Virtual Library : Techniques that will get your website banned from search engines

1. Do not 'over optimise' your website, or use any techniques which will result in it being penalised. These might include so-called 'black hat' techniques (unethical ways of getting your site listed) such as:

Doorway pages : cloaking : website/page redirects : excessive cross-linking with other websites : submitting multiple domain names from the same site : duplicate content : selling links on your site with the sole purpose of increasing your popularity on, for example, Google....

If you don't believe that sites can be banned, read about the BMW website which was 'blacklisted' by Google because they had used "doorway pages".

2. Don't stuff your site full of hidden text, text that is the same colour as the background, or tiny text that contains your key words. Search engines can spot this and will ban you for it.

3. Don't ever use one of the "Submit your site for free to 1000s of search engines!". It may seem like a good idea, but it isn't. Worse still, it will fill your Inbox with spam!

These types of sites are not search engines, but 'link farms' (link popularity schemes, also known as Free-for-Alls). They are created with the sole purpose of obtaining false search engine rankings. Additionally, real search engines may penalise you for being included in such a site.

4. Don't send out large amounts of spam in the guise of "e-mail marketing." No one likes spammers and you may find that your site is banned by if you are identified or thought of as a spammer, or even if your site is just on the same server as a spammer. N.B. NTL is just one ISP that will block the viewing of websites that are hosted on the same server as a spammer's site.

If you want to send out e-shots then make sure your recipients have opted in to receive e-mails from you. Also, that they know how to opt out.

<< Back to Virtual Library contents