Bizarre Google Request Update

Now you have to post the search term. Whoever (or should it be whom) wrote these to you is obviously bordering on OCD with psychotic overtones. Anyway, would like to add your link to my obscure and under-visited site. Yours I like. Keep it going.

You must, must , must reply just to keep this going and all of us entertained.

The guy hasn’t got a leg to stand on and you’ve got to put in the reply about his email being read by over 45,000 people - 45k of people thinking what an idiot he is.

C’mon. Screw around with this guy some more. Tell us the search term.

He should be delighted that his website is listed in an organic search, as many are just sandboxed for ages. Just because his unpaid listing is lower than your unpaid listing is no reason for him to throw his toys out the pram.

Google don’t make money from organic search. He’s not paying for search. So what’s his problem? Is his Lawyer going to sue Google (who are responsible for the lsitings)? Where’s Matt Cutts when you need him. Come on Matt! This has got to be worth an update on your blog. The Big G versus the paranoid and delusional minnow.

You might want to remind him that Google make their money from paid listings not natural so its in their interest to have information/blog sites ranked higher than ecommerce sites.

Having said that the guys an idiot so i would just string him along, after all youve now got an audience to entertain now!!

come ON!

you can’t stand for this!
reply along the lines of…
“dear shitforbrains,
Whilst i appreciate you are probably a struggling businessman, i’d hazard a guess that it’s this pissy attitude you have that is causing your problems, and not because some search engine thinks your site sucks.

if you wish to purchase advertising space on my site, please contact me. If you wish to employ me to optimise your site so it ranks higher, please contact me. otherwise leave me alone before i set up a rival site and blow yours out of the water.

whilst you may not be impressed with sarcasm - it being the lowest form of wit, at least it is not the lowest form of half-wit.

regards…”

You owe the readers of your blog the website and search term - basically the unedited first email.

You said previously you would if you received another threatening email and mentioning a lawyer is pretty threatening.

Stay true to your word and post the search term.

Mess with his head some more! Come on, do it! This is one for the ages, man!

Dear (name here),

I apologize sincerely for not taking your request seriously. I didn’t realize how important your business was to you, so as a peace offering, I’d like to give you some advice as to how to deal with the situation yourself both now and should it arise with another blog in the future.

I have only written my blog for an audience, and to be totally honest I agree with you that blogs should not rank higher than commercial sites for commercial terms due to their highly personal nature. So in order to help you prune the results, I have decided to give you a few links to Google resources that will help you get your ranking back and remove the sites that shouldn’t be there:

http://services.google.com:8882/urlconsole/controller?cmd=reload&lastcmd=login

This is Google’s URL removal tool. If a URL must be removed immediately from Google’s index, this is the first place to go. I can’t do it myself, though, because it’s my own domain and Google doesn’t allow for such bias.

http://groups.google.com/group/google.public.support.general?lnk=gschg

This is Google’s general support group. From there, a staff member should hopefully guide you to the correct place.

And finally, you may wish to post to various search engine optimization-specific forums outlining your scenario and making sure to link back to this blog so that people can see the results themselves. This may be the best way to find help.

Again, I sincerely apologize for this. I hope one day that we can meet up, drink beer, become friends and discuss many of the pressing social issues of the day together.

You definitely need to reply to this guy. This is quite amusing. I wish I could get an email like that someday!

You might contact the ACLU, about this attempt to suppress freedom of speech, attempted intimidation, and unwarranted assault. You might consult an attorney about filing a criminal complaint about the threats. The guy’s behavior is criminal, not just rude.

My admiration, though, for your restraint. Publishing the URL involved, the search terms, or an evaluation of the person’s business aptitude or personal characteristics would be simple things to do. Your actions in maintaining your integrity and honor are a blessing to all of us.

Brad K.
Ponca City, OK

Gotta love people who think that, just because they believe something it must be true. Personally, I’m appalled at the business owner’s sense of entitlement. He paid for nothing, yet he thinks because he is a business he is entitled to be ranked above you?

Best of luck dealing with this. It should be pretty straight forward. Just hope his lawyers aren’t as ignorant as he is.

How about:
“Don’t you worry about blank. You let me worry about blank.”

Alternatively:
“Blank?! Blank?!!!!! You’re not looking at the big picture!

OK, best I could come up with are Deano Dress Shoes. But that’s only page 2 (after a bunch of price listing sites tho).

A hint for us maybe?

First of all, I would stand my ground and not give in to his demands.

Secondly, I might let him know that Google might actually prefer that he has to pay for advertising to keep his top search results for that keyword. They don’t actually make any money directly from natural results.

—

I have seen situations in the past where I set up sales pages for specific programs, and then the owners of the programs asked me how I was able to top their sites in Google for their specific, relative keywords. Although I have seen this a number of times, no one has ever asked me to remove my pages.

One of the funniest things i have heard yet!
I have to wonder whether he has checked back to your blog and has seen all of these responses?

Personally i cant wait for the lawyers letter to come through! Brilliant!

I’d go with:

Dear —,

You are absolutely right. I have considered your request and contacted google. You were of course correct, Google is far more interested in ecommerce businesses than blogs, so I guess I wouldn’t be winning that battle.

Thus, in order to keep the wolves from the door, and of course to make use of my superior Google rankings for search term —, I have decided to turn my blog into an ecommerce site that also sells — (hey, a little competition is never a bad thing, just ask Coke and Pepsi).

I’d like to thank you for being my inspiration in getting this (fingers crossed) lucrative venture off the ground, any advice you can give the “little people” for getting started would be appreciated.

Regards,

Dean Hunt

haha, I hope Google sends him a bill for all that “money” that make from businesses like him on natural search.

Dean,

This is indeed one of the funniest things that I have seen cross the net in a long time.

Please keep updating us to what is going on.

You should probably NOT give out the senders website or search term for a couple of reasons:

1) He might sue you. He could say something like you encourage a DOS attack against his website, or some other BS.

2) It would generate traffic to his site

Thanks for posting.

Good Luck!!!!

You have got to let us know the search term. Let’s see if we can’t push this guy a bit lower - or is that just really cruel?

C’mon give us the search term! :p

It’s not an act of cruelty - it’s a lesson in the reality of the business world! There was 101 ways the guy could have handled the unfortunate situation he found himself in and he chose to be an ass about it.

OK anyway, a reply…

—-

Dear (name),

While I understand your frustration that your site no longer ranks number 1 for (term), those rankings are not within my control.

As you rightly point out, Google is responsible for ranking websites in the order they see fit. Perhaps your site has simply lost a little respect from Google lately? I’m not entirely sure emailing them to complain about my site will rectify that.

I would strongly suggest that you approach your business strategy from a more realistic angle. Basing your business on the traffic gained from a number 1 position for a single search term is a very unstable foundation for any legitimate business. To be out ranked by a site that isn’t even trying to out rank you is just a symptom of your larger problem.

I do not share your view that a “business” website should out rank a blog - Google indexes and sorts information without any thought for the person or people behind the information. I would suggest that if you would like preferential treatment for your business, then you should look at vertical search engines or PPC engines to expand your market reach. This would be a much more stable approach than relying on free organic search traffic - you get what you pay for.

I should point out here that technically you are wrong about Google’s financial situation - more often than not, Google MAKE money from information sites displaying Adsense - these sites usually rely organic search traffic to succeed. Google doesn’t make any money from businesses in organic search results. So perhaps you should remove your site and undertake a PPC campaign, which in my opinion is a more appropriate approach for a business to take?

I would be very interested to hear what both Google and your lawyers have to say on the matter. I doubt very much that you will receive the response from them that you desire. As such, can I politely suggest that you fuck off and stop wasting my time.

Kind Regards,
etc

—————-

I think I may have lost my focus near the end there…

MG

Prepare to be slashdotted. You are about to come up on the main page there.

Post the site, he will then become victim of the /. syndrome. Hopefully hes paying for bandwidth!

I’d say try to set the guy straight, link him this this page so he can read the comments already left, this will show him that his response is unwarranted and a bit silly.. but when corresponding with him try to be sincere and straightforward.

Ridicule should be left to those who are not directly involved in the dicussion so as not to inflame his sense of personal injury.

Some people just “don’t get” the web, google, and other froms of technology that we all know natively… although it is fun to poke fun of others to feel superior, being nice and trying to actually “help” someone learn goes a long way to making personal interactions more pleasant for all of us..in conclusion my vote is “take the high road”.

-Llama

It sounds like some newbie to the internet, is it for a real business like bestbuy.com or is it for some tiny small business like isellshrubs.com

Definitely don’t list the site nor the search term … you’d be giving the other site free publicity. I think you have handled this extremely professionally and intelligently.

The guy is begging you to make him number one on Google and help drive traffic to his site. Just post the unedited emails and make his wildest dreams come true.

He needs to complain to the people who run the Internet.

This guy sounds like someone who bought one of those “Internet Companies in a Box” get-rich-quick-on-the-internet schemes. He has no idea how google works or even how to have a civil discussion with someone via email.

I understand your caution by not revealing any details about that guy or his business but I really hope it gets out somehow and that an example will be made of him … too many people are totally oblivious to the way the web and google work, it might get them to educate

If you have the $$$ I’d get an Adword listing, kicking you up further still, just to piss him off. If you do a fundraiser here, I wouldn’t mind pincing in a few, just for kicks Other than that, I’d not reply at all, let em cook and spend their $$$ on lawyers that can’t bend the law to their twisted will anyway.

Good luck and hang in!

I suggest you get a lawyer. He has several avenues of legal actions he can pursue against you.

LMAO!

My response would be:
Dear blank,
It is obvious that I am far superior to you and all the emails in the world won’t change that. So sorry.
My one suggestion for you is to go back on the medication. While this won’t improve your seach position, it may help you take that dump you so desperately need.

This is about as stupid as the woman here in California that called 911 because Carl’s Jr. didn’t make her Western Bacon Cheeseburger correctly.

She actually wanted an officer to come to the restaurant and force the manager to make her burger correctly!!

Can you believe it?!?!

Dean is absolutely correct in not naming the site or search term, and in not replying.

1) Naming the site here would just result in some folks playing Internet vigilante. While the man has no case against Dean right now, naming him and his site could create one.

2) Naming the site here could inadvertently raise the other’s site’s page ranking, which it does not deserve for the behavior exhibited so far.

3) Naming the search term could lead people to finding the other site or other innocent sites (see #1) and might increase Dean’s page ranking on that keyword.

4) There’s no point in replying; it just encourages further bullying emails and you’re not going to educate someone on something unless they want to be. This other fellow clearly needs to better understand how Google works, but he doesn’t seem prone to listening.

Yep, he’s a brit.

“Expect a letter in the post” is brit slang.

Which means he’s got even less of a leg to stand on, since you’re not British.

I suggest you give us the search term and let him enjoy all the “attention” he’ll get from it, till he realizes what a stupid limey ‘tard he is.

Uh, I would be willing to bet a large sum that google makes a lot more money from blogs than they do from his business.

To start with, they own blogger.

Then there are all the blogs that have AdSense on it. Like say, this one! If he is so concerned with his SERPs, I’m betting that he doesn’t buy any AdWords. You probably make more money for google than he does.

If you get a letter from the attorney, scan it and post the unedited PDF.

If he keeps this up, your blogs ranking for the search term will be valid, as someone who got sued over the search term. In addition to all the blogs that will rank high for the term, we could start a campaign to get about 30 of his competitors ranking higher than him.

Dear [name],

On behalf of all Internet users, I hereby request and demand that you immediately cease and desist any and all communication about Google or the Internet until such time as you can show at least a marginal understanding of either. I have sent three hundred and eleven letters and a small wicker basket of apples to my team of nineteen thousand lawyers who should be contacting you shortly.

I expect a poorly structured, rambling reply soon.

I’m sure the 45,000+ readers that come to your site through various means, as well as all the people linking to it from their blogs has really hurt your PageRank.

I think Dean made this up.
Why else wouldn’t he expose them?

You know what you should do is to start a poll of the following options:-

1.site owner is an asswhols and has no rights to threaten you)
2.site owner has a point.
3.site owner should stop his site (because he doesn’t understand a thing about how search engines works)

I didn’t take time to read all the comments, so this may have already been said, but you should send him a reply saying that since your page is ranked higher, he should pay you $500/month (or some other insultingly high ammount), and in return you’ll post a link/advertizement to his site on yours. I’m sure he’ll be pleased with that idea….

Thank you for standing up for your, our, and my rights. Should this issue go so far as to become a financial burden on you, you have my financial support.

Personally, I would respond that you do not have anything to do with how Google works, and if their spiders and logic engines for searches decide that you should rank higher than him, then so be it.

People like this really get to me. They think they own the world because they have a physical product or service to sell, when you on the other hand have something that people will find equally valuable. I would rather read a blog than goto a site ran by someone who obviously knows nothing about advertising online or e-commerce in general.

Good luck Dean, I will be checking your site daily now! lol.

Josh.

The sad thing is, he will get a lawyer to draft a letter of argument against you. Most lawyers don’t know how computers, the Internet or search engines work. So as long as someone is paying them, they will pursue any argument.

The best thing to suggest to him, is to have a third party web developer examine both sites and determine why his ranking is failing him. The obvious quick fix for him is to purchase a higher ranking.

I find people like this to be really sad. I used to work for one. If this is a small company, the lawyer will suck out all of his revenue and bankrupt the him.

HA HA HA HA. Now if that isn’t the funniest thing I’ve ever heard. I mean, this is so silly of a lawsuit that I, for once, have no words. Maybe he should get a clue.

Aren’t all the posts and activity on this site resulting from the contact going to make it that much harder for him to get higher than you in the search ranks?! Gotta love the irony in that…

This is very funny. Thanks for blogging this. I’m with you on not letting the world know who the owner is.

No free publicity for him!!

I say counter…
Threaten to contact your lawyers over the emails he is sending you, and his bullying tactics. He is causing undue mental stress and an increase in bandwidth at your website. Tell him about the bandwidth problems he is causing you because of his emails being posted and then being slashdotted. Tell him about all the effort and mental frustration you have gone through just to keep his name, website, and search term out of the news. Also remind him how you are restraining your readers from knocking his site off the first page of search results all together. Then thank him for the free publicity.

HAHAHA
If that does not work then he really is an idiot.

The classic “my lawyer will be in contact” threat. People who use that line rarely have any clue about the law. I gather that y’all are in Britain (mystery complainant’s idiom “in the post”, your reference to quid elsewhere on the blog); I can’t speak for the laws there, but if they are anything like here in America then I seriously doubt there’s any cause of action for him to hang his hat on. Even if he thought you were somehow manipulating the rankings behind the scenes, he’d have to convince a judge to grant discovery just to be able to subpoena your records in the hopes of finding proof of his theory, and any judge worth his salt would deny such a baseless request and rule in your favor summarily. So his lawyer can puff himself up and blow hard all he wants, there’s no case. And if he were actually to file such a baseless claim, there’s the old malicious civil prosecution and abuse of process theories for your countersuit. Have fun!

–David (law librarian)

You need to mention the search term, that way other people will blog about the search term and link to your site, thus moving you up in google rankings.

whatever you do, DO NOT mention this guy’s site, you don’t want to help him out. if you do, don’t type it so google can index it.

You should really send a note back to him saying that because of his humorous emails your site has attained many new hits (including me) and that the Google Ads on your site have likely gotten quite a few more views than usual, therefore netting Google more money than his site (which likely has no revenue traceback to Google). Just my 2 cents on the matter.

Please please please publish this guy’s website. Pretty please.

This is hilarious - I wonder if this guy has enough IQ to be running an internet business to begin with.

This is the funniest thing I have ever seen linked from /. Thank you so much for publishing his edited emails. I sure hope his lawyer sends you something in the “post” and if so PLEASE post it here (edited for the protection of the stupid)
I hope your blog is ranked #1 by then end of this.
Keep it up you are now bookmarked!

…. so is he “post”ing it to a webpage or putting it in the “post”… maybe he knows more about the web then we thought…. lol

I don’t know, but this could be a brilliant marketing ploy by Dean. If it is Kudos, you generated a lot of free publicity.

Fermin

There are some real crazies out there on the Internet. Sometimes it’s best just to keep your head down. Smart move, not replying.

Kevin

LOL! Yes it’s your fault that Google ranks your site higher! Please, put it to black, this post is to funny for this net!

Maybe he should read the rest of your site to learn about SEO and search positioning.

Is it even possible to remove your site from Google for certain terms???

I, like the rest of the readers, would really love to know what the search term was.

What a whack job!

If you post this guy’s name, search term, and website, then probably a lot of sites will link to him, his PageRank will rise, and he’ll leave you alone.

Alternatively, most of the links will have text like “what a moron!”, and his PageRank will plummet, and he’ll go out of business, and he’ll leave you alone.

Win/win, if you ask me.

What’s the funniest about this idiot writing to Deano is that he’s got the oddest sense of entitlement.

This is characteristic lack of empathy. Not only he doesn’t understand how Google works, he simply can’t see that quite likely, Google’s doing the right thing to avert traffic from his nethole into Deano’s page.

So, to summarize:

- He does not understand how Google works — “mommy, there’s a little person in the TV!”
- He feels his site is morally superior to and more deserving than Deano’s site — truthiness, yay!
- He attempts to bully Deano into submission — “give me the toy or I’ll hit you”

Eerie elements of cargo cultism and similar retrogradisms.

Anyway. people with stupid senses of entitlement must be shot in the neck. I deserve to do it myself!

Here’s my suggestion for a reply.

_________

Kind “I expect a reply soon” Sir

By the grace of God, I am hoping that this email is finding you well. I have been given your name by a mutual friend who is a lawyer in your city. He assures me that you are an honest man of good intentions.

I am writing on behalf of Princess Sulwa Sarinahtan of Nigeria whose father, unfortunately, passed away in recent months leaving the sum of $25 million US dollars in a bank account in Lagos.

I am proposing this venture that can be of mutual benefit…

etc, etc…

If he thinks Google is making money off of his listing, it’s clear he doesn’t understand Google. You might inform him about Google’s advertising program. If he wants more traffic, and wants to give Google money, this is his best bet: http://www.google.com/intl/en/ads/

You should ignore him, he’s just another looney on the net. Don’t waste your time with people like him who act as self-elect internet police.
Thank god there are many good blogs with much higher rating than crappy store.
I think you did the right thing but now showing his site, that would only cause traffic in his direction and maybe that’s exactly what he wants.

Luca

DUDE!

The answer is simple.

Contact this guy’s primary rival company and offer them cheap (or free) advertising space on your blog.

And don’t post the details of this guy, like Chris says it will just boost his rankings.

Dear Sir,

I appreciate your cander in your reply, I can assure you that I was not being sarcastic in my first reply. I’m sorry to hear you perceived it that way.

However, I can say that up until now I have been decent enough to leave off both the search term and the name of your website from my non-profit blogging of this incident.

If you insist that we play hardball, as I have understood you are insisting that me must. I will not be as decent of a person and reveal both the search term you covet as well as your domain name to the hundreds of thousands of people that seem to be reading my blog and commenting on this situation.

That will probably not work out too well for you, I would imagine that would probably affect your bottome line much more than being number 2 on the search term. That is just a guess on my part, perhaps you are one of those people that believe that any publicty is good publicity. If that’s the case I have no problem letting the world know. It’s up to you really, let me know whether you would rather just forget about this nonsense of trying to bully me around the Internet, or should we publicize the granular details of the disputation. Either way is fine with me, perhaps your lawyer can weigh in on that decision as well. Let me know what you two decide.

Thanks,

//Signed

I am guessing that the term is “Madrid Life” as Dean is listed in the top 20 for it, plus with it being in his title, he has it on every page of the site.

At the same time Martian Soil (http://www.martiansoil.com/) ranks in at number 25, so it can’t be that hard of a keyword to top out in.

This would be funnier by far if I hadn’t dealt with just this sense of entitlement in various support positions over the last (mumble mumble) years. People who are accusing the blog owner of making this up are right to be skeptical — how many viral marketing scams have us long time ‘Net denizens been inadvertently sucked into over the years? However, this has that ring of truth (as opposed to truthiness) that only the truly clueless can muster.

While I also am not a lawyer, the comments from many here stating that the first mention of legal threats is cause to completely cut off conversation is accurate. Most support groups have specific policies in place regarding how to deal with legal threats. For example, if you threaten to sue over some problem at an Apple Store’s Genius Bar, the proper response is to give them the address (NOT a phone number or name!) for Apple’s legal department and show the customer the door, politely but firmly — no exceptions.

This may not be true everywhere, but many jurisdictions have laws that prohibit people from making casual legal threats — in other words, never say “I’ll sue you!!” unless you completely intend to call your lawyer and do just that. Otherwise, you may have opened yourself up for receiving a lawsuit instead, and the problem you were hoping to solve with vague legal threats will probably still be with you.

I would LOVE to see the site that started this whole thing. However, it’s legally silly to name names — then he might be able to whip up a case for libel or defamation of character.

If, by some wild chance, the author of these e-mails is reading these comments, a word of advice: After 25 years of computer supports on all possible levels (retail, college, large corporations to small startups) I can state unequivocally that acting like a pompous asshole does NOT get you better service. It might look like that to you in your narrow, inverted anal/cranial world view, but it isn’t. You’re going to get the bare minimum of service that is required to make you shut up, and not a lick more. Nice people we bend rules for, look the other way when we know repairs should be out of warranty, and generally cut serious slack.

People who treat support (or any service staff) with the respect human beings deserve (at least until they prove they DON’T) will get farther over the long term. People who automatically assume that such people are slaves to serve your capricious whims can never be sure what’s in their food.

~Y~

OK, my bad. Correction: Marketing Madrid maybe with Life thrown in. Dean is tops in both.
That is sure to annoy others who think that things like providing anglo info is far more important.

I am not a lawyer, but come on people. Naming his name cannot be libel or defamation of character, so long as Dean has been entirely truthful with us. Truth is a defense to both civil actions, particularly when all he is doing is reposting a communication he received word for word.

My suggestion is that Dean should contact the EFF. He might be able to obtain legal help free of charge-this is the sort of thing that gets their dander.

Ironically, he’s helped increase your ranking on Google due to more sites linking to your site.

Shame we didn’t know his site as we could bomb your site for his company name. I would love to see his email then.

Is this for real DeanO? Or are you just such an SEO/traffic ninja that you fabricated this brilliant story in order to attract 45k readers? Either way it’s causing quite the buzz. If it is real, this guy is a complete moron.

Make him an offer!!! If he is dumb enough to pay a lawyer for a pointless lawsuit… You may not be bullied, but everyone has a price =)

Is he taking internet surfing lessons from GW Bush? Maybe someone should show him how “the Google” works.

I would respond to the guy stating that unless he cease harrassing you, you will release the “term” and his URL. Tell him you have many thousands of readers who thing he is a jerk and it would probably hurt what ever business he has even further.

I Wuz Here. This guy has got to be kidding you.

Now that you have been slashdotted, you will surely gain more inbound links.. thus having even higher rank for [edited] .. sucks to be that guy.

I have to agree with one of the earlier posts - you should inform him that after realizing that there is a healthy market for [edited] (thanks to him), you have decided to throw your hat in the ring. You could even take it a step further and create a fake front page that is almost completely, but not quite, identical to his.

-do you have stairs in your house?-

Dean;

This is what happens when people dhave a shitty site and others with more ingenuity get more kudos than them.

I think you should ignore this person, and let him draw first blood… If he threatens you with a letter of a lawyer, I am sure this is not going to get any farther than that. Google itself, I’m sure will step in and clarify the issue on your favor.

Regardless he is really wasting his time, because this is nothing you have fault of. If his ranking went down and yours is higher than his, it means his site sucks and yours doesnt.

To the guy writing the email, If you want to get better page rankings, there are many things you can improve on your own site to do this, some of the dideas I can give you are to do a redesign of your site, create and online marketing campaign of your product and feature components to draw more traffic thus increasing your status in the ranking pages. If you dont have money to do this, then I guess you should consider another line of business cheaper than harrasing honest people who write their thoughts on the Internet, just because they are far more interesting that the business you have.

My .02 cents

Gilbert

“He may have a good lawyer, but I have got a blog…”

Game. Set. Match. LMAO!

Tell him you weren’t being sarcastic and that perhaps he should buy some google text ads.

The sensible reply would be that this issue is between him and Google and nothing to do with you (though it would be interesting to know what law he thinks you have broken that would require a lawyer to be involved?).

But please don’t be sensible, be funny. If you do need a lawyer, maybe you could borrow Something Awful’s, Leonard “J.” Crabs.

Well, one thing is for sure…

Since you are getting all this coverage and more websites are linking to you such as /. you are going to get a much higher ranking.

As long as you don’t link to the “competitions” website, you are golden!

-Josh

Man this is so funny, send him a few links to some SEO related stuff. Then send him a bill for your services once he doesnt pay you threaten him with legal action.

Keep the laughs coming.

*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***
*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***
*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***

Dear Sir,

> Firstly, I have to admit that I was not impressed
> with the sarcastic nature of your reply.

Please accept my apologies, my reply was not meant to come across as being sarcastic. This matter is being addressed with utmost of respect and professionalism.

> Secondly, I am writing to let you know that I have
> contacted Google and am awaiting their reply.
> You have to understand Dean that an online business
> should be higher in Google than a blog.

If you don’t mind, do forward Google’s correspondence on to me.

> Don’t forget that Google is a business as well,
> they obviously make more money from other
> businesses than they do from blogs, so it is
> in their interest that I am higher than you
> for certain searches.

You are right, Google is in the business of search engine rankings and you are in the business of selling [blank]. Google uses special algorythms in order to determine search engine rankings; I am not in control of these algorythms and frankly I do not even know how they work. None the less, I see that you are in the business of selling [blank] and therefore it is in your interest to ensure that your web site receives a higher ranking than mine. Perhaps you could considering taking out a Google ad; their ad-words will enable your web site to be shown as a “sponsored” ad. Also, Google ads help you keep track of your turn over which may help you understand your business and it’s online presence.

> I have also contacted my lawyer about this issue,
> so you should expect a letter in the post very soon.

[start - you may want to leave this out]
It is too bad that you did not contact a lawyer before speaking to me; in your email you clearly stated that you could not find the search term [blank] any where on my website. Because of this I am powerless to do anything about this.
[finish - you may want to leave this out]

I can’t stop you from engaging me in litigation but surely would it not be more prudent for you to engage an online marketing company instead of an attorney?

Regretfully yours,

Signed

*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***
*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***
*** GOLDEN RESPONSE ***

Contrarian Minority Report.

“If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him!”

Dean, take the advice of SEFL (but not as it was ironically given), Don, and Larry Clapp. Use your Heart of Compassion. Advise this person to read the comments on your original blog entry and this followup to see what ridicule s/he has garnered. Then “kill” him with kindness: reveal the search term, the URL, and for a few weeks put a link at the top of your blog to the site.

I think the smart thing to do would be to send a copy of the entire conversation to Google and ask their advice in dealing with the guy.

Keep stringing him along, but start charging 25 cents to read his replies to everyone. Charge $20 to reveal his name. Then, you’re a business site making lots of money. What’s the paypal account to send my $20.25? Kudos to you for actually not displaying the address, though. I don’t know if I could be so kind

Maybe this bloke is playing with you?

The Internet does not exist for business. What could a lawyer do in this case? Have any laws been broken? Does this person have any legal standing that allows him to “order” you to change the way google has ranked your site.

Again, this bloke is probably playing with you in the hope you will publish his URL so he can piggyback some hits from your site…

Regards, Bawdo2001

Depends what do you want to do. If it happened to me, i would try to give that guy the least opportunities to legally attack me. It’s obvious he’s nuts and will try anything. Continuing to have contact with him and try to enrage him, without a legal advice, may in the end make you give him something that he can use together with his lawyer to base a (or better: any) case on.

Don’t reply. Find somebody in the community who can assist you. EFF, or whomever else.

Dear Sir,

The nature of my collaboration with Google is not a matter of public debate, there is a high possibility of Google making a lot more money from a blog (like this one) that from many businesses (like yours).

This is as good as baiting a nigerian scammer.

Infact, you should set him up with a few, they would get along just great.

Cant wait to hear more, but i think when google reply to him.. he will disappear into the back room of his online shop to cry.

You should show the site traffic to your site to him , give a business proposition to him to buy your site (45k visitors in couple of days) and many many slashdot traffic coming now. tell him that he can buy it for a few hundred thousand $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ he may fall for it. just kidding

or else keep playing with the guy and write a comedy. it may be even worth a movie if you play around for some more time. “idiot harasser in my mailbox” probably that would make more $$$

hey tell the search term cant wait for it. esp seeing that moron’s reply mail

Don’t post the searchterm - that’s what he is going to benefit most from.
If you don’t post it, your site will get higher because of this mess - he might drop even lower…

Or - sell to him the post on your blog

But curiosity still dwells: What’s the site he’s complainig about? [Don't tell also...]

Have Fun!

It’s a problem for Google that blogs tend to interlink, so they often feature very highly in searchs.

Since it’s a well known problem for google, and it’s hurting him, then maybe he will spend the kind of money that Google does on search algorithms and let them know what they are doing wrong.

By the way, for your entertainment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_Google_bombs

Love reading about this one - its a bit like Tony Blair complaining about being linked to the search term ‘poodle’ or George W Bush being linked to ‘failure’ - that’s the nature of google search!

BTW it would be lovely if you could link this charity to the search term DFID purely because that’s one of the things they campaign on and I know at least 4 people who’d find it funny!!

Deano

I run one of the UK’s leading retail sites. If you were higher than us on Google, my first angle of approach would be to have a very loud word in the ear of the web marketing team.

If your correspondant cannot meta tag or search optimise his site correctly, its his own stupid fault.

By the way can you publish his name so none of us make the mistake of employing him.

Liked reading the conversation

Dear Mr Aardvark

I represent Aardvarks Limited. It has recently come to our attention that your name appears before the company’s in the phonebook.

It is unconscionable that a private individual should be more easily found in the phonebook than my company. Afterall, this company is my livelihood, whereas you make no money from having the surname “Aardvark”.

I therefore require you to either delist from the White Pages, or change your surname by deed poll to “Aardvarkt”.

Let’s not forget the White Pages makes money from listing our names, and I am sure they will get more business from my company than from you.

Hi Deano!
Definitelly, it has something wrong with these people.

I’m on a mailing list about blogging and I send a message for the group talking about this case.

They reject my message (Message not approved: Online Store to Sue Blogger Over Google Ranking):

Renata, I’m going to reject this email from being published in the group since I am concerned about the group injecting itself into someone’s legal affairs. Your connection with the topic is not explained, which is also a possible problem.

I am concerned that accepting it for publication to the group without a more thorough description of the situation might cause some problems down the road for us by appearing to take sides.

If you think I am misreading this situation please let me know.

OMG!!! It’s just news…

This is the most ridiculous thing i have heard. why is it he thinks you have power over rankings. Its like someone asking you to not speak because it doesn’t allow for his car to be heard. I did have a guy ask me to have his Property Account information removed because for some reason it ranked first in the listing on Google. The bad thing is I work for a government office and cant remove his account from public access. He threatened legal action as well. I doubt anything will come of it.

Here should be the response;

As a site that does not make money I respectfully acquiesce to your request. It is not my responsibility to maintain your rankings. If you wish to pay me to do so I would be all more than happy to maintain your ranking. But since I am not being paid I have four words for you “Sucks to be you!”