What Is Referral Spam?

Referral Spam

What Is Referral Spam?

In short it is any unsolicited referrals. I speak of referrals in the form of link referrals. When ever some one gives you a link, it's a referral. Referral spam is when some one places that referral there themselves. It can be done by signing a guest book or blog, telling them you liked their web page, and telling them you have a similar web site and then place a link to it with any anchor link you want. This is repeated over and over again on different web sites and blogs, and can even be done on BBS's and forums. There are even programs designed to automate the whole process. SEO Traffic Rank has reviewed or reported on some of them. PRStorm, Blog Submitter Pro, and Auto Blogs Filler to name a few. One of the oldest tricks in the book, and there will always be new ways to do referral spam too. You can referral spam blogs, guest books, forums, webstats pages, and even some search engines. Any way you can leave your footprint behind so that it links back to you is a referral. If it was unsolicited, it was referral spam!

What Has Been Done About Countering Referral Spam?

Spamming Blogs

Google has implemented a nofollow tag for all their blogger blogs for comments which essentually strips the spammer of any weight they might have got from the link. The nofollow tag stops the search engine from giving that link any credit. Other blogs have also begun adding the nofollow tag on comments too. While most observers admit this will have little impact on spamming blogs, most agree it's a step in the right direction. You see referral spam is also good for getting traffic too. The nofollow only prevents you from getting back links credit or gaining PR, it only stops the search engines, not surfers. People can still click on your link to visit your site. Others are against it. Not the spammers, but the blog owners. Many believe a nofollow tag will remove what little incentive there is for honest people from leaving real comments. Why should they if they get no credit? They fear the only ones who will leave comments now are the spammers trying to get what ever traffic they can scrape up. There is even a nofollow remove plug in for wordpress owners. All WP blogs from version 1.5 come with the nofollow and the plug in is needed to remove it. MSN and Yahoo have announced that they will obey the nofollow tag and also implement the tags on their blogs too.

Spamming Webstats

The only way to prevent referral spam to webstats is to not have your webstats results page accessible to the web. There is no other way. Yet many people have their stats page accessible to the web! The only other thing being done about this type of referral spam is disciplinary action after the fact. People have lost their broadband service over this. 

Spamming Guest Books 

About the only thing guests books can do is remove live linking, but doing so cripples the guest book because this has been the only forum where this type of activity is some what welcomed accept in absusive cases.

Spamming Forums BBS

Some forums just monitor closely or regularly and remove any referral spam that shows up. Others have implemented the nofollow tag or do not allow live links. In the cases you are permitted a signiture file which appears with most of your posts, where you can leave a return link to your site, either you have to wait for a specified amount of time before you get a sig or you never get one. Forms and BBS that implement a nofollow tag are cutting their own throats. For years forums and BBS, like guest books, enjoyed a permitted level of refferal spam. With out it, why should any one leave a post?

The Future Of Referral Spam

Referral spam will always be around, and there will be new ways and sources too. As for the nofollow tag, I do not believe that is the best solution and will eventually fade or be replaced with a better solution. The nofollow tag punishes every one and assumes every one is a thief. Such tactics never work. For now the tag is enjoying it's 5 minutes of fame. Eventually a better solution will be found.