It Pays To Have Content REMOVED – Not Suppressed
We were hired recently to remove content from a third-party site that we have had good success with removals in the past. As a courtesy to our customer, we agreed to do a Google search for additional links to the content to be removed and try to get those removed too. Well, when our Google search for the customer’s name turned up no less than 3 pages (!!!) of nasty search results, we asked our customer to personally track down and provide us with a list of all the links to be removed. After doing some research, the customer discovered that the link-suppression company the customer hired (before coming to us) was the one who was creating all manner of links to the original content it was paid to suppress! Apparently, our customer opted to hire a link-suppression company for a month to try to get the offending content pushed down in Google. When s/he stopped using the link-suppression company’s services, they went crazy and created links to the very content they were paid to suppress all over the internet – causing the offending content to appear at the top of Google. Luckily, there’s a good ending to the story, because once s/he contacted Online Defamation Defenders, we were able to get the original content removed, the links cleaned up, and the customer’s reputation restored.
Ignoring the fact that this conduct is unethical, this proves that suppression should only be considered if complete removal is not an option.