Google Hijack - just a big loophole

by Sapphire (May 31, 2005)

As if Google didn’t do enough crazy things this weekend, somebody stole the top SERP position for AdSense from them. I can’t explain it nearly as well as JenSense’s Google hijack article, and the follow-up has a response from the All-In-One-Business.com guy who hijacked it.

If this goes the way Google snafu’s usually do, there will be this little polarized war between people yelling “stupid Google!” and “bad webmaster!” and no one will learn anything.

But there is something to be learned: Google isn’t Lord of the Internet. Even if they are the most important site (which is debatable), they are still learning, just like everybody else.

And that means we are foolish to put so much meaning on page rank, to hang all our traffic hopes on this one search engine, etc. If you’re letting one SE’s page rankings determine who you’ll do business with on the web, you are a lazy webmaster unwilling to do your own research. If you have a business plan that depends on your ranking in Google results, you have a bad business plan. If you have a marketing plan that depends on AdWords, drop whatever you’re doing and come up with a better idea. And if all your online money-making plans end in “…and put AdSense on it”, you’re in for a rude awakening.

Google’s important. Take it into consideration. But remember to think beyond and outside Google. They’ve got their own business plans, and they may not include you.

Posted in SEO
Subscribe to the feed or email updates