Why I Banned Google on my Blog
I banned Google on my blog in 2012. Why?
Isn’t it ironic for a self proclaimed SEO (as in “search engine optimization”) blog to ban Google?
Let me tell you the whole story below!
The enthusiastic start of this blog
When I started out this blog in 2007 I did not get any significant Google traffic for months.
I was proud of that. After all I preached “SEO” beyond Google.
I got thousands of visitors back then from a social media site called StumbleUpon.
It was the place to go in those days. Also many other bloggers linked to me so I got traffic from them too.
My articles have been translated into dozens of languages from all over the world, many exotic ones included.
Google found me. I suffered ever since
Then one day Google finally realized that I’m there. I think it was like 6 months later.
In the meantime I was hugely popular all over the place especially for a boring niche topic like SEO.
Of course SEO 2.0 was never really about SEO and Google, it was more about social media and blogging from the start!
It was about relationships and engagement. It was about enthusiasm. Somewhere on the way I lost this enthusiasm.
I ended up following Google and trying to make bots like my site.
I relied more and more on Google. I even used boring headlines and added “seo blog” both to my title and headline.
This way I ensured that Google finally gets that I’m writing an SEO blog here.
I’ve been ranking top ten for SEO blog for years until some time in late 2011 Google decided that my site is low quality and dumped me.
The query [seo blog] is not an important one but it was good to know I rank there for my ego.
A few years later I was checking out the new Google knowledge graph for [seo].
I wanted to see what happens when you search for [seo blog]. So what did I find? On #11 a really spammy “seo blog”.
I was at 11 for a long time as well so it was really as if this blog has changed places with me.
It was apparently the lowest quality possible and only a few months old.
It wasn’t even really a blog. I did not want to out it here though. I did it on Twitter.
After Google penalized me at the end of 2011 I did not check my rankings anymore because there were no rankings to check left.
I didn’t rank for anything anymore really. I fixed some obvious duplicate content issues and the likes. It didn’t help.
Nowadays as more and more people are suffering from being demoted by the helpful content system e.g. I can very much relate and try to help.
Un-googling the blog
Yet I was glad I could de-optimize my title and call myself SEO 2.0 again like before my optimization for Google.
Approx. 40 – 50% of my traffic was still arriving by way of Google even after the penalty but it was mostly offtopic or even parasitical.
- People not interested in this blog found it via Google to steal my images.
- “dofollow blog commenting” spammers could find me via Google.
- Automatic scrapers that wanted to copy my content came via Google.
Only a few percent of the Google traffic was valuable at all. As most of that traffic was “not provided” I didn’t even know what people were searching for on my site.
I didn’t care enough to frantically try to overcome the encryption of referral data problem.
This blog has always been a proof of concept. It was about being independent from Google. Then Google itself reminded me that you can’t rely on it.
I have been always providing “great content” and got myriads of natural organic links plus did all those things Google demands you to do.
All that “white hat SEO” stuff people recommend to you. It doesn’t work though when Google decides to penalize you. Yes, I said it. White hat SEO does not work.
You can be the whitest hat alive like I was on this blog and in the end you get a kick in your guts.
So-called “black hat SEO” (or SPAM) gets you penalized even faster but white hat SEO does as well.
The only thing that works is SEO 2.0 as in my original concept. You have to become independent of Google.
You need to establish an audience on social media and direct traffic alias subscribers and returning visitors.
Google is not a reliable traffic source whatsoever. Thus I banned Google search on this blog!
People not robots
I used the noindex, follow meta robots tag starting in 2012.
This way the people I linked out to didn’t get hurt but Google wasn’t allowed to capitalize on my content anymore.
It was meant to solve the content theft problem and the comment spam problem ideally. The scrapers outranked me anyway.
I do not make this site for Google bots. It’s not a drop-in and take away blog. I want to write for regulars who appreciate me and my writing style.
Google: Fuck You, I won’t do what you tell me.
I even considered to start a new “seo blog” as a proof of concept where I use all of the spammy “techniques” the spammy but ranking blog I described above did.
- Using stock photo cliches.
- Linking out to Google videos on a static blog “homepage”.
- Using the term “seo blog” all over the place.
- Getting some dodgy links.
In the meantime I wanted to try to regain my enthusiasm on this blog here.
Also I wanted to make my real audience happy, especially the people who stayed with me for 5 years! I love you! You rock!
This is a blog for people and about people not about search engines and built for engines. I may ban only Google in future in the robots.txt and let Bing etc. in but why should I?
In case you wonder: I unbanned Google search three years later. Why?
I wanted to publish an ebook but Google showed some low quality sites above me when ranking for [SEO 2.0]. That would be misleading!
By now – 5 years and almost 500 optimized, updated or pruned posts later – I got some albeit very few rankings back.
Was it worth the effort? Probably not. I owe it to my few remaining readers though who arrive here on their own accord mostly.
I really like this post. I don’t agree with it 100% but I like the fact that you are taking a stand.
My ‘blog’ has low visibility in the SERPs particularly for higher traffic terms like ‘SEO Blog’. My pessimistic attitude about ranking for any decent terms made me think that I’ll just write the titles, content that I want to write instead of stuff that would possibly get more readers.
I have toyed with the idea of blocking Google before but really it appears that we have equal disdain for one another so if I get a visitor great, if not oh well :)
Bold move Tad. What a great way to make a statement
Great. I’m with you, you get a backlink and I do not want you to backlink my site. Its a German site and its not about SEO. Therefore I don’t insert the URL of my website, but I’m thinking about to ban Google as well, because I spend more time with SEO than with creating content. That is no reason for me to run the blog. My intention is to tell people about Creative Commons. I know, nobody will miss my blog since nobody knows it, but I like your attitude and I will do my best to spread the word ;-)
I wish you all the best. Keep your position, even it might be a hard thing to do. We need people like you.
Cheers, Tom
Sean: Yeah, your domain name is probably already to difficult to swallow for Google. Btw. the keyphrase [seo blog] is not high traffic. It’s more of an ego term. I’ve been ranking for a few other SEO related terms, like [advanced seo], [url seo], [image seo], [seo css] etc. All gone.
Thank you Richard. Well, it’s probably not as bold due to the circumstances, but it is a statement indeed.
Tom, thank you for the kind support. When I started blogging on my private radical art blog back in 2003 I didn’t care for Google either. It’s back to the roots in a way.
Also I remember the Web before Google. In 1997 I got all my visitors from mailing lists, web rings, newsgroups…
I love the idea… I love the post… and I love the RATM reference!
Great work Tad :-)
I like that your primary focus is not pleasing search engines, but building relationships and attracting users.
Just a thought, but if you only want to block Google why not use:
User-Agent: Googlebot
Disallow: /
Although I suppose that would make links out useless.
Best line: “Google: Fuck You, I won’t do what you tell me.” :-) let me think of good old rage against the machine
Really disheartening to know that you’ve been outranked by a scraper site. I understand what you’ve been through & I fully support you sir.
So, are you going to use black hat for your new site? Would love to see the results :) It’ll be White hat vs Black Hat.
Stickin it to da man!
While I wouldn’t go as far as to noindex myself, I do agree with the idea.
It is frustrating when an outdated, empty, total bullshit site can be anywhere near the top of the SERPs simply because it has a keyword rich and “aged” domain, or has fired off so many spammy links that the algorithm can’t keep up.
I get your reasons but what about the scraper sites taking your content and ranking for it. Forget the traffic ok but there can be reputation management issues.
Finally someone has guts to do this openly.
If Google will keep this same fu***ng attitude towards webmasters than I believe more people will follow suit.
Google exists because of our content and it is not us who exist because of Google.
There were websites being developed before Google and will also be developed after Google.
Google is not just stealing your content but also your personal information through its various tools.
Recently they started offering some 1 GB broadband connection in order to steal everything from you which they were not able to do through their tools.
People will start hating Google very soon.
Remember, what goes up comes down too!
Wow! I must say it’s a bold move! But as far as i think every SEO should make themselves independent from Google. A True SEO doesn’t rely on a search engine.
Couldn’t agree more. Who knows how the Google ranking algorithm works! one day your website would be ranking on the first page and the next day it wouldn’t even appear in search results. But one thing is for sure, SEO efforts will considerably increase the traffic.
[…] eben las ich einen Artikel über SEO und Google von Tadeusz Szewzcyk, der sehr schön und schlüssig herleitet, warum es eine gute Idee sein kann, Google einfach aus […]
Appreciate you speaking out so frankly against the myth that Panda only affects low quality content sites. Seems no one is safe. I’ll be a part of your audience going forward (my site was pandalized in 2011 as well).
I m doing SEO since 2000 when first Google toolbars launched and now after 12 years i m seriously thinking to change my profession or move to BING SEO
mac: Sadly I can’t do it as in Germany where I live and work Bing is meaningless and Google a monopoly with 95%+ market share.
Tad…you are so right and google is is a freaking monster. Millions of legitimate online businesses that only wanted to please this monster are now lost, wandering what the hell happened! Well – now you have told us what has happened. Good stuff.
However, what are we to do? From the largest corporate site to the smallest mom & pop online business Google has helped us achieve what most of us wanted – profits and success. My question to you is this…how will we replace this monster…and who is going to show US the way?
[…] are even taking radical measures and are banning Google from their Websites. I can’t say that I’m ready to ban Google from my sites, however, I do […]
Paul: Excellent question. Right now I’m still evaluating the situation. I will follow up in a post once I have enough hands-on techniques to deal with this.
Generally it’s about relationships, direct traffic and your 1000 true fans. You have to go after people who are really your audience, not try to get new people all the time from Google.
[…] user base along with SPAMMERS. One SEO pro blogger we know, has actually banned Google from his SEO Blog. Reading Tad Chef’s account mirrors what we experienced. White Hat Google suggested […]
Quote….
You can be the whitest hat alive like I was on this blog and in the end you get a kick in your guts. Black hat SEO gets you penalized even faster but white hat SEO does as well.
The only thing that works is SEO 2.0 as in my original concept. You have to become independent of Google. You need to establish an audience on social media and direct traffic alias subscribers and returning visitors. Google is not a reliable traffic source whatsoever.
End Quote..
Found your blog through a happy accident of me searching for something else..
Personal anecdotes aside – this is probably the best argument against Google I have ever seen..
And that is not overstating it. I found myself (while reading this post) nodding in the affirmative so many times I thought I was going to get whiplash.
SIDENOTE: AskTheBuilder.com’s Tim Carter lost about 80% of his traffic. He is the “whitest of white” hats and a adsense case study darling. You are so right!
All I have read among those in the SEO tin foil hat crowd are articles about how you can appease Google post Penguin.
That weebling wad of bird fat has all but destroyed my site’s traffic. There are not enough adjectives in Webster’s to express my disgust.
Just want to say “kudos”. Glad there is someone out there who is not drinking the Google kool aid..
Robert Cary
[…] Today I have the pleasure to chat with Tadeusz Szewczyk . I really enjoy Tad, it’s one of the people I like the most on twitter, and you need to read his blog, SEO 2.0 , currently a Google-free blog. […]
I totally agree and am even considering not calling myself an “SEO” anymore (I’ll think of some really clever term that clients will like). It’s not just my problem with Google anymore – it’s all the fodder around “SEO is dead” which makes it difficult to land clients ;)
But, you are right – the traditional mind set of SEO doesn’t really exist anymore – yes, we still preform technical audits and off-site strategies… We also look at all digital assets, social media, video, mobile, brand reputation, PPC – hell even outdoor advertising if I can leverage from it.
Skills overlap – I am a jack of all trades …..
Amy: When you find a decent replacement for the term SEO to call yourself tell me about it.
I may use it as well. All those content, inbound, digital marketing combinations do not suit me.
[…] of the year somewhere I heard this news that someone actually blocked Google on his blog by his choice. I don’t think I am as bold as Tad is but still I am really thankful to Tad for […]
As bloggers, we must stop the google obsession and start being customer / our reader – centric.
Is our bid to get seen not all about the customer in the first place? There are other options apart from google. The day google wakes up, they would have been buried by social media
It’s wild that just today I decided to quit Google. Then, reading an unrelated forum post, I Binged the phrase “FUD campaign” which brought me to your (well reasoned) blog.
When I started using PPC for my offline business, I started with Yahoo, because it was cheaper. Later, I waded into Adwords. I discovered that Yahoo was gaving me much more bang for my buck.
Now that I only have online businesses, I have found that Bing is my friend. It’s giving me high rankings without flipping me into whoredom.
Baidu will even give me traffic that Google won’t. I don’t have any Chinese content! F*** Google!
[…] The whole point of my anti-Google stance is that I never really recovered, that is, I didn’t even really try. I was fed up with Google bullying webmasters already and when this apparent false positive hit me I was simply angry. At that time I was hugely popular as some of my posts got hundreds of shares, etc. So telling me that my content was “low quality” was a major offense. As a reaction and out of protest I banned Google search on my blog then: http://seo2.0.onreact.com/why-i-am-banning-google-on-my-blog […]
Thanks so much Tad you really have built up a following and gained respect amongst SEO’s in the industry. Don’t you think at the very least it would be a great case study to clean up your site and try to get some of that delicious organic traffic?
I definitely agree with you that Google sends a ton of terrible traffic, even for unpenalized sites it really is rubbish a lot of the timses.
Either way I respect what you are doing and will continue to follow you and your posts!
Am I the only one here who thinks this is rubbish? I’m not saying the article is, or the author for that matter. And I do agree that Google can be really annoying, just about as much as people abusing the system to rank shitty sites. But Google remains a huge source of traffic and categorically refusing to play the game seems childish. You are only hurting yourself. Furthermore, Google is evolving towards a system better at recognising valuable and appreciated content, and harder to cheat. Is it really that bad to change a few title tags and the like to stay in the game while it gets fairer?
Maybe, the search engines cannot consider this article relevant but I liked it too much. I have a small blog and I dont want to have a list of links to “pay” my visits. I want to get real relationships building that can nourish me for producing better contents a each day. I write for people.
greets from Brazil