Off-page SEO and link building: General strategies and authority transfer in the digital news media


== Abstract ==

In recent years, a number of digital news media outlets have begun to include paid links in their content. This study seeks to identify and analyse this content whose sole purpose is to improve the website authority of the advertisers and their search engine rankings. To do so, it employs two basic methodologies: first, it undertakes a systematic review of off-page SEO practices, the digital press and native advertising; and, second, it reports a case study based on the identification and analysis of 150 news items that contain specially commissioned links resulting from a commercial transaction. The study provides evidence of a new revenue stream for the digital news media, one that is not clearly disclosed and which is based on the sale of links. The article includes a discussion of the case study findings, and presents future guidelines for the use of paid links based on the emerging concept of ‘native advertising’.

== Full document ==
<pdf>Media:Lopezosa_et_al_2019b-69730-3602-document.pdf</pdf>


== References ==

Amazeen, Michelle A.; Muddiman, Ashley R. (2017). “Saving media or trading on trust? The effects of native advertising on audience perceptions of legacy and online news publishers”. Digital journalism, v. 6, n. 2, pp. 176-195. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2017.1293488

Amazeen, Michelle A.; Wojdynski, Bartosz W. (2018). “The effects of disclosure format on native advertising recognition and audience perceptions of legacy and online news publishers”. Journalism, pp. 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884918754829

Batsell, Jake (2018). “4 steps to bring ethical clarity to native advertising”. Neiman report, September 23rd. https://niemanreports.org/articles/4-steps-to-bring-ethical-clarity-to-native-advertising

Booth, Andrew; Papaionnou, Diana; Sutton, Anthea (2012). Systematic approaches to a successful literature review. London: Sage. ISBN: 978 0 857021359

Brin, Sergey; Page, Lawrence (2000). “The anatomy of a large-scale hypertextual web search engine”. Stanford University. http://infolab.stanford.edu/~backrub/google.html

Cámaras-León, Nuria (2018). “Linkbuilding 2018, guía de enlazado perfecto (+12 predicciones expertos)”. Unancor, 11th January. https://www.unancor.com/blog/guia-linkbuilding

Carlson, Matt (2014). “When news sites go native: Redefining the advertising – editorial divide in response to native advertising”. Journalism, v. 16, n. 7, pp. 849-865. https://doi.org/10.1177/1464884914545441

Cooper, Jon (2012). “Link building tactics. The complete list”. Point Blank SEO, April 1st. http://pointblankseo.com/link-building-strategies

Cramer, Theresa (2016). “The deal with disclosure and the ethics of native advertising”. Digital content text, Sept. 23rd. https://digitalcontentnext.org/blog/2016/09/06/the-deal-with-disclosure-and-the-ethics-of-native-advertising

Crowe, Anna L. (2017). “Illustrated guide to link building”. Search engine journal. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/link-building-guide

Dean, Brian (2018). “The definitive guide (2018 update)”. Backlinko, March 11th. https://backlinko.com/link-building

Ferrer-Conill, Raul (2016). “Camouflaging church as state”. Journalism studies, v. 17, n. 7, pp. 904-914. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2016.1165138

Fishkin, Rand (2016). “Targeted link building in 2016 - Whiteboard Friday”. Moz, Jan 29th. https://moz.com/blog/targeted-link-building-in-2016

García-Carretero, Lucía; Codina, Lluís; Díaz-Noci, Javier; Iglesias-García, Mar (2016). “Herramientas e indicadores SEO: características y aplicación para análisis de cibermedios”. El profesional de la información, v. 25, n. 3, pp. 497-504. https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2016.may.19

Giomelakis, Dimitrios; Veglis, Andreas (2015). “Employing search engine optimization techniques in online news articles”. Studies in media and communication, v. 3, n. 1, pp. 22-33. https://doi.org/10.11114/smc.v3i1.683

Giomelakis, Dimitrios; Veglis, Andreas (2016). “Investigating search engine optimization factors in media websites. The case of Greece”. Digital journalism, v. 4, n. 3, pp. 379-400. https://doi.org/10.1080/21670811.2015.1046992

González-Villa, Juan (2017). “Cómo hacer link building: estrategias y ejemplos prácticos. Useo, 30th March. https://useo.es/como-hacer-link-building

Gonzalo-Penela, Carlos (2006). “Tipología y análisis de enlaces web: aplicación al estudio de los enlaces fraudulentos y de las granjas de enlaces”. BiD: textos universitaris de biblioteconomia i documentación, n. 16. http://bid.ub.edu/16gonza2.htm

Gonzalo-Penela, Carlos; Codina, Lluís; Rovira, Cristòfol (2015). “Recuperación de información centrada en el usuario y SEO: categorización y determinación de las intenciones de búsqueda en la Web”. Index comunicación, v. 5, n. 3, pp. 19-27. http://journals.sfu.ca/indexcomunicacion/index.php/indexcomunicacion/article/view/197/175

Google (2018). Google guide making searches even easier. Search operators. http://www.googleguide.com/advanced_operators_reference.html

Harry, David (2013). “How search engines rank web pages”. Search engine watch, Sept. 23rd. https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/news/2064539/how-search-engines-rank-web-pages

Hart, Chris (2008). Doing a literature review: Releasing the social science research imagination. London: Sage. ISBN: 978 0 761959755

Kleinberg, Jon M. (1998). “Authoritative sources in a hyperlinked environment”. In: Procs. of the ACM-SIAM Symposium on discrete algorithms, pp. 1-33. https://www.cs.cornell.edu/home/kleinber/auth.pdf

Lewandowski, Dirk (2012). “A framework for evaluating the retrieval effectiveness of search engines”. In: Jouis, Christophe;

Biskri, Ismail; Ganascia, Jean-Gabriel; Roux, Magali. Next generation search engine: Advanced models for information retrieval. Hershey, PA: IGI Global, pp. 456-479. ISBN: 978 1 466603318 https://arxiv.org/pdf/1511.05817.pdf

Li, You (2017). “Contest over authority”. Journalism studies, pp. 1-19. https://doi.org/10.1080/1461670X.2017.1397531

Mathiasen, Stine F. (2018). “10 quick takeaways from native advertising days 2018”. Native Advertising Institute, Sept. 23th. https://nativeadvertisinginstitute.com/blog/takeaways-native-advertising-days-2018

Monterde, Nacho (2016). “Introducción al link building”. SEO azul, March 4th. https://www.seoazul.com/introduccion-al-link-building

Pollitt, Chad (2018). The global guide to technology 2018. A resource for marketers, advertisers, media buyers, communicators, publishers and ad tech professionals. https://nativeadvertisinginstitute.com

Publisuites (2018). “Estudio del uso de linkbuilding”. Publisuite, 15th March. https://www.publisuites.com/blog/estudio-de-linkbuilding-publisuites

Rowe, Kevin (2018). “How link building will change in 2018”. Search engine journal, Feb. 2nd. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/how-link-building-will-change/231707

Schauster, Erin E.; Ferrucci, Patrick; Neill, Marlene S. (2016). “Native advertising is the new journalism: How deception affects social responsibility”. American behavioral scientist, v. 60, n. 12, pp. 1408-1424. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764216660135

Serrano-Cobos, Jorge (2015). “SEO: Introducción a la disciplina del posicionamiento en buscadores”. Colección EPI Scholar. Barcelona: Editorial UOC. ISBN: 978 84 9064 956 5

Sweetser, Kaye D.; Joo, Sun; Golan, Guy J.; Hochman, Asaf (2016). “Native advertising as a new public relations tactic”. American behavioral scientist, v. 60, n. 12, pp. 1442-1457. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764216660138

Thelwall, Mike (2004). Link analysis: An information science approach. Amsterdam: Elsevier. ISBN: 978 0 12 088553 4

Yin, Rober K. (2014). Case study research. Design and methods. Canada: SAGE. ISBN: 978 1 452242569