My Google Rant…

[Dien Rice]

Originally Posted by SteveSki

If anyone has any suggestions on how they would handle this situation with Google please share your thoughts with me.

Hi Steve,

I commiserate!

Unfortunately, the bottom line is most likely that if you want to use Google, you have to "play" by their rules - stupid as they may sometimes be...!

I have to add here, too, that Google is known for its poor customer service. Anything that requires any kind of "human contact," they don't do very well. You hear stories about this from people who use Adwords, AdSense, and so on... And it sounds like your own experience just adds to this impression, too!

On your website dropping out of the search engine for specific terms, it's possible that Google might have done so because they wanted you to buy the advertising. However, they are also always changing their search algorithms, so I think you can never really know. They probably like it that way!

I have a story with some similarities with Clickbank. A while ago, I set up a Clickbank page with a new account to sell a new product, and Clickbank had to "approve" the sales page. They wanted me to make so many changes - it ended up taking all the "guts" of the salesmanship out of the page! (I was already cautious when writing the sales copy in the page regarding what claims I made, but it's like they don't want you to make any claims whatsoever...)

Of course, there are "many ways to skin a cat," and as you know from lots of experience, you can succeed without Google...

Best wishes,

Dien

Good news… I figured whining was useless so I accepted responsibility to reach out to several of Google’s Helpouts Support Individuals and ask for their help. Seems that the Helpout Team has to get word back from their editorial department and the two departments weren't communicating all of the facts to each other.

I was pleasantly surprise when I found an email from them when I awoke today stating they have approved my helpout!

The girl in my Google Helpouts listing image is “Vera” my photographer’s assistant. She wears that fairy dress and wings during the photo sessions (works much better than wearing a silly wig) and treats the kids to Face Painting at the end of each session,

You Can See My Google Helpouts Listing Here!

I figured it was up to me to initiate some video chats with their helpouts team members and sell them on getting this sorted out.

I also figure that I can’t depend on Google sending me any traffic. But I just learned a very clever and 100% free way to get all the leads I want. Names, Address, Email, birth dates and the phone numbers of people already interested in photography to market to.

So I’ll reach out to them first to invite them to take me up on my helpout Will target younger people just getting started with photography so they should have less bad habits to unlearn and are generally more open minded.

As for my website dropping off Goggles first page I think it was really due to over optimization of my key words. All the backlinks I built used my keywords for the anchor text and it got picked up when they made their Penguin update.

Cheers,
Steve