Search Engine Suppression

Search Engine Suppression - the process of lowering a website’s search engine rankings for selected keywords by optimizing and increasing competing, lower ranking websites that are targeting the same keywords.

Although the term “search engine suppression” (or search engine ranking suppression) was recently developed by Webhead Interactive in 2008, the idea of suppressing a websites search engine rankings’ has been around for as long as “search engine optimization” (or SEO)which was approximately 1997.  The importance of developing the term SES (or SERS) is that up until recently, it was often difficult to describe the service that SERS encompasses. 

Search engine ranking suppression should not be confused with search engine reputation management (SERM).  Although SERS is associated with SERM, it is only a small part of search engine reputation management.  Other parts of reputation management include but are not limited to:

• Blog and forum posting
• Proactive negative domain purchasing 
• Confronting and rationalizing with negative posters
• Pay Per Click advertising
• Press release optimization

You might be asking yourself “why would you want to “suppress” a website’s rankings rather than just promote and increase your own website rankings?”   It is thought that over 80% of all internet users don’t leave the front page of search engines.  Google, the leading search engine, has 10 listings per page (a top 10).  The main reason for search engine suppression is to combat negative internet articles or postings toward a business name or and individual person’s name, and push these negative website rankings off the front page (out of the top 10). 

*Fictional example below
Let’s say you own a tanning lotion company and one of your employees gets in legal trouble during his personal time (having nothing to do with your suntan lotion company called Bikini Kitchen).  If this “news” hits the internet, often times in these articles or postings, the website will mention the company name that this person worked for in addition to the negative information about the employee.  This negative information can tarnish the company’s name even though the company wasn’t directly involved.  Now, when an internet user searches the company’s name Bikini Kitchen, these negative postings can often rank in the top 10 on the search engines and hurt the reputation of the innocent party and potentially hurt the brand equity of the innocent party causing them to purchase tanning lotions from another company. 

So, what is the process involved in suppressing an opposing website?  Let’s say there is a negative posting ranking #9 on Google for the business name.  We would then need to optimize just 2 lower ranking websites to jump this competing website to push it to #11 (2nd page).  We don’t (and can’t) negatively optimize the competing site.  The way we lower the ranking of the negative site is by promoting all closely ranked  sites so they will jump this competing site and push it’s rankings down.

Search engine suppression can be complicated and is typically more difficult than traditional search engine optimization.  Here’s why:

1. Traditional search engine optimization applies to the optimization of one site.  Typically search engine suppression involves optimizing several sites.
2. Traditional SEO involves a client owned website.  SES usually involves non-client owned sites.
3. With SES, often times one or more websites need to be created to combat the competing site.  Typically, traditional SEO clients only involve one client owned site.
4. New websites are often more difficult to get to the top of the search engines quickly.
5. The media often gravitates toward negative press which can give a competing website a natural advantage.

Webhead Interactive personally coined the term “search engine suppression” and uses many customized strategies to lower the rankings of negative competing websites for our clients.

Contact Webhead Interactive to discuss your Florida Search Engine Optimization Needs today!