Google - Please load me for Over Optimising !!!

Can we make Google's retribution work in our favor??

I did with one particular site that had far too many visitors making enquiries that were never going to result in a purchase.

Analysing the logs with highly detailed sales feedback indicated that a good proportion of geographicaly qualified searches ended up with a visit to the clients premises. However the converse was true for non geographic 2 word search referalls.

The reason for this is that the products concerned are of the type that need personal selection and a fair degree of customisation usually resulting in a total of 3 visits or so. Lets say in all practicality clients need to be within a 50 mile radius.

With 2 completely different search phrases (both 2 words) bringing most of the referrals, it soon became clear that a strong Geographic filter was needed. But how do you filter out visitors that are over 50 miles away from the client’s premises. Some of the local visitors even show overseas IPs.

This is where you deliberately invite Google to punish a site. By exploiting the already strong results from "KW1+KW2+Location" 3-word search term, we can "Over Optimise" the 2-word phrase "KW1+KW2" to the extent that Google heavily loads the more competitive 2-word phrases but leaves the 3-word phrases unaffected.


The starting point was:
Both 2-word phrases in top 3
Both 3-word phrases in the top 10

The result was:
Both 2-word phrases in top 3
Both 3-word phrases outside the top 100

A few years ago this would have been a disaster, but nowadays searchers are more clued up about search terms using Geographic qualifiers in a very high percentage of searches when it is a critical factor.

My client now has far less Email and phone enquiries to deal with but is selling just as many products.

Net result = 2 hours saved everyday + bandwidth down + sales unchanged.

[OldWelshGuy]

Agree 100% SMeagain.

I turn away a load of work, and I ensure that my site ranks for a couple of token phrases, but by and large I have de optimised it as I was ending up writing about 5-15 'sorry I can't help you' emails every day.

In the past, I have tried de-optimising but it is a bit restrictive with product promotion/descriptive text.

It was the opposite approach in this case. Actually "Over-Optimising" the more general and therefore more competitive 2 word phrases so Google loaded them down below the Radar.

A happy client and a relieved me when it worked without affecting the essential 3+word phrases containing Geo Qualifier.