With a flurry of discussion at Search Engine Land and SEOBook over Google’s apparent violation of their own policy against passing Page Rank with paid links, I feel compelled to talk about a lesson learned from this discussion. It is important to make sure that when you are being paid to make an endorsement or if you pay someone to make such an endorsement, you must disclose that fact to the public. As I think about my own competition and I see their online ratings and reviews with consistent five stars, I can’t help but wonder if they aren’t offering discounts for positive reviews or paying their customers for their reviews. What do you think, does a discount for a service constitute a paid endorsement?
