Would this be openly disclosed as a "paid review" on the article page and still have a regular link that doesn't use "nofollow"? That doesn't sound like something aligned with Google's intentions to me. How they deal with it, now or in the future, is another thing.

I don't know what google thinks of it, or what they might or could do about it. Maybe they don't care today, and will care tomorrow.

Kind of 'gray hat' seo.

Paid for a review, becomes
Paid for a link and review, becomes
Paid for a link and a positive review etc.
Gray keeps getting darker. I tend to stay in the mid to lighter shades for my sites.

Just how would Google know it was a paid review or not?

What's the big deal, you're paying them to review your site and if they link to you great.

I swear Google has people so brain washed it's not even funny anymore.

In the US, paying for a review without openly disclosing that arrangement is also under scrutiny by the FTC.

I swear Google has people so brain washed it's not even funny anymore.

No, it's still pretty funny.

To contrast Tedster's point, in some countries there are no such requirements to disclose.

There are lots of blogs that offer paid reviews with a link to help with your SEO. Entire industries have sprung up around it, connecting website owners with bloggers. And by many accounts, it works great in the rankings.

Also as noted, Google probably frowns on it, and there would seem to be some risk that they might frown on your site if they caught you doing this.

there would seem to be some risk that they might frown on your site if they caught you doing this

Who would be "You" here? Blog owner or beneficiary of links?

I came across a good blogger (PR6 site) last year that used to do paid reviews. He never advertised it anywhere and neither he used to take direct money for the review (aka link).
What he used to do was contact marketing teams of big companies and would give reviews (say around 80% positive or neutral in nature). In return he would get the reviewed product or service for free, say a digital camera or a holiday package....

@wheel - You are right, it is not a mandate to disclose such reviews in many countries.

What's the big deal, you're paying them to review your site and if they link to you great.

That review site is worthless for Google since they get paid for their links, they are not natural, so it is entirely logical for Google to discard the review site from their index if they want better search results. In the end, it could be a waste of money to pay them. But it can also take a long time, if at all, for the bad review site to get caught.

they are not natural,

But olly does state

I just saw a blog in our industry offering a "paid review"

therefore surely that would look natural?

If not then there's a heck of a lot of links in danger!

There's a strong possibility that Google applies an "internal nofollow" to many links, even if the web page itself doesn't. They were doing this before they publicly proposed the nofollow attribute and there's no reason to think they've stopped.

So when Google sweeps through backlinks and essentially nullifies their ranking power, then websites who were benefiting from that link equity lose that ranking benefit - and this cascades for many hops down the web's interlinking.

Many ranking losses we hear about seem to have their roots in this kind of link recalculation, rather than being a true penalty.

If a blog gets Google's attention for this kind of thing, then I think this would be Google's first recourse.

@tedster - Wanted to know if the blog giving out links would also be affected (raking+traffic) if Google does internally no-follows those links? If not, then I guess this is a good business for the blogger (site owner) giving out links as he still gets paid considering visibly its a do-follow link.....

is it payment for links or for the review? I thought it was for the latter when you mentioned it above...if the blog is good and does attract visitors, the linked site benefits as it gets the traffic...it is not just about links these days...

google is right if they internally do a nofollow but they shouldn't penalize you as this is one form of advertising...and google is an ad company itself...

and it is always better for the blogger, if he acknowledges the paid reviews...but how many popular ones do is another question...

this guy started with reviews initially in return for goodies but quickly focused on linking by realizing it as an added advantage with better ROI :-).
Also, this helped him to tie-up with some online marketing agencies (I guess) for reduced efforts of client acquisition. Anyways, I checked yesterday and found that he is still in business with PR6 site and constantly adding new reviews (even product comparisons at times).