Is Reporting Your Competition to Google a Reliable SEO Technique?
Nick LeRoy asked:
Are you familiar with Google tattle tailing? This is how is normally goes down. You are in the process of checking out your search engine rankings and realize that another site is kicking your butt. At this time you are so frustrated that you click on their site and look for any technique that could remotely be considered “black hat”. After you convince yourself that this questionable tactic is the reason why their outperforming you in the search results, you promptly go to Google web master tools and tattle on them. This technique typically has two trains of thought by SEO’s.
Report the cheaters!
The first view is that cheaters should never prosper – REPORT THEM! Questionable SEO techniques are against Google’s terms of service and is considered “cheating”. If everyone were allowed to use questionable seo tactics it wouldn’t take much effort or skill to rank for keywords. These webmasters are cheating the system and outranking your site, don’t think twice, get them banned!
I’m too busy building better content and links!
The second view is that it’s a waste of time reporting these sites to Google. Odds are if the technique that is in question truly is questionable or against Google T.O.S then they will get caught and banned anyways. Why waste your time reporting them when you can use the time to create unique content and build quality search engine friendly links to your own site? Leave the reporting and or disciplining to others, you have better things to do with your time.
What to do? Which is best?
The first option gives you a small chance that the site gets banned and you go up one spot in the search engine results. The second option gives you the opportunity to not only leap frog the “cheater” but to potentially reach the top of the search results. The choice seems pretty obvious to me, however there are always people who will disagree with my theory.
You’re going to report them anyways? Ok, but remember…
It’s a personal choice whether or not you want to report this site. However you should always keep in consideration whether your site is 100% legit. Are you using questionable tactics or possibly dancing with “grey hat” techniques yourself? If you opt to report someone’s site that’s your choice, but make sure you watch your back. If someone finds out you did this – you can probably expect the same course of action for your website in return. If you’re using questionable SEO techniques and Google finds out, you too can get banned from the search engines!
Free Marketing and SEO Resources
Are you familiar with Google tattle tailing? This is how is normally goes down. You are in the process of checking out your search engine rankings and realize that another site is kicking your butt. At this time you are so frustrated that you click on their site and look for any technique that could remotely be considered “black hat”. After you convince yourself that this questionable tactic is the reason why their outperforming you in the search results, you promptly go to Google web master tools and tattle on them. This technique typically has two trains of thought by SEO’s.
Report the cheaters!
The first view is that cheaters should never prosper – REPORT THEM! Questionable SEO techniques are against Google’s terms of service and is considered “cheating”. If everyone were allowed to use questionable seo tactics it wouldn’t take much effort or skill to rank for keywords. These webmasters are cheating the system and outranking your site, don’t think twice, get them banned!
I’m too busy building better content and links!
The second view is that it’s a waste of time reporting these sites to Google. Odds are if the technique that is in question truly is questionable or against Google T.O.S then they will get caught and banned anyways. Why waste your time reporting them when you can use the time to create unique content and build quality search engine friendly links to your own site? Leave the reporting and or disciplining to others, you have better things to do with your time.
What to do? Which is best?
The first option gives you a small chance that the site gets banned and you go up one spot in the search engine results. The second option gives you the opportunity to not only leap frog the “cheater” but to potentially reach the top of the search results. The choice seems pretty obvious to me, however there are always people who will disagree with my theory.
You’re going to report them anyways? Ok, but remember…
It’s a personal choice whether or not you want to report this site. However you should always keep in consideration whether your site is 100% legit. Are you using questionable tactics or possibly dancing with “grey hat” techniques yourself? If you opt to report someone’s site that’s your choice, but make sure you watch your back. If someone finds out you did this – you can probably expect the same course of action for your website in return. If you’re using questionable SEO techniques and Google finds out, you too can get banned from the search engines!
Free Marketing and SEO Resources
