the down economy. Buyers are much more conservative these days with their money – a glitzy ad just isn’t going to get the job done.

Since organic search rankings build on themselves over time, an investment now can mean you’re there in waiting when the economy begins to recover.

Read the poll and our prior search engine optimization e-blog post on the advantages of SEO over PPC.

Anyone who is a regular viewer of cable TV undoubtedly knows of his legendary “Hi Billy Mays here…” and the compelling prose and presentation. Even if you didn’t buy the product, you came away with a strong first impression.

It’s easy to mock Mays; Lord knows I was replaying that legendary intro in my head when I heard he had passed. But Mays has sold countless buckets of OxiClean and other products that made him and the products’ inventors a lot of money in $14.99 and $19.99 increments.

There are many lessons we can learn from Billy Mays to build effective search campaigns that build your brand and drives action.

Branding

Almost in a Pavlovian sense, you immediately knew what was coming once Mays’ commercial hit the airwaves. Everything moves together to say “something useful and cheap is on its way!”

In a similar fashion, be sure your search presence matches your branding efforts in language, tone and content. Always include your brand name in both meta tags and PPC ads and evaluate whether you should include visual elements like “official site” to indicate to visitors your site as the source of your brand.

Solve a Problem

While we can’t remove a fruit juice stain from a white shirt like Billy can, search engine marketing allows you to target potential customers closely. It’s easier to match customers through PPC ads linking to highly targeted landing pages.

And even though you do not have control over page selection for a given keyword in organic search, content can be developed and organized in a way to deliver highly segmented keyword searchers to the exact page they need.

Show Value for Their Click

Another reason offers from Mays were so compelling was that he usually didn’t pitch anything that cost more than $20 and included a buy one get one free or offer for an additional item at no charge.

Not every product out there can fit into that mold but you should clearly indicate the advantage – quality, durability, cost, etc. – your product has over others.

Use a Call to Action

Last and certainly not least is to include a call to action in your PPC ads and website content. Once you have their attention, draw them to take the next step by visiting your site further or clicking a “buy”, “join” or “get” link.

Read this Search Engine Watch article for a more in-depth look at the legacy of Billy Mays and how methods he used to sell millions of products over the airwaves are applicable to both PPC and SEO.

But to a marketing manager at a large corporation, PPC is quite attractive because it’s the most familiar to them…and there’s a clear connection between money spent and results. Ads can be set up and implemented quickly. Marketers and budget managers can easily calculate ROI and see clear profits within a few days at most.

It’s difficult to sell SEO against PPC since initial results may not show for six months. If a professional search engine marketer is being honest, they cannot possibly pinpoint exactly when you will begin seeing the fruits of your investment nor will they be able to tell you precisely what the impact will be.

Search engines also can change their algorithms during this timeframe, obscuring the impact of an SEO campaign.

But there are many reasons why SEO is better – 75% of all search traffic is driven by SEO, versus only 25% for PPC so potential opportunities are three times greater with SEO. And according to this heat map image by Rand Fish, searchers focus more top search results anyway. (some argue being in the top spot of search results carries a high degree of brand value as well)

Courtesy of Rand Fish at SEOMoz

PPC ad campaigns are also getting more competitive…current studies conclude PPC profits are shrinking and may be gone altogether in some industries.

Since SEO builds on itself, traffic continues to grow if you keep doing the right things. As traffic continues to grow from the original baseline, a company may see a doubling or tripling of their investment.

Read this Search Engine Watch article for more insights on why SEO is better than PPC and some of the barriers of convincing potential clients or marketing managers at your company of the benefits of investing in SEO.

Of course, the over-simplified explanation is to add interesting content on a regular basis – some professional bloggers say daily but weekly is good enough to develop a following according to veteran copywriter and web marketer Michael Fortin in his article “How I Grow My Blog Organically Using These 5 Steps”.

Other than email signatures, Michael doesn’t advertise his blog…he continuously builds subscribers and generates revenue through sponsored links on his page for his own products or ones he’s affiliated with – revenue is a byproduct of his efforts, not the main focus of the blog or its content.

Hire a publicist or distribute extensive blog posts or articles to editors, directories, ezines, other blogs and even offline magazines. Allowing others to reprint, syndicate or otherwise redistribute is a great way to develop a following – other publications and resources can easily modify your article or post to fit their target audience, like I’m doing here.

Check out these SEO tips and more at Mike’s blog.

Their most recent attempt to boost revenue, YouTube’s new offerings signals a major expansion from the homemade, short length video clips that have made YouTube popular.

The company stated it will add to its movie/TV show collection over time – hundreds of different TV shows will be offered for free, including “The Beverly Hillbillies” and “Married with Children”. This new service expands YouTube’s relationship with many studios, whose parent companies include Sony, CBS, MGM, etc.

And on Thursday, partnerships with smaller companies like Discovery, National Geographic and Snagfilms to carry their content was announced. Google will share advertising revenue with these partner companies – it was also announced they were creating Google TV Ads Online, where advertisers can target online video viewers.

This may represent another great opportunity to get your website out there and further establish your brand online – in addition to organic search (search engine optimization) efforts – some paid advertising is also a good idea, as recently explained at our search engine optimization blog.