Just scanned an interesting article on Clickz by Fredrick Marckini of iProspect based on new information he has gathered from the recent Google patent filing. I have often heard merchants say that their rankings disappeared. I wonder if this particular issue with too many affiliate links coming in too fast could be part of the problem?

Very interesting if it’s true, because I know a lot of merchants that want to use their affiliate channel to boost their rankings and get special software just for this purpose – even though they are only paying their affiliates per sale. So it’s possible that this particular practice may be a double edged sword for merchants.

“Google reveals in the filing its ranking algorithm is organized to thwart overly aggressive marketers. It confirms something search marketers have long suspected: Google watches how fast new links to a site appear as a way to detect and penalize search engine spam. If too many new links appear in too short a timeframe, the site may be penalized, or even banned, by Google.

According to the filing, Google also watches how many new links with identical anchor text emerge. This is another clue links may be suspect or mass-manufactured. Additionally, Google monitors the rate at which links disappear to identify the degree of relevance and sort out spam. If Google does these things, you should assume other engines do something very similar.

If you were to switch to an affiliate platform that caused all your affiliates to link directly to your site overnight, all using the same anchor text, red flags would very likely be raised with Google and other search engines. Your site might be banned or, at the very least, experience a sudden decline in rankings. Either scenario costs a lot of money and take months to repair.”

Read the rest of the article here:
How Affiliate Programs Can Affect Search Rankings