Author Marziah Karch says:

Don’t like being found in Google? Here are some sure fired ways to lower your ranking and get the worst search engine results. These are the worst of the worst dirty tricks, and they can lower your Google ranking or just get you banned.

Tricks explained include:

• cloaking
• duplicate content
• having a robot write your web site
• adding keywords that don’t relate to your content
• link exchanges and bad neighborhoods
• hidden text
• title stacking
• distributing viruses, trojans, or other badware
• doorway pages
• automated inquiries

Read the entire article at About.com.

Patrick Altoft of Branded3 says:

The Unnatural Link update works in direct contrast to previous updates because it penalises websites purely based on the link strategy they have chosen to adopt and it has caused huge problems for the sites that are affected.

Another quote from the blog post, and my personal favorite statement, says perfectly how High Aspirations, Inc. feels about SEO… do it right, keep at it, don’t play games or dirty tricks because eventually you pay for those big time!

Site owners need to understand that there is no point in getting rankings in 3 months if those rankings disappear 6 months later. If you want to build a long term business then you have to adopt a strategy that delivers top rankings that will stay for the long term even if this takes longer to show results in the short term.

I highly recommend you read the entire blog post at Branded3.

Author Peter A. Prestipino says:

Google announced that it has taken a step to reward high-quality sites, but what it has really done is punish those engaged in techniques and tactics that don’t provide a good user experience.

High Aspirations, Inc. is very happy to see this happening. I cannot tell you how many times I have to explain to a client why a site keeps ranking higher than them when all they have is the same content page after page, endless links, and text that doesn’t make any sense to a human being! It is vindication to see a client’s site ranking where it should have been all along because we don’t resort to design and content games and dirty tricks! Yippee!

Read the entire article at Website Magazine.

It is important to submit your website to directories because they offer increased exposure and the chance of being found by robot/crawler/spider driven search engines (like Google).

Here are some possible reasons why your site wasn’t submitted to one or more particular search engines:

• the engine’s requirements do not fit your site
• many do not accept free submissions at all anymore
• free submission requires a reciprocal link (a link back to the engine) and your site does not have a links page or section
• the engine requires a physical location and you do not provide that information on your site
• the submission process requires an email address from the same domain name as the URL being submitted and you are not using your domain for email

Each hand submitted search engine, directory, etc. has it’s own rules and requirements which is very time consuming. There is also a follow-up period of approximately 2 hours within the next two days to review emails resulting from the submissions and handle any further requirements such as validating email addresses, activating accounts, etc.

Author Jill Whalen, of High Rankings, says:

I’ve written previously here about Google’s "Panda Updates" and what they mean to website marketing and SEO. But more recently Google’s ultimate web spam Czar, Matt Cutts, mentioned in passing at a conference that Google will be getting even more aggressive towards sites that are pushing the envelope with their SEO efforts. This of course has got some SEO types in a tizzy.

Read the entire article at TalentZoo.com.

If you want guaranteed placement and a quick listing, you will need to pay the search engines to list your site. High Aspirations, Inc. will be happy to manage this on your behalf, just contact us to discuss which engines are your priority and your budget.

Google Safe Browsing: Report a Malware Page

By reporting the virus infected web site, not only will you make yourself feel better because you’ve done a good deed, you’ll protect others because once Google confirms the infection they will list the web site as hazardous and contact the site owners to report the infection. Obviously it’s up to the site owners to fix the infection problem, but at least you’ve done your part!

The Doodle 4 Google contest invites students in the United States, grades K-12, to use their artistic talents to redesign Google’s homepage logo. This year’s theme is “If I could travel in time, I’d visit…” The contest isn’t limited to schools. Parents, guardians, and after school programs can submit their students’ creations as well.

The winning student will see their artwork appear on the Google homepage and take home some cool prizes and, as a special bonus, the winning artwork will appear on a limited edition of Crayola’s 64 box!

Contest Info

Learn How to Enter