Public Relations Nightmare for Google Search

The following is from the FKM Agency blog but is of interest to anyone doing SEO.

Hello fellow search geeks,

This is TOTALLY worth the read. (warning: it’s a long article): A Bully Finds a Pulpit on the Web

For those of you that don’t want to read the entire article, here’s a quick summary:

The article features a website, it’s owner and more then a few irate (understandably so) customers. Essentially, the owner of the site is making a point to capitalize on negative online feedback in order to increase his search rankings (thus traffic and sales).

From an SEO perspective, the guy is playing the system well. He has recognized that his customer service and product are below par and customers are leaving negative feedback online. However, when a customer does this, they often link to the site and mention a product or products that they purchased. This provides a link back to the website, which enhances the websites natural search presence.

Google is just a small part of the colossal fail that lets a guy like this thrive. All those other companies that are listed in the article are also somewhat responsible (his hosting company, the credit card companies, eBay, etc.)

The biggest issue here is that consumers are not doing the research before buying from a company. Just looking at the website for 2 minutes, I know that I would not buy from them. Why?

• Designer goods for low, low prices. That’s the first clue
• Second, the “reviews” are canned - and there are not reviews on a product by product basis. That’s now a basic for any e-commerce website.
• The About Us page content - that’s basically canned content
• They don’t link to FB or any other social networking sites - which would allow for real consumers to provide feedback
• Product images - this one is a little harder - but when you can see the reflection of someone in a product image for a ($300+ item), unless it’s on eBay, run away.

Consumers really need to do their own due diligence before buying from a new vendor. I rarely buy from sites that I’ve never heard of and I ALWAYS Google the site’s name before I make the purchase, particularly if it’s for a big ticket item. And bottom line, if it’s a designer product being sold for half the price, do the research unless you want to tangle with guys like this.