• SEO Book, Friday, November 6, 2009 2 PM

Affiliate marketing has become another way for Google to embed itself in your conversion streams, writes Aaron Wall, who believes the search engine shouldn't always get a bite of the pie. For starters, he writes, Google needs to do a better job of screening paid search ads, especially when the U.S. government determines companies are not legitimate.

Wall points to videos commissioned by the Federal Trade Commission mocking ads about FreeCreditReport.com, and then to search engine rankings for the keywords "annual credit report," where the government's site falls into slot No. 4 behind FreeCreditReport.com. He also points to his favorite Indian restaurant that once had the telephone number listed in the search engine results. Now it takes him one more click to find it.

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