PPC-Advice.com

I recently came across an interesting “malware warning” from Google and Stopbadware.com informing me that the site I was visiting may be harmful to my computer.  The site in question was TheHockeyNews.com!  Really, the only harmful thing I can think of originating from The Hockey News website is injury news from my beloved Ottawa Senators.  There must be some mistake, right?  Not according to Google last week…

Regardless of whether you have Google Desktop installed or not, if you’re searching for results from organic SERPs in Google’s search engine, you’re likely to come across the Malware warning every now and then.  With increased internet security scrutiny, Google is providing a good public service to those of us that might be at greater risk, but it also faces a challenge to search marketers.

I’m sure the people at The Hockey News were rather unhappy about being on a black list of sorts, and they have the right to be.  A portion of their revenue is undoubtedly generated from online sales for magazine, e-zine, and newsletter subscriptions.  Having a big red warning flash across your browser warning you of impending doom by visiting their site is likely to turn off most – if not all – of their visitors.

So, what can you do to protect your fate online?  Follow these simple rules:

• Register with Google Webmasters Tools
• When advertising online (in Adwords for instance), be sure to protect your trademarks.
• Register common misspellings, plural forms, and even hyphenated forms of your trademarked domains
• Make sure you keep “opt-in” subscriber lists confidential
• Send newsletter blasts from services such as Campaigner, that offer managed subscriber list services that scrub duplicates and opt-out contacts
• Register with the Better Business Bureau Online, or similar consumer protection groups
• Protect secure pages on your sites using updated security certificates with the highest cipher strength available (if it’s an e-commerce site, don’t use a shared certificate, opt for a private certificate)
• Use a trusted payment processing gateway for any and all online transactions

There are many more ways to get your site blacklisted by Google and Stopbadware.com, but these are the most common unintentional mistakes webmasters make when marketing online.  Intentional lures are in the realm of black hat marketers, and we do not associate with those guys.