Negative SEO - What Do You Think?

[potpiegirl]

This post is deleted!

[charles1]

I've heard that if a site is well established (and been around a long time), with a large diverse link profile it won't be affected by this tactic, in fact it could strengthen their position.

I'm guessing Google knows which sites are top ranking for valuable keywords, which would mean they would assume that these top ranking sites would have no reason to pay for bad links. Hence they would ignore this.

But if a sites newer, has fewer links etc and is lower ranking it probably would work. But why would anyone target a site that isn't ranking highly?

It really sounds like a waste of money and time to me. As this money could be invested in content creation and link building.

[Carson-Ward]

Exactly. It's hard to tank a big brand, and the small sites aren't worth sinking.

A lot of the drops we see are from people who RELY on link networks and other spam tactics to promote their site. If a site ranks first with legitimate tactics, you have very little chance of getting them flagged with spam. More importantly, it's an enormous waste of time to focus on competitors for search results when you could be building your own site.

I would add that if your competitor does lose money as a result of you manipulating search results, you may be legally liable in some jurisdictions - and don't think that your blog network owner is going to take the fall once the subpoenas start dropping.

I'll discuss more in an upcoming blog post.

[potpiegirl]

Hey guys - thanks for adding to the conversation!

I totally agree that it would be downright silly to go after the 'big brands', but I'm not so sure it's impossible with less authority sites.  And, just because a site/url has a weak back link profile (ie, might be vulnerable) doesn't always mean it doesn't rank well.

Looking forward to your blog post, Carson!

Jennifer

~PotPieGirl

[MicahMMG]

It probably isn't illegal.  There might be some kind of fairly broad laws about sabotage that could cover it, but nothing specific to Search Engines.  So, it's probably not a crime that the government is going to choose to prosecute for.  However, you still might be able to put together a good civil lawsuit case about it.

It's almost certainly unethical.

Does it work?  Against a fairly weak website, I think it would.  There are niche websites that don't have a huge link profile, that I think would be vulnerable to this kind of attack.  It may be the strongest website in its niche, but it may be a very small niche.

[Carson-Ward]

Micah,

I imagine this could easily be interpreted to violate copyright, sabotage, and unfair competition laws, but I don't know which. Building spammy links to a competitors site would probably be enough alone to constitute "bad faith," which is not a great start for a defendant. We want to be very careful about giving legal advice, which is why I suggest people speak with qualified professionals.

You bring up a good point about niche websites, but the fact remains that sabotaging a competitor does little or nothing to build your own site's strength.

[MicahMMG]

Agreed on all points.

Did my original reply make it seem like I was endorsing this tactic?  If so, that was not my intention.

[Carson-Ward]

No, and sorry if it seemed like I was disagreeing. I just wanted to clarify and add some thoughts.