Digital practice leaves brands, agencies and bloggers exposed to legal challenge – Walker Morris
BRANDS may be inadvertently jeopardising their Google rankings and breaching Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) guidelines with their Search Engine Optimisation practices, Walker Morris has warned.
The practice of Search Engine Optimisation agencies (SEOs) paying bloggers for links and advertorials is widespread. But these practices may expose brands, SEOs and bloggers involved to legal challenge, Jeanette Burgess of the Leeds-headquartered law firm says.
A recent statistical analysis carried out by Bloom Agency demonstrated that when they approached bloggers and website owners to invite them to host content on the client’s behalf, 75% requested payment. Bloom’s policy is not to pay for content but the analysis serves to illustrate that there is a common expectation of payment for hosting such links.
This type of activity is not unusual in the digital world, according to Walker Morris. SEO agencies regularly pay bloggers to host links, or to write favourably about their clients. And website owners and bloggers are often happy to oblige.
House PR, the agency handling PR activity for Mastercard’s sponsorship of the Brit awards, found both itself and its client at the centre of some unwelcome PR earlier this year when it was reported that House PR offered journalists free passes in exchange for favourable promotional tweets and sponsor mentions in editorial coverage.
Burgess, a partner in the Media Group at Walker Morris, said: “Many link-building practices have serious legal and commercial implications. A blogger who is given money to promote a product or service has to ensure that consumers are aware they’re being advertised to. Ignorance by brands is no defence. The ASA has made it clear that “ultimately the buck would stop with the advertiser”.
“In addition to breaking ASA guidelines, there are potential commercial implications by breaching Google guidelines. Google have demonstrated they will penalise the brand by ranking it lower in search results or, in extreme cases, removing it from Google search results altogether.”
A quick internet search will reveal all sorts of speculation as to the identity of other brands penalised by Google for their nefarious linking practices – from banks to law firms to retailers,” Walker Morris highlights. One of the most cited examples of a high-profile brand, at least in the UK, to suffer Google’s wrath for breaching its guidelines was Interflora. In 2013, for 11 days between Valentine’s Day and Mothering Sunday, Interflora was removed altogether from Google’s UK searches after it had posted around 150 advertorials on regional news sites.
Burgess added that brands, agencies and bloggers need a detailed understanding of where the boundaries lie and how they ensure they can deliver a legally compliant service. For brands and agencies this means adopting a more rigorous approach to SEO contracts to protect both parties. For bloggers this means ensuring they don’t breach ASA, HMRC or trading standards guidelines.
The issues will be discussed at Walker Morris’s Breakfast Brand Bash this morning.
