As your business blog grows, you’re likely to find that a lot of visitors find their way to your blog through search engines, particularly Google. While it’s very important do keyword research and use search engine optimization techniques in an effort to increase that search engine traffic (stay tuned to BusinessLogs for search engine optimization tips coming later this week), there are some things that you must avoid, no matter how tempting, else you run the risk of having your business blog banned by Google.
In simplest terms, Google uses a proprietary search algorithm as well as human analysis to detect sites that use search engine optimization techniques which artificially inflate the results Google returns for keyword searches. If your business blog is caught doing any of the things listed below, your blog will be flagged as spam and may very well be banned from all Google search results going forward.
In other words, don’t do the things listed below if you want to get traffic from Google:
1. Keyword Stuffing
Keyword stuffing is when you stuff a bunch of keywords or links using specific keywords as the linked-text in an effort to boost your Google search traffic related to those keywords. For example, including a list of links with your keywords in your blog’s sidebar or footer for no other reason than to stuff your keywords.
2. Scraping Content
Your business blog could be banned from Google if you’re caught scraping content, which means that you copy content from other sites without publishing your own original content. Not only can scraping content get your business blog banned from Google, but it can also get you in trouble with the law if you violate copyright laws (i.e., you don’t want to commit plagiarism).
3. No Original Content
If your business blog is filled with ads, affiliate links, and so on but no original content, it could get banned from Google’s search results. You must publish more original content than anything else on your business blog.
4. Hiding Text
Don’t try to hide lists of keywords by making the text the same color as the background of your business blog or making them the tiniest font possible. You’re likely to get caught and banned from Google search results.
5. Paying for Text Links or Accepting Payment for Text Links
Google uses links that appear in Web sites as criteria in its search result ranking algorithm. Therefore, Google believes that sites that pay for text links to be published on other sites or sites that publish links in return for payment are artificially inflating search results. Therefore, both the site that pays for the text links and the site that publishes them can be banned from Google search results if they’re caught.
Google views each of the above techniques as spam techniques. Once your business blog is banned from Google search results, it is nearly impossible to get back in — even if you’re not guilty of intentionally spamming. Don’t give Google’s algorithm or human analysts a reason to suspect you of committing any kind of possible spamming.
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