Does Sponsored Content damage a website in 2024?

Golden Nose Slim

Junior Member

Jan 29, 2023

140

37

• May 28, 2024

• #1

Howdy, everyone,

Would appreciate your help on a quick question.

I have this one site where I occasionally post sponsored blogs. The articles go in a section called "Advertorial," but they're not marked in any other way. The posts are usually on the same theme (e.g. soccer) as our other posts.

Will adding these kinds of articles affect the site's score/ranking?

Cheers for any informed opinion

 

SirLouen

Elite Member

Executive VIP

Jr. VIP

Jan 17, 2015

5,264

4,956

• May 28, 2024

• #2

No, if you follow the guidelines. But it's unlikely anyone buying such sponsored content will accept such guidelines. I wouldn't.

 

Golden Nose Slim

Junior Member

Jan 29, 2023

140

37

• May 28, 2024
• Thread Starter Thread Starter

• #3

SirLouen said:

No, if you follow the guidelines. But it's unlikely anyone buying such sponsored content will accept such guidelines. I wouldn't.

Click to expand...

Thanks a lot for that! Yeah, makes sense.

Pretty hard sell though. I might be able to get them to agree to having them flagged as "sponsored," but the no-follow is a bridge too far.

Any idea what's the penalty if you don't follow the guidelines?

 

SirLouen

Elite Member

Executive VIP

Jr. VIP

Jan 17, 2015

5,264

4,956

• May 28, 2024

• #4

Golden Nose Slim said:

Any idea what's the penalty if you don't follow the guidelines?

Click to expand...

Most page with low reputation, end with no visits,
Google shadowbans pages with wrongly tagged sponsored content. You can see sites with million of visits per month, that ended with barely a thousand.
Only media outlets can go along with this without penalty.

 

D

Deleted member 752298

Guest

• May 29, 2024

• #5

It is indeed recommended to use the right link attribute for sponsored links. If you are using Yoast plugin, here is a nice guide:
https://yoast.com/outbound-link-sponsored-nofollow-ugc-attributes/

 

SK Media

Senior Member

Jr. VIP

Jun 6, 2023

1,023

101

• Jun 7, 2024

• #6

I want to say yes. after placing some sponsored links on my website I see the rank drop. my website is old with high traffic. Also Google clearly said that affiliate links is against the Google terms.