Google has pulled the SEO ranking of Interflora for its own brand name as well as generic related topics such as ‘flowers’, ‘flower delivery’ and ‘florist’, which would usually have brought the company to the top of the search list.
The penalty is thought to have been imposed as a result of 'unnatural' link-buidling, backed up by Tweets seen by The Drum that suggest that the florist has been actively asking for paid-links in stories to be removed in the last day, indicating that this is what the company is being punished for. However one industry insider has told The Drum that he doesn't believe this to be the reason for the punishment, adding that this tactic was to put Google 'off the scent' of the real issue, which is still the cause of speculation.
David Naylor, CEO of Bronco Internet, who has experience of working with Google, commented: “With the penalty that Interflora has come under this week, seeing them lose their top ranking position for their own brand name, as well as the main traffic terms in the flower sector, just shows no one, not even the biggest brands can escape Google’s penalties.
“Whatever SEO techniques they have used to gain rankings, does it give Google users a good experience when brands are not ranking for their own name. As we have seen previously big brands don’t remain penalised for long so they may appear at the top again in the next few weeks as Google needs them in their index.”
At the time of writing, The Drum was awaiting a comment from Google and Interflora.
A blog by David Naylor offers further insight into what companies should do in such a situation.
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Association for Defending Webmasters against Rigorous Oligopolies Destroying Small Companies
Right to visibility on the internet!
http://a-d-w-o-r-d-s.org/en/
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@conta10142 As acronyms go that isn't one that works: adwrods c
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@Cowdenbrummie are you a pirate , your avatar designed by PSOF , which Ironman races have you done are doing?
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@BusDocSurreySus
Top spot! Done IM Austria, Switz, France and non_branded Roth and Outlaw plus a few Enduroman things so far and off to Lanza in May. Yourself?
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This can also happen when a competitor pays to have links to your website put onto spammy sites, not good at all.
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Overcooked! Years of article / directory / comments spam should catch up with the big brands just as much as the little guy. Don't mess with the Penguin!
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Negative SEO wouldn't take a big brand like Interflora down. I have still to see a case where negative seo has worked. It's a myth. You just have to look at the link profile of Interflora to see why they have been punished. Too many low quality Irrelevant links.
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I like that people are punished for cheating but if I'm searching for Interflora, I want to find their company. Are Google actually trying to preserve the quality of search results, or are they just on a massive ego trip and making an example of a large corporation? Reminds me of medieval hangings...
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@natas89046 Want to find Interflora? How about just entering interflora.com on the address line? Works for me. You don't need Google.
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I'm all for penalising those trying to game the system, but isn't the penalty here in danger of being seen as self-serving? I read elsewhere that Interflora had upped their paid-for advertising to compensate for disappearing from the organic results. More cash in Google's coffers.
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I see there's still a lot of strange going ons in the comments section on the Drum. So far six 'new posters' have posted comments on this article and they all have a username with the same format of five lowercase letters followed by five numerals. The username gloocomms also looks a bit dodgy. In fact I would say that so far I'm the only real fucking person who's actually taking the trouble to comment. Everyone else is a bot. Just like Interflora, someone on the Drum is engaging in some fakery fuckery.
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@malcolm_tucker
I'm real!
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@malcolm_tucker perhaps it's the way the site integrates people logging in via Facebook or Twitter, assigning semi-random usernames based on real name?
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@christopherwoods if I show up with the same pattern you may be right.
Edit: Nope, it uses my real name in creating the commenter name. Looks like malcolm is unto something
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