[suzie250]

I have always blocked certain pages (like the privacy page) with robots.txt so they are not indexed in the search engines.

With the new rules regarding privacy policies for Adsense, do I need to allow the bots access to them?

Do you think that being blocked is enough for Google to see that I have one, or do you think the bots will be checking for certain words within that file to see if we are in compliance?

I have just put up a new site and realized that even though privacy policies are in place for my other sites, I never unblocked them.

[Bill]

Ahhh...IMHO...best to unblock them. At the last Affiliate Summit West (Vegas last January) I learned that SERP ranking is also influenced a bit by having an "easy to find" Privacy Policy. I volunteered to have one of my main sites analyzed in a session - and that yielded three small recommended changes. I made those changes while still in Vegas and saw that travel site climb to second place for some great key words last summer. It had been in the third spot for more than a year.

That one position meant a several thousand dollars in increased hotel sales last season. One of those "tweaks" was to make the privacy policy more visible. I didn't have it blocked, but it was not linked to from the home page - just from internal pages. I can't say it was that particular change that made a difference, but all four panelists (SEO professionals) agreed that a direct link to a privacy policy is important. They did not say anything about blocking with robots.txt, however. YMMV

[writerguy]

In a related matter -- does anyone know if there's a well written, nicely compliant "Privacy Page" example anywhere that takes into account BOTH Google AdSense requirements AND the latest puzzle from the FTC?

I've been hoping some merchants I'm affiliated with might address this issue with some practical, usable examples or templates or something we could use.

Anybody know of anything like that?

[BurgerBoy]

Originally Posted by writerguy

In a related matter -- does anyone know if there's a well written, nicely compliant "Privacy Page" example anywhere that takes into account BOTH Google AdSense requirements AND the latest puzzle from the FTC?

I've been hoping some merchants I'm affiliated with might address this issue with some practical, usable examples or templates or something we could use.

Anybody know of anything like that?

I sent you a PM Gary.

[John Powell]

If you do a G search for w3c privacy policy you will get the idea of the way I do it. I put up the P3P and the privacy page is normally not restricted to bots. I think on a couple of sites it's marked <meta name="robots" content="noindex,follow"></meta> but nothing in robots.txt

That P3P set up can be read by IE to see your policy, and I always do that. Seems someone here at ABW got me on to that.

I have a separate Disclosure page, but haven't got it rolled out to all sites yet. Gary if you want to take a look pm me.

[RemodelingGuy]

Originally Posted by BurgerBoy

I sent you a PM Gary.

You should share BB.

My privacy policy, as well as my disclaimer are over 10 years old and although they are Google compliant, I'm afraid they are out of date.

@ suzie. I would never block a PP page.

[suzie250]

Thanks guys. My privacy pages are accessible from almost every page on the site and I just didn't see any reason for this type of page to be indexed. I'll let 'em go and maybe I'll see some benefit out of it.

"Please release me, let me go......" Great, now I'll have that song stuck in my head all day.

[Mr. Sal]

Originally Posted by suzie250

Thanks guys. My privacy pages are accessible from almost every page on the site and I just didn't see any reason for this type of page to be indexed. I'll let 'em go and maybe I'll see some benefit out of it.

"Please release me, let me go......" Great, now I'll have that song stuck in my head all day.

Sure!

You mentioned, and now I am the one stuck on memory lane... ( Release Me )

I still have on old 45 record of that song.

[2busy]

I still have on old 45 record of that song.

convert it to MP3 already.

[2busy]

Thanks guys. My privacy pages are accessible from almost every page on the site and I just didn't see any reason for this type of page to be indexed.

noindex them in your metatags, not in robots.txt That way the bots can see them fine but they won't be indexed,